Interviewer: Tarek Hassan Refaat

Edited by: Mona Timor Shehata

“When I see a certificate on a candidate’s CV, I translate it that this candidate knows the vocabulary, and we have a common ground in our discussions, but it does not mean he/she is a good project manager, nor a bad one…”

Beshoy Beshara

Project Management Expert

ABOUT THE INTERVIEWEE

Bishoy Beshara, is an experienced professional in project management who worked for various companies in Egypt before moving to Canada to partner with a group of entrepreneurs and started their own company Aurora Solutions Canada.

THE INTERVIEW

  1. HR Revolution ME: First of all, Bishoy, thank you for taking the time to be with us and share with us your insights! So, let us begin, can you tell us a bit more about Bishoy Beshara?

Bishoy Beshara: Hi Tarek, it is always a pleasure talking to you.Tough question to start with, but I can give you some quick facts:

  1. HR Revolution ME: Being a project management professional is quite the job, could you give us a brief about it?

Bishoy Beshara: Well.. there are two ways to look at it: The responsibility, stress and day to day insanity can crumble the toughest shoulders that is for sure, but the impact a project manager has on the success of their projects is rewarding indeed; that signoff moment where you deliver successfully to a happy customer, happy employer and a happy team is what we work for day and night.

It is one of these jobs that you cannot get initiated in, nor follow a certain set of rules and expect success. Think of it as music. Yes, studying, training and accumulative experience can take you a long way, but you can never make it without a God-given talent.

  1. HR Revolution ME: Certifications are one of the most advertised matters nowadays in various fields as well as project management, how do you view the impact of certifications on an individual?

Bishoy Beshara: It completely depends on the individual, if they are there for the certificate stamp, then that is all what they will get: a stamp on their CV, if they are there to understand and learn then that is what they will get.

For me, when I see a certificate on a candidate’s CV, I translate it that this candidate knows the vocabulary, and we have a common ground in our discussions, but it does not mean he/she is a good project manager, nor a bad one.

If I see too many certificates on a certain profile, I translate that in my head that I am getting to know an academic person, which can be a goodfit or a bad one, depending on what I want tos add to my team.

  1. HR Revolution ME: Having worked in the Egyptian market, and now you work abroad could you shed some light on what you think are the pros and cons of the Egyptian market?

Bishoy Beshara: Size and Chaos are the main differences as far as I can see.

With our massive population of 100 million souls there is always a market share that is enough to kick-start any business or idea…a big plus for any entrepreneur. Quick MVP, Quick Market Test and higher chances of finding a good niche, that is the impact of the size part.

Then comes the real thing about the Egyptian market, the chaos of it…from an old complicated culture to the governing laws and regulations that can change overnight. As much of a risk in this chaos to any sound planning, as much italways gives birth to creativity in individuals and organizations alike. Our culture has this built in attitude to work around problems, the “good fahlawa” as we call it, which is the biggest thing I see in the market, it can always backfire, but when it works it is amazing!

  1. HR Revolution ME: From an experienced professional to entrepreneur, could you walk us through the transition?

Bishoy Beshara: I really and honestly do not see myself as an Entrepreneur, I think it is one heavily overused word. To me, an Entrepreneur is someone like the annoyingly magnificent Elon Musk, single handedly changing life as we know it.

I am more of a Field Marshall, as all work psychology tests resulted, I know how to lead a team from point A to point B, regardless of the road, hardships and complications.But Entrepreneur? I wish my friend. I wish.

With that out of the way, let me tell you how we started Aurora Solutions.

Basically a group of managers got together, after so many years serving the Enterprise and Government sectors, and thought that we can bring all this experience to a quicker market, where our beliefs in MVP, Lean Development and Continuous Organic Growth can be put to the test – that is the formal story at least.

In reality, my current partner and co-founder of Aurora Solutions, Mohammed Gomaa, was an old work colleague with a previous employerbefore we parted ways. He was visiting Egypt late in 2015 and we decided to take a drink for good old times sake, that is when he told me about what he is trying to kickoff and what Aurora Solutions is all about, we finalized our partnership agreement in 30 minutes, and a couple of months after I packed a bag and went to Canada, and here we are.

  1. HR Revolution ME: How do you view the experience of starting up a company in Canada?

Bishoy Beshara: I must say that we were lucky to start Aurora Solutions in Canada, especially at a time of economic recession in the province we are in, beautiful Alberta.

With the oil prices dropping, the economy took a big hit, but it was impressive to see how federal and provincial functional governments act. There was a conscious decision to shift the economy to small businesses, and right away you could see the programs set in place to help business owners, in the form of loans, ease of procedures, training programs…etc.

All it takes is few minutes in a registry office to initiate a company, but on the other side, the amount of control and precision work required to keep a business running is really challenging, and when it comes to laws and regulations concerning financial control, liabilities as well as work ethics and privacy regulations, no one is joking here.

  1. HR Revolution ME: Would you tell us more about Aurora? Its services? And how can people reach you?

Bishoy Beshara:

We tore down everything we hated while working for large scale enterprises; no working hours, no time sheets, no 2 months notices before vacation, and even no excuses needed when someone wakes up in a bad mood and does not feel like working the day. It was risky, and forced us to be extremely meticulous about who we hire, but the end resultis stunning.

Imagine a Skype business call between a manager in his bathrobe in Canada, another manager in a café in Abu Dhabi, a developer on the beach in Spain, another in his apartment den in Ismailia, a third in our office in Cairo and a Graphics Designer in a Caféin downtown Cairo, all delivering to a customer in the United States for a project to be launched in Cairo. Everyone is relaxed, able to plan their lives while efficiently delivering amazing quality outcome. It all feels like a sweet dream to be honest.

Aurora Serves mainly the SMB sector in Canada, providing end to end portfolio. Think of it as SaaS on steroids. We Provide Branding, Digital Marketing, Websites Development, Selective Custom development web and mobile apps, core business applications for collaboration, CRM, POS, Accounting…etc. and we tie it all up together.

Our assumption is that in their core, all SMBs are similar in a way, and we tap on this similarity to deliver to a large number of customers using a small team. Because we understand the journey, being part of it ourselves, we end up developing long terms partnerships with our customers, one project after the other.

Want to play? Make contact through our website www.aurorasolutions.ca or email me: b.beshara@auorasolutions.ca

  1. HR Revolution ME: How do you view a resume, what are the first three things that attract your attention in a CV?

Bishoy Beshara: Tough to put that in words, when you see a resume you kind of get a feeling about the person who wrote it, their character and so on. When hiring, I seek more of a certain character for a certain role rather than a set of skills.

Mistakes, either in language and formatting are an immediate disqualifier of course, while I can work with so many different characters, I cannot work with lack of quality.

A rule of thumb, if I spend more than 1.5 minutes on a CV, then probably there will be an interview.

  1. HR Revolution ME: KPIs, Scorecard are the keywords of the working market today, how do you set your own KPIs or Scorecards for your teams?

Bishoy Beshara: Here is where we go back again to thinking and acting Lean. Before setting any KPI of any sort, the question we always ask ourselves is why are we measuring that? What do we do if it is in the green? What do we do if it is in the red?

If those answers are not available, then the KPI itself is more fat that needs to be removed from the system.

  1. HR Revolution ME: How would you describe the most challenging aspect of your business?

Bishoy Beshara:

Market penetration would be the hardest aspect.

The Canadian Market is not tempted by technology by itself. No bells and whistles will land you a deal.If what you are offering is not providing a real, tangible, measurable business value then it will not fly.

Compare that to the north African and Gulf regions, where you can easily position a cutting-edge technology and close the deal just because the technology itself is sexy.

Another aspect is the size of our customers. We work mainly with the SMB sector, meaning less bureaucracy and red tape and easier access to decision makers, but it means that the number of leads you need to nurture, and the number of customers you need to keep giving ongoing attention and superb service to, increases exponentially.

  1. HR Revolution ME: Would you walk us through your regular day?

Bishoy Beshara:

I do not exist on Saturdays. I am still keeping that blissful habit of 100% disconnection from the world on Saturdays. You should give it a try 🙂

  1. HR Revolution ME: If we do the comparison between Egypt and Canada, from your point of view, how do you view the differences between entrepreneurs in Canada and in Egypt?

Bishoy Beshara: Canada is a stable country, rules and regulations are clear, fixed, reasonable, and relatively easy to master. Making all the administrative work take no less than 5-10% of one’s effort, with no potential for corruption, or a crazy intervention by someone in power to cut you out of business or at least take their “share”.

The Market is not as huge as the Egyptian market though. To get some numbers in perspective, Calgary, our HQ city and main playground of operation has a population of 1.3 million as per the 2016 census. That is it! That is everyone in your city!Imagine that you are positioning a new product and reaching out for potential customers where all your market is just 3 streets in Nasr City 😀

That massively affects entrepreneurs and business owners, positioning and pitching an idea becomes ridiculously harder, ROI calculations are much more brutal and merciless.

Yet an Entrepreneur here has a support network of government and private sector initiatives for help, training, support and facilitation.

  1. HR Revolution ME: Where would you like to see Aurora, in 2 years from now?

Bishoy Beshara: I would love to see her still small in number of employees, still agile, still fast paced, able to serve a large number of customers in an automated yet personalized touch points. And maybe with an office somewhere warmer I can escape to in the brutal winter months 😀

  1. HR Revolution ME:It’s been quite a pleasure having you with us, would you care to share your favorite quote that inspires you?

Bishoy Beshara: “If you do not like where you are, move! You are not a tree”

  1. HR Revolution ME: If there’s one advice that you would give to the youth, what would it be?

Bishoy Beshara: A tiny little bit of being humble and open will take you a long way…I interviewed so many bright young minds that had their cups full already, making possible growth and maturity nearly impossible.

Plan your retirement NOW! With your first job, with your first paycheck…after 20 years building a career, believe me you will look back and wish you had started your retirement planning earlier.

  1. HR Revolution ME: In the end, we’ve come to the end of our interview, is there something you would like to say or share?

Bishoy Beshara: It has been a pleasure Tarek, and my apologiesit took so long to make this interview happen. I enjoyed every bit of it, and I hope I was not very much out of line.

HR Revolution ME: Beshoy, it has been indeed quite the pleasure in having you with us as part of this interview!