Plank

Plank

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Our Story

Experienced. Collaborative. Friendly.

Over the past 14 years, we’ve gathered a group of diversely talented and highly motivated individuals who believe problems are best solved collaboratively. Our experienced team work with you to unleash the power of pixel-driven connectivity.

Principal & Founder

Warren Wilansky

In 1998, just three years out of university, Warren co-founded Plank with his personal savings and a dream to make the internet a beautiful place. With no formal business or entrepreneurial training, he’s graduated from a real world MBA by turning Plank into one of the most highly respected boutique digital agencies in Canada. His high standards and ability to create and maintain strong client relationships are the foundation of the company’s success. But enough about him – Warren truly believes a company is not an entity unto itself but a reflection of the people who make it special.

Managing Director

Steve Bissonnette

As Plank’s longest serving employee (over 12 years!), Steve is the embodiment of the company’s evolution. In 1999, he became our first full time lead designer and was responsible for the quality of much of our early work. As the team grew, Steve’s natural leadership ability and attention to detail made him the best person to serve as Managing Director, using his innate ability to find slick, elegant solutions to all our technological challenges, while keeping creativity and usability at the forefront.

Creative Director

Gary Brazier

Since 2007, Plank’s creative vision has been placed in GW’s immensely capable hands. A self-taught designer from the age of twelve, some of his previous gigs include Senior Designer at Airborne Entertainment, Art Director for The Montreal Mirror, and Co-Founder of Blue Dot Communications. Asked to sum up his design philosophy, he turns to a Cary Grant quote: “It takes 500 small details to add up to one favourable impression.”

  • v1.0 Photoshopping Since
  • 1 Billion+ Pixels Served
  • 10,000+ Hours Playing Bass
Senior Account Executive

Sarah Bagnall

How do you keep projects on track, understand a client’s needs, and keep people informed and happy, all in a manner that is equal parts professional and enthusiastic? Actually, it’s a trade secret. But we can tell you that it’s what Sarah does — unbelievably well. With her previous work at PUMA Canada and Cossette, she brings to Plank a wide range of experience in both public relations and marketing. Content, strategy, branding, design…she gets it. And that’s why, for over four years, she’s been building great relationships.

  • 3+ months left of Maternity Leave
  • 500+ Client Calls / Year
  • 200+ LinkedIn Connections
Interactive Director

Jennifer Lamb

Jennifer’s days with us are almost as old and numerous as the agency itself. Her early, award-winning Flash work helped put Plank on the map as an agency pushing the limits of online interactive projects. In 2006 she returned from some time living in East Asia, and we jumped at the chance to have her back on the team. Immersing herself in HTML and CSS development, she quickly became our resident browser-bug-busting expert, and still sets the standard for our pixel-pushing production team. Her experience, efficiency, and desire for results translate into amazing work, on time and within budget.

Director of Mobile Development

Geoffrey Weeks

Geoff joined Plank in 2004 and quickly established himself as a core member of our team, with his diverse skill-set and focus on interactivity and motion graphics. Coming from a background in music, photography, and film, he brings artistic sensibilities to every project, while his programming and managerial experience guarantees that all those little technical issues are never overlooked. Geoff’s role at Plank is now focused on channeling our well-honed interactive and interface design skills into mobile development, ensuring that the quality of all our mobile projects exceed expectations.

Senior Developer

Patrick McFern

A self-described “anti-stereotypical” programmer, Patrick is a health and fitness nut that comes to Plank with formal training from both Concordia University (BA Computer Science) and Vanier College (DEC, Computer Science). He has a ton of experience, including stints at Motorola, OZ Communications, and Airborne Entertainment, and he blends his dry wit into his ability to work – and deliver – on multiple projects simultaneously. He has a profound love and respect for several extreme sports, still can't describe what style of music he listens to (metal something?), and can likely bench-press you and your momma.

  • 369 Tasks Completed / Year
  • 128 Workouts / Year
  • 3,156 km Snowboarded
Senior Front-End Developer

Jean-Frédéric Fortier

JF is an expert in ... a lot. He compliments his HTML, CSS, and JavaScript skills with a strong sensibility for user interface and user experience. When he’s not busy squeezing every last bit of quality from every pixel (in every browser), he’s ensuring sites are perfectly optimized for search engines, or teaching us how to get even more out of Google Analytics. Building web sites is an art and a science, and lucky for us, JF has a gift for both.

Office Manager

Colin MacKenzie

As a former label owner, artist manager, tour coordinator, and festival organizer, Colin came to bookkeeping by way of indie rock. As our ‘numbers guy’ he keeps Plank organized so that our team can focus on delivering killer projects. But we love that beyond the books he’s a true creative at heart. A producer and director of music videos and documentaries with a BFA in Photography (University of Ottawa) — and a wicked taste in music, to boot — it’s all made him right at home here at Plank.

Developer

John Hodges

John originally studied finance, and fell into programming quite by accident. Luckily for us he decided to make it a permanent move. He began dabbling with PHP about 6 years ago, and has been coding professionally for four. John also has the solid backing of years of experience in Linux system administration and Linux-based VoIP systems. He has also been running competitively for a little over three years and has run 12,000+ km since. Some quick math puts that at an average of 10km every single day (and Montréal has some very cold, very snowy days).

Project Manager

Jenny Cahill-Jones

Jenny comes to us from England, where she spent 10 years honing her skills in print and digital media, writing, editing and correcting the English language. She started out at the BBC before moving to Time Warner and Just for Laughs, where she learned that a sense of humour in the workplace goes a long way. She spent the last few years in the UK managing complex projects and tight work schedules at luxury fashion powerhouse net-a-porter.com, before crossing the pond to Montreal and bringing her project management skills to Plank.

Business Development Director

John Bowie

John's experience as a Business Development Director has its roots in over 15 years of production, design and management in mobile and web. He has managed the production process from A to Z which makes him an expert in understanding a client’s needs and providing guidance and fresh ideas without having to leave his chair. John’s portfolio includes working with FOX’s Family Guy, Maxim Magazine, The NHL, The NFL and Bombardier among other well-known brands. He is also the 3rd bass player to join Plank and unofficially and undeservedly considers himself to be the best.

  • 18 Years behind a computer
  • 3 Mass-produced goalie mask designs
  • 1 Crazy night with St. Louis Cardinals
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