Marie-Pier Hébert

The full conversation with Marie-Pier Hébert, transcribed. Lightly formatted for reading.

It's naturally inside me. It's— I'm very responsible, always have been since a child. If I have something to do, I know I'll do it. I have objectives.

I know if I want my objectives to be filled, I need to do my work. And exercise really helps me too. When I have a difficult week where I don't feel like doing anything, should I sell my businesses and like go start a job in an office, which I will never do, but I have those thoughts, I exercise, I work out, and that helps me stay sane and disciplined and focused. If you want to start if you have ideas, do it.

Don't wait. And sometimes we're like, we have that little like thing that holds us back. Oh, I can't do this, I can't. And you're surprised when you actually do it, you can do it.

Being a business owner is such an interesting life and a fun life. It brings a lot of struggles, but I personally find that it brings more happiness, success than struggles. So I think it's all worth it. And what do you like about the city of Montreal?

The freedom that we have. It's the same. I love our city Montreal. I love that we have access to everything.

I love the culture. It's where I'm from, and I can't— I lived for a few years overseas, and I always come back to Montreal because there's something special. There's a soul and something special about it. All right, Marie-Pierre, it's a pleasure to have you on the show.

Please introduce yourself and tell us what you do. Sure. So my name is Marie-Pierre. I'm the founder of two businesses.

The first one is called Kidd. It's— we offer family solutions to employers that they can give to their employees as benefits. Our services are in-home childcare, tutoring, and in-home senior care. So simply said, employers become members of Kidd and their employees have access to our services.

And my second business is called MPH Solutions, and we help businesses grow by solving their recruitment issues. So we recruit overseas for remote positions, and but employees stay remotely, they stay overseas, but they work for North American companies. Wow, one business is hard enough, but you're able to do two. All right, we're gonna get into this, but before we do, how would you describe yourself?

Did you always want to become an entrepreneur, or did you come from a family that owned businesses? Yes, yes and no. I would say I'm an entrepreneur at heart. It's part of my DNA, it's, it's part of who I am.

I'm a very passionate person as well. Everything I do is to the fullest, it's rarely in between. So yes, it's definitely part of me. Okay, and so let's get into the services that you offer for the First Business Kit.

So you offer childcare for businesses that in other words help their employees. Yes. Can you help us understand that a little bit more? So we have 3 key services that I like to talk about.

We are known for childcare. Okay, that's the, the most, the service that is the more popular, I would say. Um, so we do in-demand or recurring childcare, and then we have tutoring that covers from kindergarten to grade 11, and And we also have in-home senior care. Once an employer is a member of Kidd, their employees have access to all of the services they need.

Okay. And we are an exclusively B2B business, so any family cannot have access to our services. Their employer needs to be a member. And your workers go to their houses?

Yes, they do. Everything is in-home. Tutoring is virtual. Okay, perfect.

And what led to that decision to start the business in the first place? Because what were you doing before you decided to go into business? I don't really know what led to the decision, I'll tell you what I was doing before. Um, people always expect like a big story, and my story is really straight to the point.

One day I decided I was going to start a business, and I told my husband, okay, I'm going to resign from my position, we're going to lose half of our family revenue, I'm going to start an on-demand babysitting service. And he said, okay, whatever makes you happy, we'll make it work. That's how it started. Prior to that, I worked for for 10 years in the hospitality industry.

Okay. I was specialized in opening hotels and restaurants. Wow. So I've worked a little bit all over the world.

I spent 4 years in the US, I spent time in Europe, and the 1 year in the Middle East. And then when I was ready to end my expat life and come back to Montreal, um, I've always known that I wanted to start a business. And an idea that I had while I was working overseas was that every single hotel I was working in, wherever in the world I was, there there was always a family that would come and say, hey, do you have a childcare service? We're here, we don't know anyone around here, do you offer that?

And nothing existed. Okay. And often I would say like, oh, I'll do it myself, or we would refer someone that works in the restaurant or in housekeeping. Um, there was not a service that was safe, reliable, easy to use that existed.

So I came back to Montreal and I decided to create— wow, that's a beautiful story, by the way. Yes. Uh, but how— okay, so now you've decided you're going to do this. How did you get about getting your client?

Very challenging, probably. That's tough because I was by myself, um, and childcare— I'm selling childcare, right? I'm not selling t-shirts. Uh, it's, it's a vulnerable population.

Parents have to trust you. So I just started, and I knew that if I offered quality service and if I was able to make parents trust me first, then the rest would go. So I started by recruiting really good childcare providers. I I did the vetting myself, I did trainings with them, and I really tried to teach them my vision and what I thought good childcare was and how to be.

So not just how to care for children, but how to be professional. And I took a lot of my experience from the hotel industries where you have standards and sequence of service, and I, I put it in Kidd as well. So we have a sequence of service. So that's how I trained the providers so that we could gain parents' trust.

Once that one brave parent started to use our service and they said, oh wow, that is amazing, then I could go on and, and just attract more customers. It's a very interesting business because you did not go— why didn't you open a daycare? I'm sure people ask you that question, but you had a different vision from the get-go. You said, okay, I'm not going after the parents specifically, but have to do B2B in order to scale.

Yes. I don't know, elaborate a little bit on the, um, I don't know, were you sitting down and said, okay, this, this is plan? This is how I'm going to envision this business model. Um, so when I started, I guess I didn't follow the regular path where you have like a business plan and you, you do market studies and everything.

I started from one day to another. I did have a business plan, but I— it was just a passion that I had in me, and I knew I had a vision. I didn't know how to make money out of it, but I was passionate to give a good service. And so in the beginning, I never thought about profitability and how I could actually live from that.

I was doing it just because I, I had an Yeah, after the first couple of years, I realized there's so much you can charge per hour for childcare, especially in Quebec with subsidized childcare where people have access to $8 a day daycares, and, and we have to pay the providers really high to have the good ones. So I was thinking, how can I make this work? In the first few years also, a few companies reached out to me because they were like, hey, you have a good service, we want to pay for it for our employees as a benefit. Can you manage something for us, build a package for us?

So I had this that happened and then I kind of started talking to other business owners, companies, and there was an interest. It's like a happy accident. Exactly. And then COVID happened.

And for us, that was incredible. And that's where our growth really started. And we switched B2B exclusively. Game changer.

Perfect. And talk about a bit about the operations side of things, like behind the scenes. What do you have to do in order to make this work? Very heavy in operations.

And I think that's what makes a difference in our service compared to others. So We have 7 days a week operations coordinators. There's always someone in customer service. We have trainers.

I didn't start like that, but today it evolves. Yeah. Yes. And I always like to bring back things like to the real start.

So if someone is listening to me and think, oh my God, wow, it's so well organized and the operations are streamlined, it didn't start like that. 5 years in, that's where we are. So we have operations coordinator, training managers, a recruiter behind one single request. There's so much work that is done for us to be able to provide quality that we do.

So we receive a request from the parents, we'll look first of all where it is, in which city in Canada, which neighborhood. We have interactive maps and all of the providers that are close to there are on that map. So we see who's close, who's available, is it a good fit for what the parent want, is it a newborn, is it a toddler, a school-age child. So then we find the right fit, we make sure they're available, and then we confirm the booking, send the profile to the parent, and make sure that all the communication is done.

Parents said any special thing, or if they gave us information on the child's routine, we give that to the child care provider so that when they arrive, they're prepared and ready for the task at hand. Wow, you make it sound so simple, but there's a lot in what you just said there. Wow. And did you find it difficult to delegate?

Like, as you're growing, you realize you have to implement all of those systems in place, because I find that a lot of entrepreneurs, they've been doing it by themselves, they know it well, 100%, and now it comes time to delegate. Did you have any challenge in that, or— Yeah, it's definitely a challenge, especially on the way you would do it as an entrepreneur. You know your business like For me, it's customer service, and I still today look at all the emails, maybe not all, but most of them, and what happened and how the customers were answered to. And in the beginning, I would jump in way more and try to control every single situation.

And with years, I learned to just take a step back. If it's not perfect, it's okay. And I don't address every single thing every time right now, but I'll keep like at the end of the week or the month, if I saw some things that I would do differently, I'll address them. Them.

So I'm less hands-on, but I want to be. But that was a challenge for me, some— when I see it's not perfect to my standards, but it's okay to let it go. And knowing what you know now, what would you have done differently? It's been 5 years.

It's a big question. I think there— I, I would have probably done the same path. I would have made different choices. So in the beginning, when I was trying to get known, so for people to learn about what KID is, I tried to invest in marketing, social media, And I probably didn't choose the right fit for my company.

So looking back, I'm like, oh, if I had known, I would have chosen someone else or to, to, you know, start in the beginning. But it's tough because you don't know in the beginning. A lot of things we don't know, right? Sometimes I even think we're delusional.

We think it's going to work, but we don't know if it's going to work. There's no guarantee. And now you're in, you're nationwide. You have about 300 providers.

This is great. What channel did you do you find that to be able to make yourself known, how were you able to— I don't know, did you master it, that your channel of acquisition? Honestly, no. Um, no, we did not, and I'm working on this every day.

Yeah, what works for us is word of mouth, it's LinkedIn, that's where all the businesses are. Reality is that HR leaders bombarded with people like me trying to sell them services, bombarded. So it's tough for you, you really have to find the right person to sell your services too, and if that person doesn't connect to what you do, sometimes it's personal if they don't, they're a parent themselves and they would never have any babysitting services at home, they're not going to think it's going to be useful for their employees. Okay, that's a good point.

And it happens, sadly it happens, but then we have champions that will say, "What? This exists? " And from one day to another it's signed and we have a national contract. This is rare, but it happens.

We wish it could happen every day, but— And what are some of the things that are very important for your clients when they're looking at what you offer? Guarantee that they'll have someone when they send a request. I think it's the feeling that they can count on us. That's important.

Reliability. Yes. And then, of course, the quality of the person that comes to their house because they're going to leave their baby to someone they don't know. So they trust Kidd as the organization.

They trust that we'll send someone that will fit their needs and their expectations. So this is what also differentiates you from other— Absolutely. Yeah. And they also have 3 services, 3 types of services when the, the company joined.

Yes, they do. So we created those services to meet the evolving needs of parents. So often when you just had a baby, you need a little childcare at home. When they start going to school, you need tutoring.

And then later, that's much later, you might have like your own parents that need help at home. So we have senior care. So we try to really focus on what a family needs and what can help them balance work and their life, their personal life. Let's talk a bit about the second business that you mentioned at the beginning.

Mm-hmm. What is it? So it's a recruitment business for remote positions. And the story behind it, that's a good story.

All right. I was growing kids and we were at this startup stage where business was growing, but I still couldn't hire people locally and pay the local salaries and couldn't find like quality people to do my customer service operations coordination. So I started to look at what other businesses were doing and I found remote hiring and I hired my first operations coordinator out of Morocco. It was 2020 or 2021 I think, and so she was doing an evening shift, so she was working overnight for her, and it was the best thing that ever happened to because once it— at the beginning, it was very difficult.

We had roadblocks. There was a lot of training that needed to be done. So, put you in the situation, we have one person that's based in Morocco in a small town. Wireless is not always great.

She has to learn what the metro map here is in Montreal, what a Big C is, what a carte Opus is. She doesn't have the references that a local person has.. And all the neighborhoods, all the different names, you know, Marie-Pierre, like they don't understand what that name is. All of those roadblocks, I, I learned what they were and I created processes so that to make sure that we have a training program to overcome them and to make sure that when we onboarded the remote employee that was based overseas, they had all the information they need.

So that allowed me— remote hiring allowed me to grow kids while having support. And then other business owners were like, 'What? You have someone in Morocco booking clients in Montreal? ' And I said yes.

And then I started another business from one day to another, and we have, uh, we've grown in within 2 years. It's gonna be 2 years, 2 years now. Yeah, you just mentioned at the beginning that you have no idea what this did for me, hiring that— called her the operation coordinator. Tell us about the feeling, like all the heavy lifting that you had to do, and then once you pass that on Yes.

What did that do for you? Oh, it's the best feeling. So to, to have someone support you and to be able to sometimes like say, okay, I can focus on something else, someone else has it, they can do it, and to be able to count on someone. So usually remote, the remote employees that we have, they're really loyal.

A job with a Canadian company is a big deal for them, and they don't want to disappoint you. And it's something I had difficulty finding locally because there's so many jobs jobs, like they have a choice. So I knew someone was loyal and they would do a good job as if it was their own business. They would give it their all.

So that feeling is incredible. So basically you place, you find them a person to work in Morocco and then you place that person in their business. Yes. Like an operator.

Correct. Yeah. To do the heavy lifting for them and then everything bilingual. Bilingual.

Yes. And we do any type of position. So customer service, bookkeeping. We have a lot of demand in accounting, finance assistants.

We have sales and marketing coordinators. Any position that can be done remotely, we can, we can fill it. And what have you learned talking to a lot of business owners? What are some of the key characteristics that you find that they have in common?

Everyone's working really hard to make it. Everyone has recruitment issues. It's a big issue. The labor shortage is real.

The turnover is real. Said earlier that there's so much choice, like everyone's hiring. So even if you think you have a great employee, they just finished their training and someone else is offering them $2 more an hour, they'll say like, oh, sorry, I have another job. That's the labor market.

And the business owners that I talk with are all struggling with that. And then here you come with your service. Yes, I can solve that. And how do you manage both, both businesses?

I'm not sure yet. I So I, I build my support. So because of overseas hiring that I have, I can have access of a— to a larger pool of talent. I struggle less HR and turnover.

I can build my teams in place, and I delegate everything I can. So I invest a lot in training and onboarding. I make sure I give all of me to those employees that are gonna run my businesses, and I run a tight ship. So I, I'm there, I communicate with them, I never let anyone feel like they're on their own and there's no one with them.

I'm in it. So you have like weekly meetings? Yeah, making sure that everybody's on the same page. Exactly.

Not too many meetings. Weekly, yeah, weekly is good. And then I make sure my expectations are known, that everybody knows what's expected of them, and I give feedback in the moment. So if something is, is not well done or wrong, I don't wait too long, I'll address it.

So that way I know that I can let go of my— not completely, you can never let go of your businesses— but I know someone can handle a situation if there's a mistake or something that can be done better, they'll do it. It won't be a problem because I'll address it quickly enough. Yeah, and you also have a family. We're going to talk a little bit about that.

You have two kids, if I remember. Yes, you have two kids, and you're managing two businesses. A lot of people believe that in order to accomplish something big, if you have a big vision, then you have to make a lot of sacrifices, which in a way it's true. Do you find that there is a work-life balance?

There is, and being me, I'll tell you everything is possible, but but it's tough, it's hard. There's nothing easy. You have to make choices that most people won't make, but you can make it work. There's no— there's not one recipe.

And for me, it's learning to be uncomfortable when things are not perfect and when I can't be there for everyone at the same time. So if my kids are screaming, "Mama, mama, mama," and then I, I see emails of things not going well, and then the client is not happy with an employee, and then another one didn't have a good fit with the sitter and everything is happening at the same time, that's tough. And you're like, okay, who do I give my attention to? And I learned to be okay with not being the perfect parent and not being the perfect entrepreneur or business owner.

And I'll, I'll say, okay, who needs me the most now? That's what I'm gonna do. What can wait? I also— there's a lot of pressure on parents, especially millennial parents, and I'm, I'm just okay with not being the greatest.

So for my kids, I know that I'm a good mom and I'm happy. And to them, if they have a mother that's fulfilled in her job, I think it's a good example, and that's already a lot. And if sometimes during bath time I have to say, "Oh, I'll be back," and I have to go deal with something, it's okay. Other days I'll be more present and other days I'll be less present, and I learned to be okay with that.

And plus your husband is there to support you. Yeah, for sure. I have an amazing partner and And it's important, like a support system is so important. I think one key thing about achieving work-life balance is accepting help and asking for it.

And when I had my first baby, that was a big challenge for me. I was launching business and I had a baby at the same time, and it was new for me to ask for help. Like there was no way I was asking anyone for help. And with my second, I started accepting more help and being okay with the fact that I couldn't do everything.

Because you realize there's— I can't do this by myself, basically. Right. Yeah, definitely. Wow, being pregnant and launching a baby at the same time.

Fun, fun. What a recipe. You said something about there's a lot of pressure on millennial, uh, parents. What are some of the— can you elaborate on some of them?

I mean, did you see the Bentgo boxes we have to send our kids to school with? What, what is this? And every morning I make sure there's like crackers, strawberries, enough color, bell peppers, the sandwich. And like, it's a small example, but we went went to school with a sandwich in a Ziploc and a juice box.

It's— I feel we have pressure, especially women, we have pressure to be good in our career and high achievers and then really good mothers at home as well and do the perfect lunches and do positive parenting. " You have to say, "Oh, you used nice colors. " Like, did our parents have to do this? No.

So that's what I mean. Sometimes I forget the lunch or my son, he leaves the lunch in the car. " I'm like, okay, okay, I have to quickly— You don't even know yourself and they call you. Oh my goodness.

You have to quickly bring it because I'm thinking back then with my parents, they were like, oh, you forget your lunch? I know it was— That's it. You're not going to eat that day. All right.

What is the best advice that you've ever gotten from anybody? It's so, so many, so much good advice I've got, and I was lucky. But I'll tell you about a situation, a quick story, and the advice I got from it, and it still helps me to this day. So I was about 26, 27 years old, working in Qatar.

I was a senior restaurant manager, and I was given the assignment to rebrand coffee shop in the National Convention Center. So it's a big deal, and I'm managing several restaurants, and then they give me that project. Oh, Maripia, you're good at at this— can you rebrand a coffee shop? And it's the main attraction when you get in the convention center.

And I'm like, okay. So I work hard, I do a presentation, I have to like create menus, uh, do branding. And, and the name of the cafe, it's called the Spider Cafe. So it's really challenging to attract, to build a brand of food around spiders.

But I work hard, I do it. And the day of the presentation, I'm alone in a room with about 17 men. I think there was one more woman in the room, and it's all Qatari men. Half of them are from the royal family.

It's like stakes are high, it's stressful, and I'm young, and I'm about to present my presentation, and I'm on the title slide, and I'm starting on the title slide, and they start interrupting me and just questioning me and telling me what they want. And I'm just like, can you let me speak? Can you let me start? And they, they're drilling me, kind of like.

I, I lose my cool a little, I'm stressed, and at that moment, fire alarm goes on. On. So I'm literally saved by the fire alarm. I go out and my boss was in the room, and the minute I'm out, he came to me and he said, don't let them get to you.

You're there for a reason. Do not let them get to you. Go back there, show them what you know. You're the best at what you do.

We ask you this because you're good. Go back and do your presentation. Do not let them interrupt. And that moment I was like, oh really?

I like— I can do that. I wanted to be respectful, like listening to their concern. And I went back in the room and I did my presentation and it was good. But from that day, the advice I got is whenever you're in a stressful moment or important moment, there's a reason for it, and you were asked to do it because you're valued and, and you can do it.

So the confidence is so important, and to not let people like walk on you, or not get people, uh, not let people get to you. I I think it's really important. It's very good advice because confidence comes from taking action. Then, you know, the belief that you can do it yourself for sure.

And you look like a very confident person. So I am naturally, so, but there are moments where I'm so stressed. And so I think they asked me because I'm confident and I, I can talk in front of a big group, but that moment I was like, what do I do? And where do you see yourself 3 to 5 years from now?

I don't know because because I always change. And when I said I'm an entrepreneur at heart, like, I have 10 new business ideas a day. Um, but I hope my businesses grow, and I hope I still am happy in what I do. And, you know, every Monday morning I'm happy.

Yes, I have like stressful weeks like everyone, but I love starting my week and working. And my goal in the next 5 years is that I still love what I do. And, um, and I think That's, that's mainly my, my objective, because the passion that you have is like fuel to keep you going. Yep, exactly.

I like how you say you have 10 new business ideas daily. I think a lot of it's the same for a lot of them. Comes in my head, I'm like, oh, I could do this, and I'm like, no, no. And then when I go tell my husband, he's like, Kathy, what about the other one you told me yesterday?

Just stay on this one. Yes. And you have the kids. Don't forget the kids, because you have 3.

So I cannot even imagine. It's a lot of work, very challenging. And what are some of the books you recommend for a owners? That's a question for my business partner because he's the one that reads all of the business books and then he summarizes them for me.

But for me, reading is only for pleasure, so I don't read anything business. And you know, it's also a way for me to keep my sanity. At night I read, I read a lot, but nothing on business. So I'm going to recommend a book that I loved in the last few weeks.

It's called The Counterfeit, and it's nothing about business, business, but it changes your— it takes your mind away from, from life, from business a little bit. Yes. And how do you stay disciplined? I'm— it's naturally inside me, so it's— I'm very responsible, always have been since a child.

So if I have something to do, I know like I'll do it. I have objectives, so I know if I want my objectives to be filled, I need to do my work. And exercise really helps me too when I have a difficult week where I don't feel like doing anything and I'm like, oh, should I sell my businesses and like go start a job in an office? Which I will never do, but I have those thoughts.

I exercise, I work out, and that helps me stay sane and disciplined and focused. That's good. So you do have those thoughts like, okay, I'm not doing this anymore. Of course, of course.

I think even the most successful entrepreneur in the world, they have them. But yeah, as long as you know where you're heading and that it's working, you're helping a lot of people, your service is very valuable. Yes, yes. For me, even today when I see a booking confirmed I'm happy.

I'm like, oh, they got it. And, you know, kid for parents, it's freedom. It's knowing that someone else will care for your kid as much love as you would and that you can do something else or go out, take a little mental break. Yes, yes.

So to this day, I'm very happy when I see the confirmations. Not for like, oh yes, we're getting bookings and it's good for business. No, for parents. I'm genuinely happy for them.

And what do you like about the city Montreal? The freedom that we have. It's the same. I love diversity in Montreal.

I love that we have access to everything. I love the culture. It's, it's where I'm from, and I can't— I lived for a few years overseas, and I always come back to Montreal because there's something special. There's a soul and something special about it.

And I can see the passion that you have for your business. I mean, I'm sure like when you walk in a room, people like, oh yeah, yes, yes, Marie-Pierre, she's gonna lift up our spirit. I try. Oh, Marie-Pierre, I don't know, was there a last message you want the audience to get out of this conversation?

I think if you want to start a business or if you have ideas, do it. Don't wait. And sometimes we're like, we, we have that little like thing that holds us back. Oh, I can't do this, I can't.

And you're surprised when you actually do it, you can do it. Being a business owner is such an interesting life and a fun life. It brings a lot of struggles, but I, I personally find that it brings more happiness, success than struggles. So I think it's all worth it.

Perfect. Well, it was really nice to have you on the show. Thank you, Kathy. Until next time.