As 2018 draws to an end our team of Principals and Senior Advisors have spent a few moments reflecting on the past year and contemplating their wishes for the year ahead.
On behalf of Osborne Interim Management, we wish you a safe holiday season and health and prosperity in 2019!
This year we at Osborne Interim Management are reflecting on the things we can give thanks for. As one can imagine, the list can be extensive from our colleagues, clients, friends, and families and the support we have received. Hard to do justice to all, but a few thoughts emerge. First off it’s quite exhilarating to realize the list is so extensive and just how lucky one is to have such a rich pool of candidates.
How we choose to recognize these very worthy recipients of our gratitude is for each to decide, but I encourage taking the time to reflect on those who have impacted our lives, and maybe not just in the past year, but overall. So, as a parting thought, think about what Santa would advise – make a list, check it twice, and then show your gratitude. Best wishes for all!
As we enter 2019, it is my wish that the year provides my many communities with hope and opportunity. I will look forward to enough to task my brain in meaningful ways, but most of all, I want Calgary, Alberta and Canada to find optimism in an ever-changing world. This year in Alberta and across Canada, we will be choosing our leadership; and I hope that the process of our elections is respectful. I hope we acknowledge elected public service as tough work, filled with good intentions (even when decisions and debate do not align with my preferences), and in desperate need of our encouragement to draw in the best possible candidates). Locally, tough decisions are required, and I wish my City can find the compromises necessary to embrace our needs and respect our constraints. I am looking forward to introducing my colleagues to all those who I am aware can benefit from our services; they are so talented and capable. I’m proud that we work together to improve organizations and strengthen our community. The coming year will find me playing golf, enjoying the desert, exploring Calgary, and embracing my family. I wish everyone success, happiness and good health.
As 2018 closes out, I’m thankful for the opportunity to work with some amazing organizations. Groups of people that volunteer that time and resources to better their community through services, advocacy and better decisions that impact all.
I’m thankful for the opportunity to work with a dedicated group of professionals that want to use their skills and experience to ensure that the needs of businesses, charities and non-profits are fully met.
I’m thankful for family and friends that support each other through our communities.
Merry Christmas and Happy New Year.
As I reflect on 2018, I owe many people a huge “thank-you”…
- I’ve learned so much from every client I’ve worked with. Although we bring an outside perspective to their challenges, and are told the solutions proposed are greatly appreciated and useful, each initiative and relationship enriches my own experience and knowledge base. That makes me better equipped for the next challenge.
- The weekly Osborne client reviews provide input from a group of extremely experienced professional colleagues and creates extremely significant value for my clients. It’s another learning opportunity for me. A team approach is always a winning formula!
- My network of professionals outside of Osborne continue to inspire me, including the volunteers I work with outside of my “day job”.
- My family continues to support both my Osborne work, and volunteering efforts.
So thank you to them all for being there for me throughout 2018!
My dreams/hopes for 2019 are for Calgary to regain its strength and once again attract the youth of Canada to come, work, live and contribute to the greatest city in Canada! The “Can-Do” philosophy of Calgarians will highlight why Alberta was the economic engine of Canada for so long. As a city, we have the talent, the ingenuity and drive to provide a lifestyle second to none in Canada. We embrace the cold and the hot weather which makes our recreational opportunities so numerous, it is hard to keep track! The Rockies are our backyard and what a place to play! Calgary has smart people making a difference, not just for Calgary or Alberta, but for all Canadians and our friends around the world. Innovation will drive our economic engine as new technologies will emerge from our location in the foothills and our sought-after solutions will drive business from around the world to our door. Riding the economic bench will be short, we will get back in the game and show that Calgarians can compete with the best, even if Amazon was only teasing us – we teased them back! We have fought the bear and we will emerge victorious, stronger and better than before! I look forward to serving our clients with professional and attentive care while supporting their missions.
Two thousand eighteen was a transformative year for me, both personally and professionally, and I look forward to what 2019 will bring on both fronts.
In addition to good health, my wish is for my daughters to continue to develop into strong, capable and caring members of the community. Our children are the future and it is our job to lead by positive example – they are impressionable, are watching and taking note more than we realize!
Professionally, I hope to continue to provide value-added service to my clients, develop those relationships on a deeper level, and as its newest Director, help Osborne grow its interim management client base.
This is the time of year to count one’s blessings and look positively into the future. For some that is much harder than for others. However, I take heart in the resilience of Western Canadians. I continue to be energized by the tremendous volunteerism that makes our communities great and the entrepreneurial spirit that brings us through every economic downturn. I look at the first world problems that we stress over and wish we could all have the opportunity to spend time in other parts of the world whose citizenry know true poverty and economic despair. I spend a fair amount of time in El Salvador, a country where they deal with real hardship each and every day, from earthquakes to floods to gang violence. A tragic count of homes and lives lost to be sure. Yet in my experience they always wear a smile and do everything they can every day to provide a better future for their children. They work hard at their jobs, many earning just $10 a day. They find innovative ways to get things done without the equipment and resources we take for granted. So let’s head into 2019 appreciating how lucky we are and determined to use our good fortune to build stronger communities and a more robust economy.
Having worked closely with the YouQuest team, I hope the successes achieved this year are multiplied many times over in 2019.
YouQuest optimizes the well-being of people with young onset dementia and their caregiving families and friends. Filling a void in services for this underserved community, YouQuest launched its pilot program at SAIT in September, providing daytime recreational therapy, counselling, and peer support. The organization was recently recognized by The Centre for Aging and Brain Health Innovation (CABHI), stating that “YouQuest offers a service that is professional, differentiated and evidence-based. The financial and quality of life support for families and caregivers provides great value to the health system.”
Osborne enjoys a mentoring partnership with this innovative non-profit, providing strategic planning, fund development and communications to help YouQuest establish a solid organizational foundation.
Congratulations to the YouQuest team for the many milestones achieved in 2018. We are proud to be associated with you and hope the organization continues to flourish in the year ahead.
My hope is that the values and qualities that have distinguished Alberta and Canada in the past will come to the fore in 2019. My dream is that we will work together and find shared solutions to our significant challenges that work for all of us.
I am thankful for the simple things in life; my wife and our girls are healthy and we have a beautiful family. I am fortunate enough to have a career that allows me a great work-life balance and am able to spend important moments with them. My business goal is to help small businesses grow and enjoy the things they want in life. This makes me happy.
I hope that it does not appear dissembling in our corporate post to express my great gratitude for the association I share with my well-considered colleagues at Osborne.
In a cynical time, I am grateful too for those friends, clients and past-colleagues who have supported me professionally in finding my way to our Osborne conference table, and for the projects we foster there together for the broader benefit of our community.
I am thankful for leaders with the courage to let go of believing they always have to have the answer and who embrace being “leader as learner”. In 2019, I am excited about asking good questions to help leaders find the answers they are looking for. My favourite coaching questions:
- What do you want?
- What is the real challenge?
- What are you afraid of?
- What is your very first step?
These are some of the people I want to thank:
- Those who resist the temptation to reply all on emails.
- Those who pick up the phone to talk instead of sending a text.
- Those who do not share their political opinions on social media.
- Those who will get out and stand for what they believe in, anonymously.
- Those who recognize and are prepared to pay for the value of experience.