Henry Dauphin is the charismatic leader of The Refinery, a Montreal-based management firm which works with promising entrepreneurs to successfully grow their start-up businesses. Since its inception, The Refinery has partnered with more than fifty start-up ventures. “We are currently working to establish a dynamic portfolio of 60 high-growth, impact start-ups, as well as an investment fund,” states The Refinery founder. “Our mission is to connect with great founders and to help their ventures efficiently generate the momentum needed for success.”

However – it wasn’t always this way. Henry had to learn from a devastating business failure, turning that experience into a learning opportunity.

“I graduated from McGill’s Desautels School of Business, and founded a fashion start-up. It failed, and I spent a year doing a comprehensive analysis of why – so that I could avoid past mistakes in a future enterprise by devising a structured approach to start-up building. That process enabled me to identify several markers critical in the building of success roadmaps for the start-ups with which we work.”

Henry has established a diverse, multi-disciplinary network of associates in The Refinery: “We have an architect, a mathematician, engineers, an artist, recruiting strategist among others,  all sharing a common passion to leverage the transformative capacity of entrepreneurship to change the world.” The company’s network currently operates in Montreal, Toronto, New York, Los Angeles,  London, England, and Istanbul, Turkey. The Refinery has assisted in several remarkable turnarounds and has also worked with established companies such as Omnicom and Nike.

A recent and ongoing success story is that of a San Francisco media venture, Tuiris Media Network, founded by Fabiola Kramsky, an Emmy-award winning media personality. The Refinery helped develop innovative processes to profile Hispanic audiences in order to create impactful and culture-centric content strategies. Fabiola states: “Working with Henry and his team at The Refinery has been a great difference maker for Tuiris Media Network. We have evolved tremendously through their strategic approach and they have proven to be great partners and friends.”

Another recent success is in the partnership and re-launch of a New York based data-driven recruiting firm, Shynebyte, founded by Kelly O’Mara, the former director of talent at internationally recognized firms such as Google and Amazon. Kelly states: “Shynebyte has been greatly enhanced through our partnership with The Refinery. They have been an invaluable asset in optimizing my company. The success of any business is directly correlated to the caliber of their human capital. Henry has assembled as unique and capable a team as I have seen in the innovation space. I am excited to see the impact of their efforts on Shynebyte’s success as we enter into our 3rd year.”

Henry continues: “We work with founders who inspire us, who are driven to disrupt while cultivating positive impact, or as we like to say, who are driven to grow rich by enriching.”

Henry and his colleagues spend considerable time and resources to develop a start-up’s optimal growth trajectory. While this process is quantitative, their model remains very human. “We admire those who dare to create, with the appropriate calibration of mind, heart, vision and grit.”

Henry states; almost as a mantra; “Rather than being ‘business people’, we are ‘people who understand business’. Hardworking, principled, ambitious, passionate, creative, optimistic and capable individuals who believe they can remain true to who they are and thrive, while helping others deliver the wins that society needs.”

“With its cultural diversity and well developed hi-tech schools and universities, Montreal is an ideal place to serve as The Refinery’s head quarters.” Dauphin continues: “Our long term vision is to continue to expand The Refinery from Montreal and help the city become the premiere and most forward thinking start-up hub in the world.

For more information, please visit the company’s website: www.therefinery.us and www.henrydauphin.com

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