The Founder Bottleneck - Why HR, IT and Finances Won't Wait
Three fractional firms sit down together, leader to leader, for an honest conversation about when and why to bring in outside expertise. No slides, no pitch decks, no services overview. Just real stories about the cost of waiting: the bad hire, the security gap, the tax structure chosen for convenience. Founders leave with a different way of thinking about timing, and a sharper sense of when outside expertise becomes a growth decision - not an expense.
Join in the conversation as Alicia Fowler - founder and owner of MOD Accounting & Tax and Rayo Business Teams, Sonja Zacharko - Business Development Executive with Tier 3 IT Solutions, and Rebecca Lee - VP Growth and Innovation at VIMY HR share stories of all that they've seen working alongside founder CEOs.
📍 Meet us at ATB Place
Come up to the 21st floor meeting rooms. Light refreshments and snacks will be served.
Meet our Panelists:
🌱 Alicia is the founder and owner of MOD Accounting & Tax and Rayo Business Teams.
Entrepreneurship inspires her. To Alicia, it's the ultimate intersection of creativity, intention, and growth, and nothing else quite compares for its power to keep you living in the moment while moving big ideas and great people forward.
Her home is on Treaty 6. Saskatchewan raised her, but Edmonton is where she's put down roots, raising two daughters and building a life for her family.
Alicia believes good accounting is the foundation of every business decision. She brings 20 years in the industry, a Master of Professional Accounting from the University of Saskatchewan, a BBA from Thompson Rivers University (earned through a study abroad program in Tianjin, China), and a CPA, CA designation.
At heart she's a collaborator and a team builder, with a leadership approach grounded in discipline, instinct, and community. She lives in pursuit of simplicity and joy, and loves helping values-aligned leaders solve problems creatively with brilliant people, simple solutions, and practical tools.
Outside of building teams, running a business, and crunching numbers, you'll find Alicia at home in Edmonton with her family, humbly learning to care for roses, slow walking with her senior English Mastiff, dreaming up far-away adventures, and Latin dancing.
🌱 Sonja is a Business Development Executive with Tier 3 IT Solutions, where she helps organizations understand their technology needs and build a more strategic, proactive approach to IT and cybersecurity. Drawing on more than 20 years of leadership experience, Sonja brings an operational and people-focused perspective to her work.
Having led complex organizations herself, she understands the pressures facing business leaders and the importance of having trusted partners at the table. She is known for building authentic relationships, asking thoughtful questions and connecting clients with solutions that support their people, operations and long-term goals.
Outside of her professional life, Sonja is a wife and mother to two adult sons who are attending universities in distant cities. As a new empty nester Sonja is enjoying time with her husband and her Australian Labradoodle, Cooper while she continutes to grow her love of cooking and pickleball.
🌱 Rebecca is a fractional HR executive, culture strategist and Partner at VIMY HR. People inspire her. There's little she finds more energizing than helping founders turn a group of talented individuals into a team that can actually scale.
Rebecca believes culture isn't a side project, it's the infrastructure that lets a company grow without breaking. She brings two decades in people and culture, a business degree from Concordia University, and a CPHR (Chartered Professional in Human Resources) designation. She's also PROSCI Change Management certified, and holds a diversity coaching certification from Howard University.
At heart she's a collaborator and systems thinker, with a leadership approach grounded in curiosity, discipline, and care. She loves working alongside values-aligned leaders to translate big ideas into action - building workplace cultures rooted in growth, belonging, and connection.
When she's not building teams or coaching founders, you'll find Rebecca on the mats as an avid practitioner of both yoga and BJJ. Catch her at music festivals, communing with the moon or giving her time to community causes she cares about.
And our Moderator:
🌱 Michelle Scully, co-founder and co-owner of Spark and Pony
Michelle is a brand strategist and visual identity specialist with over seventeen years of experience. She and her team work with founders and leadership teams in B2B and tech who know their business is great but can't figure out why their brand isn't landing. She closes that gap with brand strategy, sharp positioning, and visual identities that hold up when the business keeps moving.
Her clients have used this work to win better clients, move upmarket, and walk into acquisition conversations with a brand that could carry the weight. GeologicAI and Resource Modeling Solutions are two of them. If you're scaling and your brand hasn't kept up, that's where she works best.
When she's not crafting brands, Michelle explores new cultures, hikes mountains and volcanoes, and captures it all with her Canon DSLR. A passionate environmentalist and animal advocate, she volunteers with environmental groups and rescue centres while doting on her two rescue cats, Hammy and Pammy.