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It was the perfect space. Large rooms, brick walls, right in the city center.

“My business was doing well. I had good clients, and I felt the need or the necessity to expand the offices we had at the time. I said, OK, let’s go for it. I looked at my budget and told myself I could afford it. Yes, it was more expensive than I had thought, but I was able to manage it.”

Éric Cardinal realized fairly quickly that it was a mistake. “It put too much pressure on the company’s finances,” he explains. “It slowed our growth and even brought it to a halt.”

The company found itself with fixed costs that were too high relative to its revenues, a two‑year lease, and no room to maneuver. Two people had to be laid off, and the lease was eventually terminated with a penalty.

That was in 2011. Today, Éric Cardinal and his team at SEIZE03, which has 13 employees, work remotely.

An Unusual Path

The company’s name refers to the year 1603, when the treaty known as the Great Alliance was concluded in Tadoussac between the French and Indigenous nations an agreement that made it possible to colonize the St. Lawrence Valley and that refers to the beginnings of intergovernmental relations.

Éric Cardinal’s path to founding SEIZE03 in 2021 is an unusual one. He began by studying aerospace engineering, before shifting toward political science and constitutional law.

His path crossed that of Premier Bernard Landry. “The Indigenous issue interested him greatly. The Paix des Braves was being negotiated at the time, and he had decided to personally take charge of the negotiations with Ted Moses,” he recalls. “He was looking for someone to help him.”

“I was fortunate enough to go work with Bernard Landry on the Paix des Braves, and I served as chief of staff for Indigenous Affairs in the Quebec government in 2002 and 2003.”

Éric Cardinal put this government experience to use after that political episode. “When politics left me,” he says. He carried out mandates for Indigenous communities before creating his own public relations firm, briefly returning to politics, and then spending five years with National, the largest public relations firm at the time.

With his colleague Éric Duguay, he founded SEIZE03, which expanded its reach into the municipal and environmental sectors, in addition to Indigenous affairs.

A Return to the Office?

Everyone is working remotely, things are going well, and business is thriving. And the idea of bringing the team back under one roof has resurfaced. “We’re thinking about it, it’ll come one day,” says the company’s co‑founder.

It will be a more carefully thought‑out decision, so as not to repeat the mistake of 2011. “We went too fast and maybe confused growth with appearance,” he reflects today.

Beautiful, well‑located offices “that was the image I had in mind for a public relations firm. It’s a mistake to make a decision just to please yourself when you’re an entrepreneur.”

The lesson he draws from it: “It’s to ask yourself, paraphrasing Pierre‑Yves McSween, whether you really need it.”

“Needs are both clients’ needs and employees’ internal needs,” he explains. “We went around and talked to all our employees. We have a lot of young people on our team, with a good mix of senior and junior staff. You often hear that young people are against being in the office. That’s not the case. What I’m realizing is that they’re not against being in the office, they’re against presenteeism.”

So the reflection continues. “There’s an entire organization of work to rethink when you compare having a physical space versus working remotely.”