Chief Financial Officer
With a solid foundation in accounting and a passion for innovation, Justin Bissonnette brings a dynamic and multidimensional approach to his role as Chief Financial Officer at CM Labs. During this interview, he shared how his diverse background led him to CM Labs, the unique strengths he sees in the company, and why he’s excited about the road ahead.
“I view my role not as a traditional CFO, but as a strategic business partner—someone who creates value across the organization and drives transformation. I'm someone who really wants to feel that he’s providing a lot of value to the company he's working for.”
From leading a strategic acquisition within months of joining to driving data-informed decisions and championing a people-first culture, Justin Bissonnette’s story is one of purpose, alignment, and ambition.
I studied to become a Chartered Professional Accountant (CPA), then began my career at a Big Four accounting firm working with privately held businesses in the tech and construction sectors. That experience guided my career in a lot of ways. After leaving public accounting, I transitioned into senior finance roles at companies in real estate development and technology. I fell in love with the tech industry because it moves so fast and is a very dynamic environment.
I’ve also worked with value-added resellers that would sell software, hardware, and services—a bit like what we do at CM Labs. I think it’s why I was drawn to working at CM Labs. In many ways, it’s a melting pot of all my previous experiences.
Within my first six months at CM Labs, we acquired another company, which we’re really proud of. The company is AI Redefined (AIR), a Montreal-based company known for its work in real-time, human-AI collaboration. This strategic move positions CM Labs to expand its simulation capabilities, particularly in areas like pedagogy and training personalization. I feel like we are going to shape the future of simulation training.
CM Labs provides every service a company could need when it comes to simulation. Just the fact that we own the IP for Vortex, the engine we use to build our simulations, means that we’re able to customize our content if a client needs something specific. If ever a client has a problem or a request—whether they need some additional scenarios, some more development, or customizations—we’re there to support and listen to them.
To me, that’s really what makes us stand out against our competitors—the fact that we can be like a trusted partner to our clients.
I appreciate how much CM Labs values its employees. I really wanted to join a company that has an employee-first mentality, because at the end of the day, that’s our most important asset.
I also found that CM Labs is a really talented and ambitious group. I’ve worked for a lot of companies as a consultant and as a CFO, and I was very impressed by the systems CM Labs has in place. I like that we are data-driven.
When it comes to CM Labs’ culture, we’re people who take pleasure in working with each other. It’s always important that we challenge ourselves to get the best out of everyone, and I find that here it’s done in a respectful and well-mannered way.
I’ve always been someone who has high expectations of myself and I want to have an impact. I want to be able to look at the things we’ve accomplished as a team at the end of a year and be proud because we’ve really pushed the company to another level.
I’m surrounded by very talented people here, so the expectations are high, but I feel it’s good. We know that we’re the market leader in what we do, and we want to remain that way and continue growing.
Looking back, the most valuable advice I received was to stay true to myself. I’ve worked with many companies that had different cultures and approaches, but integrity always helped me build trust and alignment.
One of the most important things about CM Labs is that we offer the best training solution. We bring unrivalled realism to our solutions, so that people do not see a big difference when they jump on real machines. As a result, we’re making everyday operations safer than they were.
We’ve been really strong in a couple of market segments, for example, ports and construction. Now I think we might start seeing other segments and other verticals really take off. We’re going to enter new markets that have different purchasing habits and different needs. So I think it’s a very exciting time for CM Labs.