Leaders dedicate careers to building thriving cultures

Whether they are building businesses, institutions or provinces, the winners of the 2016 Canada’s Most Admired CEO awards have been instrumental in placing culture at the heart of their efforts throughout their careers.

The awards were founded by Waterstone Human Capital and MacKay CEO Forums to recognize the Canadian chief executive officers who have fostered a culture within their organizations that enhances performance and sustains a competitive advantage.

“Each of this year’s mostadmired leaders are huge believers that culture is the greatest asset their organizations has,” says Marty Parker, president and CEO, Waterstone Human Capital. “They passionately believe it is how they do things in their organization that drives their people and their business success. In fact, in our most recent study, 88 per cent of respondents said culture is a direct reflection of their current or past leadership.”

Ray Ivany, president and vice- chancellor at Acadia University in Wolfville, N. S., for example, is a remarkable story of leadership and the role of culture in turning things around, Parker says. “But the bigger story is the impact he has had on the province with the Nova Scotia Commission Report on building the province’s new economy in 2014. That report has since been coined The Ivany Report. Ray really is a community builder and visionary both in terms of the post- secondary community and the province.”

Ivany says that in his many years in post- secondary education, he has always been intrigued by how to get institutions to be more relevant and have a greater impact on communities.

“As a 178-year-old institution, Acadia is often couched in terms such as ‘ bound by tradition’. But that’s not the way it is at all here. History and tradition create a wave of energy that propels you into a future that is not identical to the past, but is connected.”

Applying a culture and value lens to higher performance for an institution is not fundamentally different from a business, he believes. “In both cases you are talking about human potential. It doesn’t take long to go from cultural precepts to very specific actions that define the institution or company and provide a differentiated outcome.”

For Acadia University, the outcome is evident in the fact that it has experienced the highest enrolment growth in Canada over the past five years. “That metric is entirely driven by us doing a better job communicating just how different we are culturally in terms of experience,” Ivany says.

He adds t hat cultural alignment also played a key role in the commission report, which has now become an integral part of the province’s economic development and its culture.

“Whether it’s Acadia or the Nova Scotia story, culture has to drive excellence and high performance.”

Driving excellence is something that Telus CEO Darren Entwistle exemplifies. According to Parker, “Not only is Telus the most profitable telco in the world with the highest shareholder return, it is renowned worldwide for its philanthropy. Darren could write a book on culture; he is such a believer in it.”

That book was written 17 years ago, when Entwistle and the Telus team collaborated on developing its strategic intent and everyday leadership values.

“Incredibly, Telus is the only telco in the world to have the same strategy today as it did 17 years ago,” Entwistle says.

As for culture, “the Telus team is, without a doubt, our company’s single greatest competitive advantage. Investing precious time and resources in our people and our culture is a top priority for us.”

A key focus is on empowering and motivating the team, he notes. “We know that an engaged team will deliver better, competitively differentiated experiences.” A notable testament to its culture is that Telus has received 11 BEST awards for excellence in learning from the Association for Talent Development. The awards recognize organizations that demonstrate enterprise- wide success as a result of employee talent development.

The giving spirit is also widely recognized at Telus. In 2010, it became the first Canadian company in history to have been named the most outstanding philanthropic corporation in the world by the Association of Fundraising Professionals. Since 2000, the company, team members and retirees combined have contributed more than $482 million to charitable and notfor-profit organizations and volunteered more than one million days of service to local communities.

As Entwistle says, “Our competitors can replicate our products, services and technologies, but a potent corporate culture takes years to build and is tremendously difficult to emulate.”

John Nicola, chairman and CEO of Nicola Wealth Management, has focused his corporate culture mis- sion on changing the face of the investment industry, Parker says. “He was among the first to a fee-based model. His commitment to a very transparent, open advisory business has had a massive effect on his own company’s growth and the entire industry.”

“In our industry advisers build practices, they do not build businesses,” Nicola says. “I was determined to change that and made the decision to go to a fee-based model long before the regulations were introduced. It was atypical when we started 20 years ago, but less so now.”

After i ntroducing t he new model, average top-line growth rate rose from eight per cent to more than 20 per cent annually, he reports. “I have no doubt that the right corporate culture had much, if not most, to do with our transformation and our success.”

Yet culture goes beyond its investment activities. Since the outset, the company has had a profit- sharing model and generous bonus system and now has 30 shareholders. “The current value plus dividends are well in excess of 100 times the amount we started with in 1994. It is interesting how the pie grows faster when sharing is part of your culture.” The company also dedicates a fixed percentage of earnings for local and international charities.

Nicola says he has come to realize that organizations that take care of the issues of culture, fit, consistency and values are simply better performers. “It’s irrational not to get that stuff aligned. There’s a huge metric difference between companies that have a good corporate culture and those that don’t.”

Winner Sean O’Brien, president and CEO of Reliance Home Comfort, stands out as a leader who has taken a good thing and made it better, Parker says. “When Sean joined the company three and half years ago, it was growing steadily at a rate of around three per cent a year. Now it’s nine and change and the company has doubled in size.”

O’Brien’s focus was on cultural transformation by eliminating hierarchies and having a robust mission and vision. “That allowed us to transition from a nice, conservative, growing business to a growth organization. It wasn’t a matter of a business that is broken. It was about emphasizing our strengths and pursuing them.” Since February 2013, he has grown the business by 40 per cent with revenues topping $600 million.

O’Brien previously spent four years as president of Acklands Grainger where, he says, “everything clicked in terms of culture.” When he joined it was a $640 million company with earnings at two per cent. When he left it was a $ 1 billion company with 12 per cent earnings. “That was delivered by having a culture that the 2,500 team members cared about. They were proud to be at work; they pushed and challenged each other; and they took care of their customers.”

O’Brien believes culture is “the turbo fuel” in any organization. “Every business has a culture, whether it’s good, bad or ugly. But a good culture is one that is aligned with what you are trying to accomplish.”