It has always been my dream to start a software company.

I left my in-house legal counsel role to start working on the FOI Assist software in September 2018, just over five years ago. My first step was launching the FOI Assist Knowledge Base, where I figured I could help FOI professionals by answering the kinds of questions that had often stymied our FOI program at the Toronto 2015 Pan Am Games.

By the next summer, I had created a prototype Fee Estimate Generator and had sketched out a rough user interface for most of the main functionality of the FOI Assist software.

I presented a couple of technical demonstrations that summer which gave me confidence I was on the right track. I received encouragement from a major Canadian university and my old Toronto law firm as well.

As always, getting to a polished, secure, finished product took longer than expected, and the arrival of COVID in March 2020 certainly didn’t help. Our kids were home with me 24/7, while my wife, an essential worker, went to work every day with hardly any pause.

It was January 2021 when the initial version of the FOI Assist software was released. Helpfully, I had been publishing the Knowledge Base for over two years at that point, and it had an audience. What’s more, I’d been receiving requests for demonstration of the FOI Assist software before it was even released. Institutions seemed excited about what it could do!

I managed to sign up my first three of clients within two months of releasing the software, and I’m very proud to say they are all still using FOI Assist today. Those first clients will always have a special place to me. And when you first hear people tell you that something you’ve created is solving their problems and changing their work for the better, it feels like years of lead-up are finally clicking into place.

Three more years have now gone by. The FOI Assist software keeps getting better. Just this year, it’s gained the ability to send email notifications and reminders, time tracking, and the ability to easily accept Freedom of Information requests and application fee payments online, among other improvements. And improved metrics reporting, charting, and auditing functionality is just around the corner.

As of 2023, FOI Assist is being used by municipalities, police services, school boards, post-secondary, and other public institutions across Ontario. FOI Assist Knowledge Base readers spot me at conferences. I’ve made friends and met so many great people through creating something that makes people’s professional lives better. I’ve even gotten to hear those magic words a few times now: “I don’t know what we’d do without FOI Assist!”

Thank you for being a part of it.

Happy Holidays

And all the best to you and yours in the year ahead!

Justin Petrillo

London, Ontario

December 22, 2023