Our people make the difference.

As Chief Executive Officer of Calian, Kevin Ford focuses on enabling the management team to execute the company’s four-pillar growth framework of customer retention, diversification, innovation and continuous improvement. This unrelenting focus has taken the company to the next level, with revenues exceeding the half-billion-dollar mark in 2021. It’s one milestone on the journey to becoming a billion-dollar, proudly Canadian company.

Named CEO of the Year by the Ottawa Chamber of Commerce and Ottawa Business Journal in 2017 and EY Entrepreneur of the Year in 2019, Kevin attributes his success to teamwork, integrity and commitment. These values, combined with Kevin’s enthusiasm for Calian technology and talent and his passion for diversity and inclusion, help him to future-proof the business.

Kevin is fully invested in the growth of the company, playing a key role in the 18 successful acquisitions Calian has made since 2012.

“Through a combination of strategic acquisitions, innovative solutions and diversification, we continue to increase our customer base in Canada and expand into new international markets.”

Kevin was promoted to Chief Executive Officer in April 2015. Prior to becoming the CEO of Calian, Kevin served as the Calian Business and Technology Services Division President for more than four years. Kevin worked in professional services for more than 30 years, including 11 years at IBM as a Partner in Global Business Services.

He also contributes to numerous charitable organizations, sits on the board of the Ottawa Hospital Foundation and serves as chair of the CADSI board. Kevin has coached hockey and most recently led the charge to save a legacy live music venue in Ottawa.

Patrick Houston is a Chartered Professional Accountant with more than 15 years of experience and an extensive background in corporate finance, international operations, mergers and acquisitions and public markets.

As CFO, he oversees the accounting, business support, financial planning and analysis, treasury and tax functions at Calian. Patrick places an emphasis on the continuous development of a finance function that enables the company to achieve its profitable growth ambitions and maintain a high level of integrity and transparency.

Prior to joining Calian in January 2019, Patrick began his career in public accounting with Deloitte, before moving on to DragonWave, a Canadian-based high-tech company listed on the Nasdaq and TSX.

Michele is the company's first Chief Commercial Officer, joining the Calian leadership team in November of 2020 to lead our Marketing, Communications and Proposals team. A well-rounded marketing leader, Michele successfully, and pragmatically leads marketing teams through product launches, re-branding, market expansion, organizational change and other strategic projects. P

rior to joining Calian, Michele held senior marketing, sales and operations roles at Microsoft, most recently as Chief of Staff—Modern Workplace Global Sales, where she oversaw sales operations for the global technical sales team. Most of Michele's tenure at Microsoft was focused on partnering with government organizations to utilize technology to accomplish their mission, including progress towards UN sustainable development goals and smart city initiatives. This focus was maintained through her leadership of the global government marketing efforts, and later as Managing Director of Microsoft’s federal government sales practice.

Prior to her time in the US, Michele was a product marketing lead and competitive analyst for Ottawa-based technology start-ups; guiding products from initial design specifications, through development, production and deployment. A graduate of Clarkson University (New York, USA), Michele holds a Bachelor of Science in Engineering, Management & Marketing.

Seann Hamer is the first Chief Technology Officer at Calian and is responsible for developing, executing and communicating our customer-facing technology roadmap and driving our innovation agenda. He is the advisor to the senior leadership team on product development, acquisitive growth strategies and R&D priorities including the Calian Innovation Playbook.

Seann has more than 35 years of experience in the satellite and cable networks industries as a result of numerous technical and business positions he has held over his career at Calian. He previously held dual roles as the VP, Communications Products and VP, Marketing and Development in the Calian Advanced Technologies division. He was a driving force in the creation of a successful and growing products business.

At the heart of the Calian long-term growth is its people. Under Sue’s leadership, the Calian HR team is focused on developing and executing a talent management strategy in support of the company’s overall business plan and strategic direction.

Sue joined Calian in 1999, gaining progressive management experience and a deep understanding of the company's diverse business by working within its service lines. She joined the Human Resources team in 2014 and drove key HR initiatives, such as leadership development, business unit partnership and compensation strategies. Sue has distinguished herself as a trusted thought partner, change champion and devoted employee engagement advocate. She accomplishes this through a fierce desire to bring out the best in people. Having played key roles in integrating acquisitions, she seeks to unlock employee potential and strengthen the Calian brand as an employer of choice.

A University of Waterloo alumnus, Sue advocates for performance excellence, collaborative work environments, and people development through strong leadership and succession planning. Sue was appointed CHRO in 2019.

Michael is a dynamic leader and collaborator with over 24 years experience leading global technology organizations in both large multinational public companies as well as high growth start-ups. As CIO, Michael develops enterprise risk management, process management and information technology at Calian required for continued success.

Prior to joining Calian, Michael held a variety of senior leadership roles at Kandy (NASDAQ: RBBN purchased by NASDAQ: AVCT) where he led global cloud services and cybersecurity and at Nortel/Genband where he led global technical support, R&D, new product introduction and business operations, including leading multiple company integrations/business transformations. In addition to his experience in large public companies, Michael has enabled significant scaling at multiple technology start-up companies, including growing the managed services and consulting divisions at Pythian, and building the global services organization at Rockport Networks from the ground-up.

Beyond his day-day role, he is active in the local Ottawa community where he has been a business mentor for Invest Ottawa and volunteered for the local food bank and community housing projects. He is trained in Lean Six Sigma, Kepner-Tregoe Resolve methodologies, and holds a Bachelor of Computer Science from Acadia University in Nova Scotia, Canada.

Jerry has more than 35 years of experience in management at Calian and other high-tech companies in the Ottawa region. Since joining Calian in 1992, he has held a number of leadership positions, including Director of Engineering, Vice President, Outsourcing, Vice President, Operations and Vice President, Training. Each of these roles required a focus on performance excellence, customer satisfaction, and service offering evolution. As CIO, Jerry brings this same focus to Calian Group Ltd. by integrating enterprise risk management, process management and information technology. These enablers allow Calian to achieve growth targets while maintaining its reputation for delivery excellence.

As President of Calian Health, Gordon McDonald leads one of Canada's largest national health services organizations which, for more than 14 years, has managed healthcare professionals and health programs as well as primary care and occupational health clinics. Gordon is focused on helping customers deliver and manage high-quality health care services for long-term, short-term, cyclical or temporary health care services. A professional engineer, he has over 27 years of experience in engineering, IT, management, health services and business development.

Gordon joined Calian's Health Services team in 2016 and assumed the role of Director as well as Program Manager for Calian’s Health Services Support Contract for the Canadian Armed Forces (CAF). He led Calian's successful bid for the Health Care Provider Requirements contract to provide health care services for the CAF, RCMP and Veterans Affairs Canada, and subsequently assumed the role of Service Delivery Manager for that contract in September 2017.

Gordon assumed the role of Vice President in 2019 and that of President in 2020. He is responsible for Calian's Health Services operations, with a team of over 1,000 health care providers, operations managers and client delivery personnel across Canada.

Patrick joined SED (now Advanced Technologies) in 1985 after completing an honours degree in Computer Science at the University of Saskatchewan. SED became a part of Calian in 1990. Throughout his extensive career within the organization, it was the variety of technical challenges, the commitment to our customers, and the opportunity for worldwide travel that spurred him to grow in his career. Starting as a software developer on Canada’s Search and Rescue Satellite Aided Tracking program, he quickly realized the importance of the work we do in this organization and its potential for growth. After serving in various progressive roles, Patrick became president of Advanced Technologies in 2012.

“We make a difference for our customers every day,” he says. “This drives our commitment to excellence, our innovation and the support that we demonstrate as a team.”

Headquartered in Saskatoon, SK, Patrick has grown an amazing multi-discipline team of engineers, technologists and production staff, in offices across Canada and Europe, capable of taking on the most difficult technical challenges.

Don is a Certified Training and Development Professional (CTDP) with a passion for learning, technology and innovation. He brings learning industry expertise from national and international markets and has extensive business experience helping clients innovate learning, close competency gaps and achieve and maintain compliance.

Don joined Calian with an understanding of the learning and development landscape beyond the company’s current markets. He has run programs for pharma, publishing, telecom and oil and gas, and has large private enterprise experience having worked on the learning programs of many global clients.

Throughout his career, Don has undertaken visiting faculty engagements at universities in Canada, the United States and Ireland, and has conducted research on next-generation learning, including gamification, augmented reality and knowledge engineering. Don was CEO of Mosaic Technologies before serving as Director of Information and Knowledge Management for Suncor Energy from 2009 to 2015, and then Chief Learning Strategist for Tata Interactive Systems until the end of 2017.

Sacha is an Ottawa-based leader with an excellent understanding of today’s technology. He has more than 20 years of experience working in technology for both start-ups and large multinational organizations, such as IBM, Blackberry and CGI. Sacha joined the Calian leadership team in 2021.

He has held a variety of leadership and technology roles ranging from software developer and management consultant to head of product management and R&D and general manager. His expertise lies in leading SaaS innovators towards achieving escape velocity, recurring revenue growth and profitability.

Sacha is a co-founder of Kandy.io and a recipient of the 2019 Forty Under 40 award from the Ottawa Business Journal and Ottawa Board of Trade. He’s passionate about building high performance cultures and grooming the next generation of leaders.

Sacha holds an MBA from the Ivey School of Business and a Bachelor of Computer-Systems Engineering from Carleton University. He is a self-proclaimed UCaaS/CCaaS/CPaaS evangelist and a regular keynote speaker at industry conferences including Perspectives, Enterprise Connect, SaaS North and the Gartner Summit.

Sacha’s technology background and experience in professional services and SaaS make him an excellent choice for Calian’s ITCS business.