Peter Mitchell

2011-02-05T01:45:00.036-05:00

Current Portfolio

Accreditation Where Credit is Due

By Peter Mitchell

As part of its ongoing commitment to provide the highest standards of home health care and service, Acclaim Health is proud to announce it has been awarded accreditation through Accreditation Canada’s Qmentum Program.

(Click here to read the full story)

February 2011

Feature Story

Education, Economics and a Twist of Fate

“Code ED” and the role of the business community in propelling kids to success, regardless of the circumstance

By Peter Mitchell

Charles Dickens has captivated generations of people with his tale of Oliver Twist, the impoverished child growing up in Victorian London torn between two futures: the seductive ‘fine life’ of crime offered by Fagin and his gang of pick-pockets; or the refined life of security presented by the benevolent businessman, Mr. Brownlow. Though written in 1838 the themes of poverty and a workforce struggling with the downside of the Industrial Revolution resonate today as the Information Revolution creates similar sweeping changes on society. If Oliver Twist grew up in Hamilton today, how would his story end ?

(Click here to read the full story)

January 2011

A Moment of Reflection

By Peter Mitchell

“There’s so much that can happen to somebody in life that you just don’t expect in your younger days. You’re living for today when all of a sudden . . .”

Her silence speaks volumes; far more than mere words can convey. It is a dignified moment weighted with reflection; with memories; with sorrow and with hope. Her mute pause encompasses the recollections of a 56-year marriage, and the uncertainties surrounding a future that sees the golden years of retirement tarnished by the fog of dementia.
(Click here to read the full story)

December 2010

Feature Story

The Corporate Samaritan

Why corporate philanthropy and responsibility make good business sense

By Peter Mitchell

It’s not easy being a Good Samaritan in the 21^st Century. The global economy has been incredibly volatile over the past ten years forcing us to tighten our belts as we do battle with rising costs and the fear of possible redundancy looming over the horizon. This instability appears to be mirrored in the planet itself as natural disasters grab the headlines with greater regularity and calls for help are broadcast with increasing desperation. Locally, as we make the journey between our offices and homes, we are reminded daily of the poverty and pour souls that have been seemingly abandoned by loved ones and the world at large. We want to help; we want to do more; but even if we could, will our efforts really make a difference?
(Click here to read the full story.)

2010-12-31T08:45:00.006-05:00

A Moment of Reflection

By Peter Mitchell

“There’s so much that can happen to somebody in life that you just don’t expect in your younger days. You’re living for today when all of a sudden . . .”

The Silent Angels of Acclaim

By Peter Mitchell

They are ordinary people but they perform small miracles every day. They don’t seek glory; they don’t seek fame; they don’t seek the media spotlight. They are the Silent Angels of Acclaim.

Every morning at 7:30 Joe receives a telephone call from Amanda through our Tele-Touch reassurance service. For 10 years they built a daily routine until one day, Joe didn’t answer.
(Click here to read the full story)

A Shelter in the Storm

By Peter Mitchell

“Grief comes like the waves,” says Anne King, Manager of Volunteer Services for Acclaim Health.

When a loved one dies, the loss strikes hard and rocks your world to the core. The initial surge subsides and you feel you have weathered the storm. Then another wave comes crashing over the horizon and you struggle to stay afloat one more. The waves keep coming and you toss and turn like a ship lost at sea.

“When those waves come, we want people to know we are there during the rough times,” Anne says. “We want people to know they can call us.”
(Click here to read the full story)

Acclaim Health and Community Care Services is a non-profit, charitable organization providing quality health care services to the Halton regions

2010-12-30T12:13:00.000-05:00

January 2011

A Moment of Reflection

By Peter Mitchell

“There’s so much that can happen to somebody in life that you just don’t expect in your younger days. You’re living for today when all of a sudden . . .”

Her silence speaks volumes; far more than mere words can convey. It is a dignified moment weighted with reflection; with memories; with sorrow and with hope. Her mute pause encompasses the recollections of a 56-year marriage, and the uncertainties surrounding a future that sees the golden years of retirement tarnished by the fog of dementia.

Inge Niestroy rarely finds time for such reflection as her days are occupied in caring for her husband John. Five years ago he was diagnosed with dementia after undergoing quadruple bypass surgery at the age of 80. The symptoms had slowly been developing prior to the operation, but she attributed the occasional confusions and memory lapses to a natural part of the aging process. After the bypass, the signs grew more pronounced and their family doctor confirmed their worst fears. The bonds of marriage remain as strong as they have always been, but Inge now finds herself in the role of parent once again as she cares for her husband in the comfortable surroundings of their own home.

“It’s not easy because he needs so much help in so many ways,” Inge explains. “I have to take care of his daily hygiene. Sometimes it’s a struggle because he doesn’t believe in hygiene anymore. I have to really talk him into the daily care. I also have him on a very strict routine. That helps him because he knows what to expect. Meals are at a certain time. He feeds himself but I do cut up his meat and get everything organized so he knows exactly where it is. Sometimes he wants to say something but he can’t express himself. He loses thoughts in between a conversation. I ask him questions and he wants to answer but it just doesn’t come out.”

Inge admits it’s hard because she remembers the past and the way he was. “He used to be a very active man. He was a welder/fitter, then a diesel mechanic –and it was always work, work, work. He worked long after his retirement up into his 70s on an on-call basis. He was assertive in the nicest way, and he was the boss of the family. Now he’s just like a little boy with such a sweet attitude. When you look at him now and you remember the man he was, it’s heartbreaking. At times I get quite emotional. I have to separate myself and go down to the sitting room and have a good cry.”

It is an often difficult task, but one she willingly carries out on a daily basis. Although they live alone, the Niestroy do have help. They have two children, a son and a daughter, who visit and lend a hand as much as possible. They have also been blessed with first-rate neighbours, many of whom provide much welcome assistance with yard work, snow shovelling, and other small tasks associated with the upkeep of a two-storey house. Inge also has the benefit of having worked as a geriatric nurse with extensive experience in assisting those afflicted with Alzheimer’s. However, much has changed in the 12 years since her retirement, and as she explains, “It’s different when it’s in your own home.”

After almost five years tending to her husband’s needs, Inge saw an advertisement in her local newspaper for an information session being offered by Acclaim Health at her neighbourhood senior centre. Acclaim provides a Caregivers Compass Program that offers guidance and support to people responsible for the care of loved ones with dementia. Made possible with funding from the Government of Canada’s Social Development Partnership Program, the Caregivers Compass includes coping strategies, practical information, workshops, support groups and individualized home visits throughout Halton Region. After toying with the idea for a couple of days, Inge decided she had nothing to lose by attending. She says it is the best thing that could have ever happened to her.

“I met Sandi Robinson there,” Inge says. “She has been so much help to me and has given me so much understanding and compassion and guidance. She comes to my home at least once a month, and I have her phone number so I can get in touch with her for any questions. Sometimes I lose a little bit of my patience with John and I feel so guilty afterwards. It’s nothing serious but I get a little short with him sometimes and I regret it so afterwards. I explained that to Sandi and she said ‘Inge; you’re only human and you’re entitled to that.’ She knows what to say and how to pitch in a few words. I’m always looking forward to Sandi’s visits.”

The Caregivers Compass provides much more than reassurance and support. As the name implies, the program provides practical insight and strategies to those forging ahead on the often tumultuous path of home care provision. Every person’s challenges are unique and require individual, innovative solutions. Through personal consultation, support groups, education sessions and an online resource found at www.acclaimhealth.ca/caregiverscompass, Acclaim Health is able to direct people to the solutions that best meet their exclusive needs.

“I have so many phone numbers that I can tap into when I need help that I didn’t even know existed,” Inge says. “I found out there was a day program for people with dementia. Sandi gave me all the information I needed to make contact with them. John fought me on it for a long time beforehand, but we went there for a visit, he participated for a little while and he loved it. There’s also a program for caregivers on Alzheimer’s, and I’m a member there now too. It’s my ticket to other people’s point of view and what they’re going through. You always find out something new. I feel I’m not alone.”

The Niestroys are one of countless families in Halton Region who have secured the support and guidance they needed through Acclaim Health. As Canada’s population continues to age rapidly and changes to health care services create a rising demand for home care, those numbers will increase dramatically. With the Caregivers Compass, Acclaim has combined the best of modern technology with the best of traditional community spirit to help caregivers receive the help they need when they need it.

“I hope more people will take advantage of this when they’re in the same position that I am,” Ingrid advises. “It’s not easy when you feel like you’re all by yourself; that you have nobody. All of a sudden everything opens up; things that you never knew existed. I’d been stuck on my own worrying and now I feel more at ease. It brings me peace of mind.”

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Acclaim Health and Community Care Services is a non-profit, charitable organization providing quality health care services to the Halton regions

2010-12-29T20:03:00.006-05:00

The Silent Angels of Acclaim

By Peter Mitchell

They are ordinary people but they perform small miracles every day. They don’t seek glory; they don’t seek fame; they don’t seek the media spotlight. They are the Silent Angels of Acclaim.

Every morning at 7:30 Joe receives a telephone call from Amanda through our Tele-Touch reassurance service. For 10 years they built a daily routine until one day, Joe didn’t answer.

Amanda immediately summoned help. Joe’s building manager entered the apartment to discover Joe had fallen during the night. Joe was taken to hospital, and after a brief period of recuperation, returned home, grateful for the assistance and peace of mind that Amanda provided.

As Joe explains, “I was lying on the floor for hours and I couldn’t get up on my own. When I heard my phone ring at the time my volunteer calls, and then heard the repeat calls, I knew that help would come.”

Acclaim’s Angels do more than provide assistance in times of crisis; they build relationships. Glenda, 90, has built a solid friendship with Norma, 75, through our Friendly Visiting Program, much to the relief of Glenda’s daughter Jane.

“I am disabled and cannot visit that often,” Jane explains. “Norma not only takes her to appointments and shopping trips, but will sometimes pop in to give my mum a potted flower just to brighten the day. When my mum was hospitalized, Norma took her to the hospital and upon her discharge, waited until I arrived with my friends to pick her up. They have developed a very good friendship. My mother treasures that as otherwise she might be a very lonely individual and her quality of life would definitely have decreased.”

Jim, a former RCMP officer, and Mike, a retired minister, have forged a similar rapport thanks to our Special Steps Program. This connection has blossomed beyond the client and volunteer bond to incorporate their wives, and they often socialize as couples.

“Mike is the only male person my husband has in his life and he has made a tremendous difference to us,” says Rose, Jim’s wife. “We both feel refreshed after he has left because his humour makes us laugh. Our lives are very difficult and this laughter brings us relief.”

Elsa provided nursing services for Acclaim for 16 years before being diagnosed with Pulmonary Hypertension. Thanks to Hospice Visiting, two volunteers help her stay connected to the real world through her gardening, and to the virtual world of the Internet so she can keep in touch with her grandchildren and friends.

“My volunteers help me maintain my extracurricular activities, and they are my chance to say anything I want about anything I want. I can tell them when I have a bad day or how I am feeling. They are my sounding boards.”

Tracey and Tim are caring for her father Stuart at home and Acclaim’s Alzheimer Day Program not only supports Stuart, but provides them with some much needed relief from the full time job of home care.

Tracey explains. “We love Dad and are glad that we can keep him at home with us, but we also love the program because it allows us those moments of relief where we can spend time with just each other, get some work done or take a nap without a baby monitor beside the bed.”

At our Bereavement Centre located in Acclaim’s Oakville headquarters at 2370 Speers Road, our volunteers also provide support to those coping with the loss of a loved one. Through one-to-one sessions, support groups or recommendations from our resource centre, our Angels provide a guiding light through grief's bewildering fog.

"We want people to know we are there during the rough times," says Anne King, Director, Community Support Services. "We want people to know they can call."

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Acclaim Health and Community Care Services is a non-profit, charitable organization providing quality health care services to the Halton regions

2010-12-28T21:12:00.000-05:00

A Shelter in the Storm

By Peter Mitchell

“Grief comes like the waves,” says Anne King, Manager of Volunteer Services for Acclaim Health.

“When those waves come, we want people to know we are there during the rough times,” Anne says. “We want people to know they can call us.”

Acclaim Health has opened the Bereavement Resource Center to provide a beacon for people struggling with the loss of a loved one; a candle on the water of sorts to help navigate the stormy seas of grief.

Lynn Smail is the Center’s keeper of the light. A Registered Practical Nurse, she has worked within the organization for fifteen years. Originally part of the Visiting Nursing Program, she has spent the past three years in Volunteer Support. Her work with Acclaim’s Hospice Program led to her role as the Center’s Bereavement Co-ordinator.

The center is made possible through two sources: the Ministry of Health Long Term Care; and through cash donations. A large percentage comes through a fund raiser held by the Maycourt Club Festival of Trees. This year alone they donated $12,500.00 to help.

“We hope to offer some recognition on our door to recognize the groups that have contributed financially to make this possible, “Anne says. “If it wasn’t for their help, we would not be able to offer this service free of charge to the public. Many people cannot afford a lot of counseling. They may be able to call once or twice, but after that they feel it really is quite expensive.”

Lynn agrees. “It’s free, and that’s good because it is usually long term. People may not need you intensely every week. They might at first until they begin to feel settled. And then they could be calling back a year later. That’s what’s nice, they can always come back.”

In addition to overseeing the Center’s day-to-day operations, Lynn is responsible for ordering the resources she feels best suit people’s needs, interviewing new referrals, and conducting the home visits that are crucial in helping people cope with the first wave and start to take control of their grief.

“People feel devastated,” she says. “To be able to go to their environment gives them a lot of comfort. Once they get some information, it also gives them the ability to realize they can come here and seek out the information themselves.”

During that first visit, Lynn helps the bereaved navigate through grief’s fog to establish their exact needs and expectations, and helps them start to draw the map that will bring them to the end of their journey. The possible routes are almost endless.

“Some people want a group; some don’t,” she says. “Some people just want the information hand-outs, and others want websites where they can go independently to try and find the information themselves. We provide all that, and connections with other agencies such as Bereaved Families of Ontario. We can’t meet everybody’s needs, but maybe we know who can.”

“The main idea behind the Center is to provide a big base of support in a lot of ways. At a time when you’ve had a loss, it’s not good to spend a lot of time trying to find the services you need because you don’t have a lot of energy. This is a place where people can come and discuss issues or review the resources we have.”

Those resources include a lending library of books and videos, information brochures, support groups, website listings, and the most important resource of all –a caring hand.

“We’re making it as cozy a place as you can come to at a time when you are hypersensitive to everything, even your environment,” she says. “If you are not made to feel warm and comfortable, you are not going to feel trusting. You are not going to feel relaxed. You are not going to help yourself.”

To create that comfort zone, Lynn has transformed a simple office into a soothing oasis. On first entering, you are greeted with the message “Seek with the soul. See with the heart.” Your eyes are invited to dance across the artwork specifically selected to invoke peaceful contemplation. Your ears delight to the music of gently falling water coming from the Circle of Friends figure on the bookshelves. And as you take your seat in a soft chair that lets you sink into its embrace, you are welcome to play one of the soothing CD’s available for your listening pleasure.

For some, a few moments of solitude is all they need. For others, the support they seek is more involved. And that’s where the Bereavement Resource Center’s Candle truly shines bright.

Anne explains. “Our bereavement initiatives grew from our Hospice Program where we were already providing Bereavement In-home Follow-up Visits for families of people with progressive life-threatening illnesses. We felt there was a need for more services in this area.”

Acclaim worked with bereavement counselors in the area to develop a specialized five week Advanced Grief Training Program for volunteers that had completed the required ten weeks of Hospice training. The program, called “Grief and Opportunity to Care”, builds on the basic lessons volunteers learned early in their studies. As they quickly discover, grief is anything but basic.

A loss is a loss; but as there are many various kinds of death, so too are there different kinds of grief. The loss of a parent creates a different set of responses than the loss of a child or sibling. Children feel grief differently from teenagers who, in turn, experience it differently from adults.

Lynn offers the following example. “There is a difference between someone who has had a palliative experience, and someone who is grieving a sudden death. Each is going to have a different initial response, and each will have their own issues.”

“They may experience different feelings of guilt. One may have had a long term relationship with someone who had a drawn out illness, and feel terrible that the person suffered. The other may regret they did not do enough for the person when they were alive, and now it is too late.”

Lynn also points out the numerous personality types that need to be addressed. “Some people are shy or very private and just want to talk one-on-one. Others feel the group dynamic works best for them. They want to relate to somebody else.”

“And sometimes there is an evolution: they start out one way, then evolve to the point where they feel they need to find support in other ways. Once they get past how the loss has happened, they can be supported by a variety of people.”

The support groups are run by Barbara Brown, a Nursing Professor at McMaster University who has been involved with bereavement work for over 25 years. They run for eight weeks in the Spring and Fall, alternating between locations in Burlington and Oakville. After the eight weeks, the group formally meets again twice more over the next two months.

But Lynn says that does not mean the support ends. “What happens is they bond really well and they often continue to meet informally after the formal sessions have ended. It just comes naturally that they help each other.”

She says that while there has been a lot of spousal support in recent sessions, people who have suffered the loss of a child or parent have also proven to fare better in a shared environment with other bereaved families.

One issue that is often voiced and receives a round if agreement in the support groups is the ubiquitous greeting, ‘How are you?’

“We have all said it at least a thousand times without thinking of what it really meant,” Lynn explains. “We are not really asking the person how they are; it’s just a simple greeting. But when you are bereaved you become hypersensitive to it. It’s not just a hello. It can get to the point where the bereaved person thinks, ‘If one more person asks, I’m really going to tell them!’”

Another common refrain is the sense of awkwardness people often feel around those who have suffered a loss.

“As a bereaved person, you can sense the discomfort. You know people are not ready to hear what you really want to say, and which roads you can’t go down. You find yourself telling them what to tell you. You wind up supporting the supporter.”

Anne says for these, and other reasons, the Center was conceived to also serve as a resource for those who are helping others cope with bereavement: nurses, personal support workers, friends, and family.

Lynn agrees, “We have books that answer the ‘How do I help’ and ‘I don’t know what to say’ questions. ‘The Helper’s Journey’ and ‘How to Help Bereaved Children’ come to mind. One book that stands out has the memorable title, ‘Don’t Ask For the Dead Man’s Golf Clubs’."

“Essentially, that is what happened to this poor woman: a widow,” Lynn explains. “A friend came over right away and did just that. That tweaked her to find out what people really do need. She interviewed grieving families and asked them ‘How do we help?’ It’s absolutely excellent.”

Lynn tells people that when they look through a book, take from it only what they feel is helpful and disregard the rest.

“Not every book is going to meet your needs, and not every word is necessarily going to touch you. The books people like are as unique as the people themselves.”

Visitors to the Center are also invited to attend Acclaim's Candlelight Service held in the chapel at Appleby College every Spring. It is a non-donminational Memoriam service, complete with choir and readings by the Reverend Susan Sheridan. Its purpose is not so much to mourn the death, but to celebrate the life.

As Anne explains, "We want to reach out to the people who are hurting and bereaved as a result of their loss. This service symbolizes and signifies it in a number of ways. One is the lighting of the candle in memory of the person. Another is placing a flower on a tree which symbolizes a tree of life when all the flowers are arranged."

"It's quite a moving service. You can feel the emotion in the room. Once it is finished there is an almost joyful sensation. There is also a reception, and at that point people say 'It was so great to be able to remember and to share.'"

Lynn adds, "It's nice for our nurses and volunteers as well. Often they were in the trenches with the families at the time it was really tough. And they just want to reconnect. That means a lot to the people too; and they reminisce about the person they've lost."

And therein lies perhaps the greatest service provided by the Resource Center: to serve as a reminder that we are not alone; that in life, we are each and every one of us a candle on the water, helping our fellow travelers find their way to shore.

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Acclaim Health and Community Care Services is a non-profit, charitable organization providing quality health care services to the Halton regions

2010-12-27T17:06:00.015-05:00

Accreditation Where Credit is Due

By Peter Mitchell

Accreditation Canada is a not-for-profit organization that provides health care organizations an external peer review process to gauge and improve their client and patient services based on national standards of excellence. Its team of surveyors includes experienced and accredited health professionals, including physicians, nurses, health executives and administrators, occupational therapists, and social workers. The lengthy and comprehensive process covers every aspect of operations from governance to finance.

“It was quite gratifying,” says Angela Brewer, CEO of Acclaim. “They presented a very positive report back to us: the leadership is good; the board is community based and very engaged; we are very involved with client safety; and we have strong teamwork throughout the organization. What struck me is the fact they heard the same messages from me as they heard from the front-line staff. That tells me that our philosophy is rooted throughout the organization. That is extremely important.”

That philosophy is based on Acclaim’s core values of respect, participation, responsiveness and innovation –factors that were evident when the organization began the journey of accreditation as part of its continuing drive to seek out and provide the best, most innovative service available to its clients.

“The whole focus of accreditation is the client,” says Johanne Carbonneau-Ellis, Acclaim’s Director of Quality Improvement. “Part of the primer involved surveyors coming to see the foundation of Acclaim Health. Did we have the foundation in place to move to the next phase? We had to survey our clients and ask questions about service delivery, their expectations and so on. Based on those results we were awarded the Accreditation Primer Award in December 2008.”

But the journey had only just begun. That success allowed Acclaim to embark on the Qmentum Accreditation Program, a Quality Performance Roadmap that focuses on a range of measures encompassing client safety, ethical decision-making, communication and training. For the next two years Acclaim completed extensive peer reviews and conducted numerous surveys relating to Home Care, Effective Organization, Governance and other standards designed to assess and improve services to clients, staff and community partners.

“They talk a lot about the interdisciplinary team,” Johanne says. “In an organization like Acclaim Health the interdisciplinary team is the client’s doctor and pharmacist, and the nurse or support worker. The team is almost like a remote team. It’s not like you’re working in a hospital where people are right there face-to-face discussing the case. There are a lot of obvious challenges to providing community health care and to have that interdisciplinary team.”

The standards are very rigorous. Johanne says, “A major focus is communication, education and training. We already had a lot of education and training for our staff, but we really had to ramp it up. We introduced a client caregiver safety handbook to help our clients and families stay healthy and safe at home. It covers infection prevention, medication management, fall prevention, fire safety, and other areas that our staff are trained and educated in, and helps them in terms of how to speak to the client and family about those issues. It was a great learning experience for everyone.”

Other notable successes include an event management system developed to investigate client events and employee injuries, a health and safety training schedule, and a 14% reduction in the number of work time lost injuries. But quality improvement never ends. The Accreditation Program runs on a three year cycle during which Acclaim will conduct an annual Prospective Analysis, administer new surveys, provide further education and training for staff, and take every step to ensure its programs remain relevant to the needs of its clients.

“What it really does for everybody is assure them that another organization besides Acclaim Health says we have a quality driven organization,” Angela says. “A client can go to our website, see that we’re accredited, and know that somebody external has given us the seal of approval. We ARE doing what we’re supposed to be doing in delivering client service. People can be assured that we meet these national standards. It means we’re doing a good job.”

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Acclaim Health and Community Care Services is a non-profit, charitable organization providing quality health care services to the Halton regions

2009-12-31T08:49:00.009-05:00

Education, Economics and a Twist of Fate

“Code ED” and the role of the business community in propelling kids to success, regardless of the circumstance

By Peter Mitchell

Charles Dickens has captivated generations of people with his tale of Oliver Twist, the impoverished child growing up in Victorian London torn between two futures: the seductive ‘fine life’ of crime offered by Fagin and his gang of pick-pockets; or the refined life of security presented by the benevolent businessman, Mr. Brownlow. Though written in 1838 the themes of poverty and a workforce struggling with the downside of the Industrial Revolution resonate today as the Information Revolution creates similar sweeping changes on society. If Oliver Twist grew up in Hamilton today, how would his story end ?
(Click here to read the full story)

The Corporate Samaritan

Why corporate philanthropy and responsibility make good business sense

By Peter Mitchell

Philanthrocapitalists

The Hamilton Community Foundation has launched a new fund that provides a return on investment for community giving

By Peter Mitchell

The recent announcement of the $5 million dollar Hamilton Community Investment Fund (HCIF) will provide local philanthropists with the means to take their capital and invest it directly into the community to support local causes, and provide a return on investment that can be recycled for further social ventures. It allows for greater flexibility in pursuing charitable endeavours, and a quicker return on investment for both the community and the donor. According to Terry Cooke, president and CEO of the Hamilton Community Foundation, it is an initiative that will prove attractive to modern philanthrocapitalists who have a greater sense of urgency about seeing their investments bear fruit.
(Click here to read the full story.)

Web 2.0: Communication e-volution

What the new social media can do for your business

by Peter Mitchell

(Click here to read the full story)

2009-12-30T11:40:00.001-05:00

February 2011

Feature Story

Education, Economics and a Twist of Fate

“Code ED” and the role of the business community in propelling kids to success, regardless of the circumstance

By Peter Mitchell

At a glance, his future would seem assured. McMaster University and Mohawk College rank fifth and ninth in our city’s top ten employers respectively, and are working in partnership with the community to develop projects such as the Innovation Park, the Digital Media Centre, and the STAART Institute to bring research, education and employment possibilities to the city. As technology continues to change the way the world works, they are doing their part to provide the tools required for Hamilton’s continuing economic development.

“Fifty years ago the major attraction figures were cheap power, good transportation, relatively inexpensive land and taxes,” explains Neil Everson, Director, Economic Development & Real Estate Division, Planning & Economic Development Department. “That’s changed significantly. The attraction obviously is still being cost competitive, but it’s research centres; it’s a skilled and educated workforce; it’s centres of excellence. Those are as big a magnet to attract and grow industry as those previous ones I mentioned were 50 years ago. We’re creating a labour force that can compete globally, anybody that isn’t accessing the services of Mohawk College or McMaster are doing themselves a disservice.”

How would young Master Twist actually fare in this brave new world? Would he harbour great expectations to become the big man on campus at Mohawk College? Would he overcome hard times to become an alumnus of McMaster’s DeGroote School of Business? Would he escape his bleak house to become a scholar at Redeemer University College? Despite the reputation of our institutions and the millions of dollars in investment, the odds may still be stacked against him. They may be the best of times for Hamilton; but for many of the city’s impoverished they are the worst of times.

Joey Coleman grew up in Hamilton’s east end and is a self-admitted graduate of the school of hard knocks. Armed with the street-smart charm of the Artful Dodger and a natural intelligence, he was able to pursue post-graduate studies and embark on a career that not only helped him escape the cycle of poverty, but provide a voice for the many that have not been so fortunate. As a blogger for both Macleans and the Globe and Mail, he has become a one-man army fighting for poverty and education issues. He says we need to look past McMaster and Mohawk and concentrate on the barriers facing our inner city youth.

“We need to focus less upon the institutions, and more upon the individuals,” he says. “We have a real problem with poverty in this city. McMaster was never someplace I saw myself at. When a volunteer came to the boys and girls club, as soon as they said they were a McMaster student, I knew they couldn’t relate to my neighbourhood. They weren’t from our neighbourhood. And that remains today. There are some people that go into McMaster from the poverty stricken areas of the city. It’s not a completely closed gate; but it’s not a welcoming one either.”

The figures appear to back him up. According to the 2010 Composite Learning Index profile for Hamilton, all of our statistics fall within the National Average, except for one intriguing measurement that falls just short. The percentage of students who reach university is 23.6 per cent, and this figure has dropped from 2008 when the figure was 27.8 per cent. Additionally, the Ontario Secondary School Literacy test conducted by the Education Quality and Accountability Office presents some interesting findings. Results from the 2010 test indicate that the percentage of fully participating students across the province who successfully completed the test was 84 per cent. Hamilton ranked well with an 81 per cent success rate, and our schools have shown improvement since the test’s inception. However, when you analyze the numbers for the individual schools the story they tell takes an intriguing ... well... twist.

Ancaster High School improved upon both the city’s and province’s average with a success rate of 88 per cent. Westdale Secondary School did even better with 93 per cent of its students successfully completing the test. The figures dip the further east you go. Sir John A Secondary School had a 72 per cent success rate. Barton Secondary School had a success rate of 65 per cent. Only 63 per cent of the students at Delta High School successfully completed the test. Data gathered by the Hamilton Spectator for its hard hitting 2010 Code Red series relating to high school drop-out rates shows the same alarming trend.

“This is immensely complex,” says Judith Bishop, Chair of the Board of the Hamilton Wentworth District School Board. “Poverty, literacy and economics are all interconnected and feed on each other. Why this is so disastrous for a place like Hamilton is you have people you can’t train; who can’t use a computer; who aren’t comfortable if you give them an inventory to do on the computer, or follow a manual. This has an impact. It’s your ability to use literacy and your functional literacy which makes you a worthwhile employee.”

According to a report on Incomes and Poverty conducted by the Social Planning and Research Council of Hamilton made public in April 2009, although the city’s general poverty rate decreased from 19.8 per cent in 2000 to 18.1 per cent in 2005; child poverty rates actually increased from 25.2 per cent to 26.4 per cent in the same five year span. The reasons for this increase are many and complex, but the results lead to decreased chances of success for these children.

“If you have parents who don’t have higher education, your chances of doing well in school are less, because you don’t have the support,” Judith explains. “You can live in areas of the city where you don’t meet anybody who has a university degree, and you don’t know what pathways are available. You arrive at school without the general knowledge and without the language ability that you need to be successful. You don’t meet anybody who is doing something different and have exposure to them. So then you have a problem that you may do well in school but you still don’t think of going on to college or university because it wasn’t in your background. You have to have mentors. Business in a variety of ways can help kids see they have different possibilities.”

Through charitable giving, co-op placements, mentoring and helping school boards develop programs to provide experience within specific fields our local business people can, and do, make a difference. The need to provide mentorship and strong authority figures is vital to ensure the success of our children from all socio-economic backgrounds. Local business leaders can help by playing the role of Mr. Brownlow to mentor and provide an alternative future to today’s poverty stricken children to combat the modern day Fagins that are often the only peers and authority figures many of these children have.

The results are inarguable. According to the United Way contributions to their 2009 campaign helped 1,176 children improve their academic skills and develop good work habits. Adult mentors were matched with 762 children and youth. When business leaders take an active mentorship role in the lives of our impoverished youth, they have a greater chance of joining the educated and productive workforce needed to drive our city to continued economic prosperity.

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Panorama Magazine is published by Banko Media

2009-12-29T09:47:00.004-05:00

Philanthrocapitalists

The Hamilton Community Foundation has launched a new fund that provides a return on investment for community giving. The idea? That the earned income will be recycled for social good

By Peter Mitchell

“When you think about what’s happening in philanthropy currently in North America, there is a more demanding and a more urgent approach being taken by younger entrepreneurs,” Cooke says. “Oftentimes these are philanthropists who say ‘I want to see the benefit done in my lifetime, and I want to flow that money on a much more aggressive timeframe.’”

The Hamilton Community Foundation is the charity organization dedicated to improving the city through the creation of endowment funds from charitable gifts, administering grants from investment income, and providing the leadership and resources required to build a strong and buoyant community. The HCIF is the newest tool in their toolbox, and Cooke says changes in the 2010 federal budget opened the door to flow-through granting that allow the tool to be wielded with maximum effect.

“Historically we would have had to preserve capital for a minimum of ten years and granted the income off the investments,” he explains. “These restrictions on spending down capital have been removed. It allows philanthropists to define the term, the defined outcome, and the pacing with which they want the benefits of their philanthropy to flow back into their communities. If it’s their choice that it remain in perpetuity and simply the income granted on a 3 ½ per cent a year basis they can do that. But if donors choose to donate a million dollars and have it flow out over ten years –a hundred thousand dollars a year plus interest– that’s their prerogative, and that is completely supported and encouraged in fact by the recent changes by the federal government in the last budget”

Part of the inspiration for the HCIF comes from Bill Young Jr. He amassed a small fortune as the CEO of Hamilton Computers and then repeated the feat with Optel Communications before founding Social Capital Partners (SCP), a non-profit social finance company in 2001. He also advises on the administration of the Young Fund, a $40 million gift his mother, Joyce, made to HCF in the spring of 2000, one of the largest single acts of philanthropy in Canadian history. According to Cooke, Young is one of the leading voices in Canada calling for private and public foundations to be more aggressive in terms of looking for direct impacts in their community investments, and he has the experience to give his voice authority.

Cooke cites the example of the Active Green and Ross Tire and Auto Centre franchises. SCP offered the company loans to commit to hiring disadvantaged workers in their stores, with the rate of interest dependent on the number of social hires they employed. The initiative is a rousing success for all parties involved. The workers who previously faced employment barriers have proven their worth, and the program has expanded from one to more than 20 stores and counting, with each successful hire improving the terms of repayment.

“The payback on the loan diminishes with every hard to employ person that they’re able to place within a franchise,” Cooke says. “There’s an assessment done both in terms of the required payback on the capital, and that is calibrated and in fact lowered if you’re doing more social good. That’s the magic we’re trying to create here. We’re trying to marry both an investment return with a social benefit to the community.”

That marriage begins with a $5 million dowry of unrestricted capital that comes directly from the assets donors have requested be targeted specifically towards Hamilton’s greatest needs. The hope is other funds will be added after the initial honeymoon period has proven the relationship will thrive. Over the next few months, board members will do the due diligence necessary to ensure the plan is well thought out. They will establish the necessary policy and financial framework, and identify projects that align with the HCF’s focus on job creation, affordable housing, capacity building, arts incubation and other social enterprises that may not meet the risk criteria of banks and other traditional lending institutions. Cooke hopes they will start to invite proposals sometime in the next calendar year.

“We’ll very likely be looking at something in the area of arts incubation and social housing. It probably will be sometime further down the path that we’ll look at social enterprises which are small businesses with a social good involved. I suspect that what we’ll want to do is take a fairly wide cut at the community and invite people with good ideas to bring them to us.”

The fund is not without precedent and board members are working closely with a number of private foundations who have successfully implemented similar initiatives; notably the Edmonton Community Foundation. They launched their Social Enterprise Fund in partnership with the city in February 2008, with both parties each committing $3 million to its creation. The Alberta Capital Region and the Alberta Real Estate Foundation have also invested $500,000 apiece. It is considered one of the leading community foundations in the country, making it the perfect template to work from.

“We’re not trying to reinvent the wheel here,” Cooke says. “The reality is that there is lots of institutional knowledge out there at foundations that have been doing this, especially in the U.S., for decades. Certainly in Canada the private foundations have been involved in community investing for a considerable period of time. As a result we get the benefit of both their mistakes and their knowledge.

We’re trying to learn from the best practices of Edmonton and a number of other private foundations who have done this successfully for a long time. So it’s on the leading edge but not the bleeding edge.”

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Panorama Magazine is published by Banko Media

2009-12-28T08:36:00.006-05:00

Web 2.0: Communication e-volution

What the new social media can do for your business

by Peter Mitchell

When John Donne wrote "No man is an island" in 1624, it was with a quill pen painstakingly dipped in ink and carefully applied to parchment to ensure readability. It took years for his message to reach his audience and he probably passed away never knowing the profound impact it had on so many lives. Today, he would likely post his meditations on a blog or podcast and reach his audience in a matter of seconds. That audience would respond with equal haste, either praising his genius or expressing their disagreement on Twitter or Facebook. The rise of social media has revolutionized the way we communicate, and Donne's words ring true today more than ever before.

Web 2.0 is providing the information highway with a radical upgrade; changing it from a series of one way streets into a complex, multi-directional grid with various points of entry and departure. With the free flowing exchange of ideas, dialogue and collaboration fuelling the online renaissance, anyone can control the stream of traffic. Companies can no longer post a stationary website on the side of the road to get their message out. They need to actively participate to drive traffic to their sites and encourage the exchanges that social media provides.

“I like to say a website is not an island,” says Gerry Visca, co-founder and Creative Director of Redchair Branding. “Too many of us used to position our website as an island. It was about us, and we didn’t take the time to ask what it is that you want as a visitor to the site. Those days are long gone. There’s a shift in power from the producer to the consumer. They’re the ones that are saying why you should buy an iPod or why you shouldn’t buy this lipstick. With social media the consumer has the ability to spread that message across multiple channels simultaneously at the speed of thought.”

Although he still maintains a website, Visca uses his blog as his primary marketing tool. It allows him to make instantaneous updates, and to link videos directly from his YouTube account. He ‘Twitters’ daily and those status updates are automatically delivered to hundreds of thousands of people’s networks around the world. He credits social media applications with much of his professional success –and they’re all free; guaranteeing a good return on investment. But he admits that with so many to choose from the challenge is figuring out which applications will best serve your company’s needs.

Martin Waxman is the president of Palette Public Relations in Toronto and will be teaching a Social Media course at McMaster University this fall. He says the first thing a business must do is monitor what is happening out there and find out what is being said about your organization. Then, as with any marketing or communications plan, you need to step back and decide what goals you need to achieve, and which tools will help you accomplish them.

“In social media there are so many pretty, shiny things. You can’t get caught up with them,” he explains. “It’s interesting to try them, but they may not be right for you. Not every organization needs to be on Twitter. Depending on your customer base or your audience, you may want to have a fan page or a business page on Facebook. But if you’re only communicating to your trade, Facebook may not be the place you want to be because it’s such a wide group”

“Or you may want to develop your own internal community and use the same tools as a way of communicating with your employees. We often think of social media as externally facing but there are a lot of great tools that you can use internally. For example a CEO could have a blog just for employees, and employees would have a chance to interact with a CEO. They could have podcasts they share internally.”

Once you decide on your specific needs, the next step is to create a social media policy for your company. Waxman says this is important because organizations have lots of staff members who are already participating in various networks and communities; and the line between a person’s personal and professional lives is increasingly blurred.

“Sometimes people forget that this is a public conversation, not a personal one,” he explains. “You’re not whispering to a friend or a colleague; you’re in essence broadcasting it. If you put something out on Twitter and don’t use good judgment, you can get an organization into a lot of trouble. It’s important to know what is appropriate and what isn’t. As an individual on Facebook you can do whatever you want and take the consequences, but if you’re in any way, shape or form representing an organization, you need to adhere to policies.”

It is the informal and oftentimes playful qualities of many social media applications that make the tightrope between private and professional such a difficult one to navigate. Those potential hurdles have been eliminated from LinkedIn, a social networking site tailored specifically for business purposes. Launched in 2003, the site now boats more than 40 million users, who use it to build contact lists, seek and post employment and business opportunities, join industry groups, or pose questions for other community members to answer.
Jim Rudnick builds websites through his company, KKT Interactive. Clients are increasingly asking him about the various tools social media has to offer as a means to increase traffic to their websites. He too recommends LinkedIn more than any other and adds that not only does it help bring people to you, it also gives you access to their knowledge and expertise.

“It also provides me with a great advisory board, because I can access people who have more experience; or are in a different field than me,” he explains. “For example, I was looking for a VOIP service so I queried my LinkedIn connections and asked ‘Who are you using? What are the pluses and minuses for whoever you may be using? Who would you recommend?’ I got lots of great answers, including the one that I finally purchased for the office.”

Rudnick says you need to be aware that social media is a moving target that is constantly evolving; trying to stay current and technologically advanced can become a full time job. He himself has a thick stack of print-outs that he adds to daily. At the end of every working day, he takes part of that stack home and spends his evening catching up on the latest news and developments.

“Most companies don’t have the time for that. They are too busy making steel, providing accounting services,–they don’t want to know all that stuff,” he says. “My advice would be to either do as I do and spend that time in learning things to stay as abreast as you can, or hire someone who does it. You’ll pay the freight, but you’ll see rises in your website’s Search Engine Ranking Positions, more traffic and more money.”

For business owners hesitant to take their first steps into Web 2.0, Gerry Visca offers the following solution: “The simplest way to turn your website into a social media tool is to add a dialogue box that asks, ‘What do you want? What do you need? Give us some feedback.’ Insert anything that allows someone to enter information, and you immediately redefine the experience and turn it into a social media site.”

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Panorama Magazine is published by Banko Media

2009-12-27T00:00:00.000-05:00

December 2010

Feature Story

The Corporate Samaritan

Why corporate philanthropy and responsibility make good business sense

By Peter Mitchell

“I think people get overwhelmed with the size of a problem and the feeling that they don’t make a difference,” Jane Allison explains. “When in truth, everybody makes a difference. If you figure out that collective capital all together, that’s extraordinary.”

Allison is the Manager, Community Partnerships at the Hamilton Spectator. She is one of many Corporate Samaritans who have recognized that big problems require big solutions; solutions that big business can provide. Through SpecKids Unlimited, she works tirelessly to administer that collective capital to improve the lives of our youth. Those efforts, combined with the assistance of local partners and donors, have supported the Summer Camp Fund, The Jeff Dickins Memorial Award, Hess Kids Unlimited and other initiatives. They are investments that benefit the recipients, but like all investments they are made with an eye on the eventual return.

“Corporate Philanthropy is about making the community stronger,” she says. “And that includes making your business stronger. Corporate Philanthropy is not solely an altruistic intention. There is a lot of altruism in it, but it is also smart business.”

Grahame Browne, Vice President, Human Resources and General Administration at ArcelorMittal Dofasco agrees.

“You have to give the message of the altruistic side but businesses aren’t by their very nature altruistic. There is a reason for doing this,” he explains. “Sometimes it’s because it feels good, but for the most part there is a net benefit to the community or to the company itself. For example we invest in the arts. That’s the kind of investment that improves the quality of life in the community but also creates vibrancy that makes this an attractive place to come to. It brings talent into the community and it makes that potential talent much more interesting. That’s beneficial to us obviously because they become part of that pool of talent that we may draw on in the future. You want to make sure it’s a good social return on investment.”

ArcelorMittal Dofasco provides approximately $3 million a year to the community through employee donations, corporate donations and sponsorships. That money has filtered to a variety of causes including the St. Joseph’s Healthcare Foundation, the United Way, and neighbourhood food banks. Through sponsorships the company has supported the Bulldog, Theatre Aquarius, and HECFI among other organizations supporting local sports and culture.

Money talks obviously, but today’s socially responsible corporate philanthropists realizes there’s more than simply talking the talk; they have to walk the walk as well. They don’t just provide financial assistance, they offer much needed knowledge, expertise, services and volunteers to causes that simply don’t have those resources on their own.

“Typically we tend to take a more holistic view of our partnerships,” Browne explains. “We’ll contribute in a financial sense, but in many cases we also contribute volunteer time support. We have lots of folks here who volunteer. At the corporate level, we are active on a lot of Boards which allow us to help the governance of those organizations; allows us to provide insights in terms of financial and human resources, tax and legal issues, and all kinds of things. A lot of not for profits need that kind of support because they can’t afford to staff for it.”

That comprehensive approach is shared by Andrew Furgal at the Bank of Montreal. As Vice President, South Central Ontario District, he has seen hefty donations made to many organizations including the United Way, the Art Gallery of Hamilton, the Children’s Aid Society of Hamilton-Wentworth, the Dr. Bob Kemp Hospice, the Mohawk College Foundation, the YMCA and the St. Joseph’s Healthcare Foundation. He also sits on the Board of Directors at the Art Gallery of Hamilton where he can provide valuable assistance in seeing how their money is spent.

“One of the things that banks in particular are good at are assessing business ventures,” Furgal says. “We can answer questions and provide suggestions as to how a particular charity might best either use the funds or do a better job in terms of applying for the funds. We will lend people to different organizations to volunteer with certain events or become part of certain causes. And it’s a two way street because we’ll get an opportunity to develop an employee by having them participate on a board. We can increase our employee skill base by giving them greater exposure to different things that are going on in the community, and by interacting with people from different companies through boards and other volunteer groups.”

That doesn’t necessarily mean the corporate cup runneth over. Requests for donations have increased dramatically in recent years, fueled in part by the downloading of funding from the federal, provincial and municipal governments. The money is no longer available through public coffers so charities are turning to the private sector in growing numbers. There simply isn’t enough supply to match the demand so businesses have to be more discerning in terms of who they are dealing with.

“Sometimes people will come to us with just get a letter: saying: We would like you to donate to our cause. There is no amount requested; and they’re not really telling us what they’re all about or what it is they’re trying to accomplish,” Furgal explains. “I can contrast that with the people who want to see us in person; who sit down and will tell us all about their organization; what it is they are trying to accomplish. And they will take it one step further by noting that we’re trying to accomplish the same thing. They’ll link it back to what they know our own corporate values to be, and present it almost as a partnership. It’s those proposals that catch our attention.”

“You take the time to really get to know the project you’re working on: what it really means, and the people who are running it,” Allison says. “And when you have to say no try to do it with as much respect as possible because it’s no this time, but not necessarily forever. In this community the circles are small and they intersect, so the likelihood that you will be working with people that you’ve turned down on another project is very high. Even if I say no, my goal is to have them walk away feeling okay about the exchange and happy to talk again at some future point.”

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Panorama Magazine is published by Banko Media

2008-12-31T10:10:00.008-05:00

Editorials:

From the Editor's Desk:
Communication

By Peter Mitchell

It’s human nature to insulate ourselves during times of trouble. When the storm looms on the horizon we batten down the hatches and hope for the best. We rely too much on meteorologists to provide us with information that we can easily, and often more accurately obtain by simply stepping outside. And we don’t need a meteorologist to tell us to take an umbrella if the forecast calls for rain, but that is often what we do.
(Click here to read the full editorial)

From the Editor's Desk:
The Age of the Entrepreneur

By Peter Mitchell

The rise of the corporate emperors in the latter half of the 20th Century shaped our reality with our unquestioning faith in the myths that surrounded them. Like London beckoning to Dick Whittington with its promise of fame and fortune, we were led to believe the path to success and stability is paved with gold. Work hard –for us- and we will reward you. Think positive –for the company’s sake- and all will be well. Join the corporate ‘family’ and you will be looked after until the end of your days. We happily wore the rose-coloured glasses they supplied and blindly followed these Pied Pipers down the yellow brick road.
(Click here to read the full editorial)

Interviews:

Rocky Mountain High

Business Lessons from Mount Everest

By Peter Mitchell

On May 21^st, 2008 Scott Kress became the 51^st Canadian to summit Mount Everest, fulfilling a lifelong ambition that took the adventurous boy from his neighbourhood trees and rooftops to the top of the world. Along the way, the enterprising entrepreneur scaled the heights of business success, becoming president of both Summit Training and Development Ltd. in Oakville and St. Catharines based company Frontier Team Building. His experiences have made him one of the most sought after Leadership and Team Development experts in North America. Business Niagara was fortunate to obtain an interview with Mr. Kress to discuss the climb, and the skills and lessons that can be applied by leaders everywhere as they ascend the peaks of personal and professional success.
(Click here to read the full interview)

'Tis Better to Give

One on One with John McCall Macbain

By Peter Mitchell

On October 15^th John McCall MacBain was named the Distinguished Leader for 2008 by the Brock University Faculty of Business. The Niagara born native attended A. N. Myer Secondary School in Niagara Falls before graduating in economics from McGill University, attending Oxford University as a Rhodes Scholar, and receiving an MBA from the Harvard School of Business.
(Click here to read the full interview)

One on One with Len Crispino

By Peter Mitchell

As president and CEO of the Ontario Chamber of Commerce, Len Crispino has a full plate championing the province’s business community. When he escapes the hustle and bustle of Toronto life to return to his home in Niagara’s Jordan Village, it’s not to relax but to devote his time, energy and effort pursuing his dream: “A Foreign Affair Winery”, the 40-acre vineyard he operates with his wife and brother-in-law. He also serves as a Vice-Chair on the Niagara College Board of Governors, helping students embark on their own career aspirations. He is proof that pursuing a dream is not for the faint of heart, and requires a lot of hard work.
(Click here to read the full interview)

One on One with George Smitherman

By Peter Mitchell

On May 14th, 2009 the Ontario Legislature passed the Green Energy Act. The Act, introduced to the Legislature on February 23, is designed to bring new investment to the province, create the next generation of green economy jobs and better protect the environment. As the legislation continues its journey to Ontario's Lieutenant Governor for Royal Assent, Business Niagara asked George Smitherman, the Deputy Premier and Minister of Energy and Infrastructure, what the Act will mean for local businesses.
(Click here to read the full interview)

2008-12-30T10:57:00.002-05:00

From the Editor's Desk

Communication

By Peter Mitchell

If recent world events have taught us anything, it’s the importance of being actively involved in the decisions and institutions that affect our businesses and our lives. The deregulation of American financial institutions in the late Twentieth Century brought sunny skies at the time, but we were blinded by the light and failed to see the encroaching economic storm that swept over the horizon. Only after the clouds broke did we realize that maybe we should have been more engaged. But this realization comes at a time when our over-reliance on the Internet can seriously weaken our ability to be involved.

There’s a synergy created from human interaction that the Internet undermines. A simple five minute conversation can be stretched out over days, even weeks when conducted online. We prepare our carefully composed snippets of information, hit send, and wait for a response that often takes hours or days to arrive –if it arrives at all. Not only is this woefully inefficient, the spontaneity of conversation is gone. The sparks that fly from verbal sparring don’t have a chance to ignite let alone blaze into new ideas, new solutions, and new ways of conducting business. Communication should deliver progression, not obstruction.

The Internet also fails to provide the regulation that constructive engagement requires. Whispers and rumours are too easily perceived as fact. Armchair critics throw virtual punches from the safety of their homes, easily sidestepping the countering jabs and parries that may be thrown their way with the tap of a computer key. The Internet provides a global playing field for schoolyard bullying, and as so often happens on the playground the bully is the first to run home when the going gets tough, fearful of the occasional black eye that engagement can bring. Compromises can’t be achieved, resolutions can’t be produced, and progress can’t be made. Noise and bitterness are the only results.

It is not enough to sit in front of our computer screens adding our voices to the cacophony of twitters and flickers and blogs. Facebook time is a poor substitute for physical face time. We need to disentangle ourselves from the Web and reassert out presence in the real world. Now more than ever, we must engage in our communities through our chambers of commerce; our political offices; and our media. We might get our feet wet and we might suffer a few cuts and bruises; but that is the cost of participating in the real world, and it’s a small price to pay if we truly want to improve the shape of things to come.

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Business Niagara is published by Niagara Magazine Group

2008-12-29T11:05:00.002-05:00

From the Editor's Desk

The Age of the Entrepreneur

By Peter Mitchell

“Nobody talks of entrepreneurship as survival, but that's exactly what it is and what nurtures creative thinking.”

Anita Roddick, Founder, The Body Shop

Then the 21st Century came along and revealed the man behind the curtain. To our horror the economic crisis made us realize that the emperors were wearing no clothes, and the truth behind their fairy tales proved grim as they showed their true colours in their self-preservation; casting employees, investors and stock-holders aside as fodder for the wolves. The gloves and glasses came off as the global economy descended into nightmare.

But no matter how much they make us toss and turn in the hours of darkness, nightmares always come to an end. The sun always rises, and the fears that once seemed so overwhelming gradually fade away like wisps in the morning mist. Our businesses, our region, our country and our world are now truly at the cusp of a new day. We are at the dawning of the Era of the Entrepreneur –and it’s a glorious day.

The true entrepreneur knows the path to prosperity is rocky, overgrown and fraught with fear,. There is no knight in shining armour charging in to save the day. You must pick up the sword yourself and slay the dragons that threaten to slay you. To achieve happily ever after you must fight for it; you must work for it; you must forge your own path. And the tools to navigate that journey come from within.

Necessity, long lauded as the mother of invention is proving to be the father of the entrepreneur as well. Unleashed from the shackles of the corporate emperors –the bureaucracy, the office politics, the back-stabbing and egos– today’s entrepreneur is free to be a trail-blazer; to apply the innovation, creativity and ‘outside the box’ thinking that had been locked away for far too long. The Era of the Entrepreneur is an age of adventure, and the rewards are there for the taking. It’s no longer just about dreams of success; it’s a matter of survival.

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Business Niagara is published by Niagara Magazine Group

2008-12-28T15:51:00.001-05:00

Rocky Mountain High

Business Lessons from Mount Everest

By Peter Mitchell

What is your biggest motivator?

Passion is a big part of my life. We can have a more fulfilling life if there’s something that we’re passionate about. Many people often start off in their youth being very passionate about certain things, but then life happens. You get busy and turn different corners and that flame starts to dwindle and in some cases it even goes out. For me, climbing is a passion that drives my life. I can see how it has a direct route to where I am today. It keeps me in shape. It gives me a reason to work out. Without that passion I just might sit on the couch and not do anything.

The climbing aspect ties in well with my business. In the business environment it’s hard to tell if you are doing well. There are so many factors coming in from all over the place it’s hard to know if you are working at the peak of your ability. Whereas in climbing, it’s a very black and white world. You can see immediately the impact of teamwork, the impact of leadership, and the impacts of change management. You make a decision and you know pretty much immediately if it was the right one or the wrong one.

How would you describe the team building dynamics involved in the Everest climb?

We had a very short time in which to create a high performance team, so we talked about the division of who we wanted to be and what did that mean as far as leadership, communications, change management and conflict resolution. We spent a lot of time getting to know each other and had team meetings every day. We made sure we were all personally accountable for the success of the team.

We started to form our own little culture and quickly got into our own ways of doing things. Then a trekking group came into our camp and stayed for three days. When you have a culture, and all of a sudden you get new team members or a merger with another team or organization, it completely throws your existing culture up in the air. In this particular case it was a negative influence. They didn’t seem to understand or care about our culture and what we were doing. They were just there and they were going to do what they were going to do. We found that those of us on the climbing expedition started spending less time in the dining area because they weren’t fitting in, and they didn’t make any attempts to fit in. It was almost like they were trying to impose their culture and their values on us and it wasn’t working.

You can certainly see how that can happen in organizations. When you merge two organizations coming from two different cultures, they’re not necessarily going to work without some influence in there; without some working around with them. You don’t notice your own culture until it’s changing on you. What’s that saying? The fish is the last to discover water. It’s just there, and unless it’s changed or gone, that’s when you notice what it was.

How did the experience and your observations of people under extreme circumstances change your perceptions or change the dynamics of how you operate your business?

I don’t think it changed any perceptions, but it helped to solidify beliefs and put things into practice. In our training courses we talk about leadership, communication and team building. This was an opportunity to really put it into play. We’re taking this brand new team –you can think of it as a project team– and we had to accelerate to a high rate of performance in a very short period of time.

Base Camp was a great learning laboratory to examine leadership and team dynamics. You have all these different teams and some of them are working well together and some are total disasters. You can start to see the root cause. A lot of the root cause in poorly functioning teams is leadership. It’s because they’re not being led well; it’s because the leadership style doesn’t really match with the expectations of the team. Then it’s group dynamics: people haven’t spent time getting to know each other; clarifying their goal, their vision, their values, their mission. It doesn’t matter how good you are. If you have a bunch of talented and experienced people, it doesn’t mean you’re going to have a good team if you’re not all there for the same reason and don’t share the same values and mission and purpose.

You arrived and weren’t sure if the climb was going to proceed. Can you expand on that?

We were originally supposed to climb in Tibet on the North Side. We had our permits and everything was all set to go, but we arrived in Kathmandu and at the last minute the Chinese government canceled all the permits and closed the borders to foreigners because they were taking the Olympic Torch to the summit. By that point there had already been challenges and protests and they didn’t want to have anybody interfering with the Olympic Torch Relay. Because there was media there they didn’t want to have anybody utilizing it as a vehicle for Free Tibet protests. The military didn’t want anybody communicating with the outside world. Anybody found doing so would be arrested and deported. The easiest way not to have interference is not to have any people. They closed the mountain and that was it. We had to scramble and get a permit to climb from the South side in Nepal. It was a very crazy world.

One of the models we look at is the Circle of Concern versus the Circle of Influence. There were certain teams on the mountain that really spent a lot of time focusing on the Circles of Concern –those are all the things that impact your world but you can’t do anything about: the military decisions, tent to tent searches, people being arrested and deported. The people that were focusing on the Circle of Concern were arguing with the military, trying to get them to change their mind and change the rules. It impacted their level of team work; their team dynamics, and ultimately their health. People were getting flu and pulmonary oedemas. That ultimately impacted their success rate.

We weren’t antagonistic. We were focusing on our Circle of Influence: ourselves, our attitudes and what we were doing. Because we were focusing on our Circle of Influence and working well with the military, things that used to be in our Circle of Concern actually started to come into our Circle of Influence. All of a sudden we got privileges that we didn’t have before: being allowed to make phone calls home and send out Internet dispatches provided that they were first read and approved by the military. The military actually started to ask us questions because we were seen as a bit of a leadership team within all the expeditions.

So it was a great example of where you put your energy and the results that you get because of it. The lesson from that is focus on what you can influence; don’t focus on all the other stuff because you’re not going to change it. If you focus on your Circle of Influence, you’ll be surprised by how much your influence grows. The economy is a great example right now. Focus on your job and do a good job. All that other stuff will just burn you out. That’s one of the lessons that resonates most with people.

Some of the descriptions on your blog were frightening. How does the overcoming of fear apply?

You can’t let the fear control you. Fear breeds hesitation and hesitation will make your worst nightmares come true. If you hesitate you’re not in it all the way, and that’s when you pull back or you don’t put all your energy into it and that’s when things go wrong. You can exacerbate the danger by your mental awareness or attitude. You can’t really think about the danger.

On the summit push I knew it was dangerous; I knew it was hard; I knew it was going to be uncomfortable but I knew that there was only one way to do it. It’s almost a trance-like state. You just put one foot in front of the other. By that point it’s all in your mind. If you can control your mind then you can keep going. If you let your mind control you then you’re not going to make it. You’re going to get scared. You’re going to get stressed out. Many of the people who die on Mount Everest die after they summit; and it’s because they get to the top, they’ve achieved their goal and all of a sudden their adrenaline levels drop. They lose their focus; they lose their balance; they trip; they fall. All of a sudden they’re getting cerebral oedemas; they’re incoherent; their dexterity is gone. All of these things happen in a span of minutes because they have achieved their goal and now their body is shutting down. In our minds the goal was to make it to the top AND to get back down to the bottom again.

You’ve anticipated my next question with that. Once you scale Everest that’s it; you’ve scaled the highest peak. How do you deal with the void accomplishment can leave?

I guess in some ways it’s a bit of a letdown because all of a sudden the next day you don’t have to climb anymore. I don’t know if I would say that I experienced any type of depression or let down after coming home but definitely my level of fitness waned because I didn’t have a goal to focus on anymore. There was nothing making me work out. I stopped running for a while. I started to put on weight. It took a while before I got back into it. I had to find a new focus because that goal of climbing Everest was done. I need to have something driving me. It’s hard for me to do it just for the sake of doing it.

You need to have a goal, a focus, something in mind. That goal that you’ve had for all these years, and specifically for those couple of months is now gone. You lose that purpose in life. I think that’s why you hear of a lot of people who die shortly after retiring because all of a sudden they don’t have that purpose in their life anymore.

So from a business point of view, once you achieve the goal it’s important to come up with the next one.

Yes. When you have achieved your goal or milestone, you definitely need to recognize that and celebrate it. But then you need to know what’s next. There’s a saying: Ultimately nothing fails like success. Because when the party’s over everybody stands around wondering what do we do now?

And that’s the leader’s role because leadership generally should be looking long term: where are you heading; what’s your vision; what’s your direction as an organization. You need to know what’s next because it’s those goals that really motivate and inspire people, and that’s how you get the performance.

What are the main lessons you give to people when you’re speaking to them?

Focus on your team; not only in selecting your members but knowing why you’re all there. What is your vision, your purpose, your values. Focus on that relationship; it’s the foundation of any high performance team. Without a solid foundation you’re never going to get to high performance.

Leadership is critical. Whether they know it or not, the power that leaders have is tremendous in how they influence the team and the culture of the team. You want to be a deliberate leader so you know what you want to achieve; and who you want to be as leader so you can intentionally do those things necessary to achieve them.

And ultimately it’s your personal attitude. It’s being accountable for the results that you get. Not blaming others for why things didn’t work. It’s asking, “What was my role, and what can I do to make things right? What can I do to be successful?”

This is not rocket science. I didn’t invent anything here. But we get so caught up in day to day life and business that we forget where we should really be putting our focus. It’s easy to be drawn down different paths and get upset about this or that when we have no control over it. Focus on where you have control: your team; you leadership; your Circles of Influence; your personal attitude. How you approach life is what you’re going to get out of it. How you approach business is what you’re going to get out of it. Ultimately your attitude determines your altitude.

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Business Niagara is published by Niagara Magazine Group

2008-12-27T12:26:00.001-05:00

'Tis Better to Give

One on One with John McCall Macbain

By Peter Mitchell

His impressive academic record was quickly surpassed by his business accomplishments. After working for three years as the director of marketing for Power Financial Corp. he struck out on his own in 1987 and bought Auto Hebdo, a Quebec based classified magazine for people buying and selling automobiles. Over the next two decades he built one of the largest classified advertising empires in the world, Trader Classified Media, extending throughout Canada before providing similar publications in Europe, China and Russia. Under MacBain`s entrepreneurial guidance, Trader Classified boasted 50 Internet sites and 350 print titles in 25 countries.

When he sold the company in 2006, the North American assets alone were worth a whopping $760 million. He could easily have invested in a yacht and sailed off into the sunset and a more-than-comfortable retirement. Instead he embarked on a new venture; possibly the most satisfying one of an already illustrious life.

He established the McCall MacBain Foundation to invest in climate change and other worldwide concerns. Based in Geneva, where MacBain now resides with his family, the charitable foundation presented its first grant in July 2007 to Liberia. Working in partnership with Conservation International, the goal is to help the African country improve its education, healthcare and environmental practices. While many might consider them lofty, possibly insurmountable aspirations, those naysayers don`t possess the drive and entrepreneurial spirit that has already led this international philanthropist to seemingly insurmountable educational and business success.

Business Niagara was fortunate to obtain an interview with Mr. McCall MacBain to get his thoughts on philanthropy and the responsibility we all share, as businesses and individuals, to put the pursuit of profits aside to help those causes and individuals in need of assistance. As any philanthropist will tell you, it is better to give than to receive.

Why do businesses give?

It’s not the guilt feeling. You want to give back. It seems like the right thing to do. There are great needs in the world. We’re concentrating our efforts on two major areas: health and education in sub-Saharan Africa, starting with Liberia. There are great needs there. People are dying. We’re working on maternal mortalities, stuff like that, with our fund.

Secondly we’re working on climate change because it’s having a terrible impact on our planet, on our children and our children’s children. We have great needs and philanthropists are needed to make changes that the government isn’t handling. Philanthropists play a big role and we’re willing to take it on. We have been fortunate through our system to be able to amass enough wealth, much more than we need to live on. So let’s try to give it away intelligently to try to make some good changes in the world.

Do you believe in philanthrocapitalism: the belief that businesses can help the world’s needs better than governments and individuals?

There are roles for everyone. One of the things we’re doing is investing in sustainable and social business. We have a big project to make a 35 megawatt wood chip renewable plantation in Liberia. That’s a big project that will change the lives of many people. They’ll get more power, they’ll get reliable power, and they’ll get power at half the price –with a zero carbon footprint.

If we make money, which will of course go back to our foundation, that’s great. So we can create a business which makes money, allows us to give away more money and at the same time creates a lot of jobs. We think this particular project has enormous potential; potentially more than governments and pure charities can provide by developing business in those areas.

Can you expand on Corporate Social Responsibility?

I do think that we forget how lucky we are. Corporate Social Responsibility makes sure that you’re doing things that aren’t harming the environment, because you’re going to have to be living in this environment in the future, both in your personal life but also your business life.

I don’t know how, for example, Philip Morris can hire any employees. I don’t understand that. People are mixing their personal life and their business life too much. I think that businesses have a role and businesses will maximize profit, but there’s a role for financial philanthropy. And individuals have a lot of money when they sell their businesses. They just don’t need to do stupid things and buy a big boat. They can do good things with their money and that’s what we want to do. That’s where our social responsibility is.

From a business owner’s standpoint, are there any other benefits beyond the “feel good” PR factor? Are there tax benefits?

The big benefit is that you’re doing the right thing. You’re helping to save lives. You’re helping make advances in a population that’s in dire need of particular luxuries that we had to give us a good start - education and healthcare – to get to where we are.

Has business philanthropy evolved in the past 10/20 years with the rise of the internet?

I think philanthropy has evolved in two ways. One is the political side. If you see Barack Obama’s campaign, he’s been able to raise a lot of money. There are also philanthropists that are raising money through the internet.

Also, Bill Gates has done a great thing by giving away the majority of his money to the Gates Foundation and getting Warren Buffet to put money there. That makes it a beacon of light for other business people by saying: “When you sell your business you don’t need all that money”. Try to invest it in smart philanthropy. Divide that between a big foundation like ourselves or a bank that gives away a little money here and there. That’s not as focussed as a smaller program like we’re talking about. They do it for community reasons etc. We’re doing it for the best health outcomes, the best educational outcomes.

Is there a downside for either the business or non-profit organizations?

Oh yeah, there’s that example of a city in Holland that decided they were going to do these great things by running some of their utilities with palm oil. What was happening was people in Indonesia were burning down their native forests to plant this palm oil, and they were creating more carbon in the atmosphere than if they were using gasoline.

Bad philanthropy can actually cause negative outcomes more than if they hadn’t done anything. There are lots of examples of that. You have to be careful when you’re giving and think of the ultimate goal. Will it be achieved properly? Some people don’t look at that; they don’t look at the unintended consequences of their giving. The other big one is bio-ethanol: using food as a fuel has basically raised fuel prices for the poor people in the world. That’s not a good thing.

What advice would you give to avoid that kind of scenario?

You should seek expert advice. You should evaluate your goals, set the goals for your programs, evaluate the programs in their execution to see if they are achieving those goals, and beware of unintended consequences. I guess the big thing philanthropies should do is make sure that what they do is sustainable. Not just give money away and the second it stops everything dies. Or buy a big building that nobody uses.

You have to be very careful that you have an entry and an exit point in your strategy. You want it to be sustainable. Some day the Ministry of Health in Liberia can take over this midlife college we’re setting up. We’re paying for a few years but eventually the Ministry will have to take over the cost and train local people to run it at a rate they can afford over the long term. Our philanthropy can’t continue to fund things indefinitely so they have to be sustainable over time. You want to be a change agent.

What can people or businesses do to protect themselves from frauds?

You want to get to know your grantees ‑ who you’re giving your money to and what you’re giving it for. Number two is to make sure you check it out. Don’t just give away your money and say “Good luck”. Give money over time, not all at once up front. Check up on it, make sure that your goals are very clear, and the staff is actually hired. Have them do a budget to show where the money is actually going.

What’s next for you personally and for your foundation?

We’re hoping to continue to develop green energy for Liberia on the investment side of the foundation. For the foundation itself, we’re looking at strategic grants around the world for the environment, and also to try to find more educational grants we can give in Liberia.

Any final thoughts?

I think people need to be aware of the responsibility they have to give to others, and try to do it in an intelligent way.

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Business Niagara is published by Niagara Magazine Group

2008-12-26T15:57:00.001-05:00

One on One with Len Crispino

By Peter Mitchell

Business Niagara was fortunate to obtain an interview with Mr. Crispino to discuss the current economic situation, what it means for Ontario and the Niagara region, and what we can do to prevail. As the world scratches its head trying to figure out what went wrong, he says we shouldn’t be running away from the economic nightmare that has engulfed the world, instead we should take advantage of the opportunities it presents and start running on a dream.

How bad is the economy really?

There’s no question people are losing jobs. Industries that at one time were fairly solid are now having to take another look at themselves; the automotive sector being one. But that doesn’t say that there can’t be a transition to a new economy as well. That’s part of the issue: that sometimes we as Canadians have a tendency to underestimate our abilities. Some of that I think relates to the fact that we are so tied in with the U.S. market. We have a very small market share of the rest of the world.

There is a lot of change happening in the economy. This is a globally caused situation that we find ourselves in. Our country generally is a very stable country; our banking system is very solid. We don’t have the mortgage issues that there have been in the United States. We’re fairly solid, but obviously we’re tied into a global market; in particular the United States.

Yes, things are bad and it’s important to recognize that there was a major downturn in the economy, but having said that we tend to point to companies that are failing. We forget that there is an inordinate amount of activity and entrepreneurship that is also happening out there; people that are responding to the economy.

Can you think of any specific examples in the Niagara region?

There is a company out there called Handling Specialty. That’s a company that has moved forward. And Dennis Parass is very good because he’s saying “Yeah, things are the way they are, but we have to forge ahead.” His market is not just a domestic market; it’s an international one: markets that typically somebody wouldn’t think of. He’s looking at forging ahead in other sectors that at first glance may seem ‘Well what does his equipment have to do with that?’ They have done work in the Middle East. They’ve done work for Cirque du Soleil. So there will be a shake-out in the economy, but as I said there are some very good companies that are pushing forward and seizing international markets.

With our economy so tied in to the American one, should we be following their lead in dealing with the downturn, or is this a good time to start taking steps to stand on our own two feet?

That’s a good question. It speaks to our philosophy on some of the issues that we’ve been facing because we’re so tied in. We have two major challenges in the province. One is the need to diversify what we produce: product diversification. And the second is geographic diversification.

The United States will always be our largest market; but that’s not to say that we can’t begin to diversify to other areas around the world. Canada and Ontario are seen to be stable places. There’s a quiet respect. They don’t see us perhaps quite as heavy on marketing as people from the United States. That may be a bit of a weakness but at the same time they also respect that. We’re not in your face. Maybe it’s time that we also begin to look at some of our policies, some of the principles upon which we’re grounded. But it’s also time that we begin to look at ourselves and ask what is a ‘Made in Ontario’ policy framework?

We also have to look at what is unique with us. What are our needs? What sort of policies do we want to put into place recognizing that we are a different country; we’re bounded by a different history. There may be some commonalities with the United States, but it is a different culture. We have our own ability to move ahead, and forge and identify who it is that we are.

We’re trying to look at Ontario as a magnet for the world, and evoking the entrepreneurial spirit in this province. It’s important when you look at the underlying spirit in this country and some of the icons that we’ve got. I know Terry Fox wasn’t born in Ontario; but there was within him that spirit of hope which I think can be a Canadian trait. And I think that trait has to come out under these conditions. People are looking for hope. They’re looking for the fact that we can get through this working together; having governments collaborate towards a common purpose.

There’s so many interesting projects that we could be looking at. There’s a lot of discussion around infrastructure. There’s been discussion about building a train between Quebec and Windsor. That’s a major undertaking, but at the same time when you think back in history, the railroad had a unifying effect on people. It created employment, but it also gave them a sense of hope and connectivity. I made a presentation to a standing committee in Niagara, and I said here is a project where you could get people to rally around; you could get the business community to be engaged in terms of funding; it would create employment; and it would be sustained over a long period of time. If you’re looking for a major unifying infrastructure project; here it is.

We have to dream big. Oftentimes dreamers are accused of not getting anything done. Well if there is no dream; nothing can be done. If you go back in history anything that was of a major consequence started with a dream. What we want to do as a Chamber is try to engage as many elements of the economy around a dream for Ontario and this notion of Ontario as a magnet for the world.

With the economy hurting, what specifically should the Ontario government be doing to help both in the short term and the long term?

We are very much in favour of encouraging –not just at the provincial but at the federal level– significant stimulus by way of infrastructure projects. We have a huge infrastructure deficit in Ontario and we have an opportunity now to close that gap. This is a good time because it has the additional benefit of helping the economy, but also fixing the potholes and building the bridges that are falling down in some cases.

Another area the business community often mentions is the issue of red tape, and the barriers to being able to move as quickly as possible; particularly as it relates to foreign direct investors who are coming into the province and saying “I want to invest here but I need to make sure that I don’t have a lot of impediments by way of red tape.” I believe Minister Bryant of the Ministry of Economic Development is onto this.

We’re also advocating the harmonization of the GST. It’s the kind of thing that can and will work as long as there’s federal involvement, because there will be a transition period. A huge major prerequisite is the federal government transitional funding for that. There have been some good developments on harmonization of the tax collection system. Now there’s only one corporate tax process by which you file. It has demonstrated that there can be federal provincial cooperation in these areas.

There’s still a big issue that we’re pushing the federal government on, and that is the issue of fiscal balance for Ontario. I don’t think Ontario has ever begrudged paying more than its fair due in Confederation. But over the years it’s gotten so out of whack that we’re actually funding other parts of Canada through our equalization up until now, to a far greater degree than the quality of services that we’ve had in our own province. There seems to be an imbalance there. We would hope that the federal government would take a look at the whole issue of fiscal transfers, not just equalization. There has to be a rebalancing.

Is a provincial deficit necessary to stimulate the economy? What are the dangers? And what measures should be implemented to keep it from getting out of hand?

I believe that people can accept short term deficits under these circumstances. I think the difficulty is when those deficits become sustained deficits. That’s the challenge that all governments are facing now: how do we begin to think about the point that we get out of where we’re at. Because we will; there will be a time when we get out of this. How do we plan for that? And that’s something that not a lot of people have thought about. They’ve thought about how to address the current economic problems, but there’s been very little thinking about how we address the growth that has to happen once this is over, and how we manage that growth. That’s where the whole question of deficits comes into play. Because if we’re going to be constantly having deficits, and we’re hampered because we’ve got to pay off debt; obviously that’s going to be an issue and it will dampen our ability to grow.

What should Niagara’s municipal leaders be doing to help the region?

To me it’s the ability to work together. Just think, if everybody worked together towards a a common goal, how much could be achieved. Niagara is facing challenges with the job losses at GM etc. Now is the time to get all of the key elements to work together. I think individually there is great strength. But I think that it’s time that everybody tried to move toward a common purpose. We have a lot of natural beauty that’s replicated throughout Niagara: Niagara on the Lake, Jordan Village, Vineland. They’re all unique, but there is a commonality to all of them. They’re all part of Niagara. What needs to be done so everybody can agree that we all need to work together; and by working together we can have a much stronger region? What politicians have to do is find ways of bridging any differences that might exist.

There is no reason why at some point Niagara can’t become the force that it once used to be. If you read through history, there used to be a major shipping centre where a lot of activity happened. It became a major hub. It’s not impossible for some new forms of excellence to form. It’s not going to help anybody to just say we’re in this mess; you’ve got to do something about it.

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Business Niagara is published by Niagara Magazine Group

2008-12-25T07:50:00.005-05:00

One on One with George Smitherman

By Peter Mitchell

How will the Green Energy Act affect the business community; particularly the manufacturing industry?

I think that the manufacturers have responded with excitement to the Green Energy Act. Because one of the things that it will do is it sent more renewable energy; but it also has a domestic content rule that will ensure more of an Ontario supply chain in any future renewable energy that takes place in Ontario. So there’s a lot of excitement amongst manufacturers and many people are looking to transition from their current manufacturing into things related to green energy.

What advice would you give to businesses in relation to the Green Energy Act? How can they best prepare?

I think the manufacturers have got to be out there, looking for opportunities, but we’ve already started to have some sessions including one last Friday: we had about 60 or 70 people there. So I think general awareness in terms of looking for manufacturing opportunities. For a range of other businesses there are a range of opportunities for them to become generators of electricity. As an example, anybody that’s got a flat rooftop is now given an incentive to take a look at whether they might do a solar array on their rooftop. We’ve got really attractive rates associated with the electricity that would be generated from that form. So we’re also trying to create, if you will, over time, mostly we had really big plants producing all the electrons that we need and we shipped them with wires. In the future, we’re trying to have more of a model where we have thousands, tens of thousands, or hundreds of thousands of micro-generators. So other businesses that are operating, doing whatever they do, might look for opportunities –to take rooftops as an example- and get some revenue out of it.

Does the Green Energy Act provide assistance to them?

Well it isn’t that it provides assistance so much at the front end, but what it does do is it provides a very good rate of compensation for the electricity that’s generated, and it does it with a 20 year contract, so it does it with a great deal of security associated with it. Even your roof at home, or the condominium building that I live in: they’re looking at how they can take a portion of their roof and install solar arrays.

In terms of investment, has any started coming in because of the Act?

I couldn’t speak to any in name to date; but that will not be the case for long. The Green Energy Act has put Ontario on the forefront of North American jurisdictions in terms of renewable energy. So the big companies around the world that have been manufacturing solar arrays and wind product are hovering about, and there’s no doubt whatsoever that we’ll land some of these businesses here in the province of Ontario.

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Business Niagara is published by Niagara Magazine Group

2007-12-31T10:11:00.006-05:00

Heroes For Hire

By Peter Mitchell

Step aside Mr. Bond, there’s a new hero in town.

At the end of Upper Ottawa Street sits a non-descript building that looks like it has seen better days. Blink and you’ll miss it. But step inside and you walk into a secret agent’s dreamscape of high-tech equipment and state-of-the-art gadgetry. From Hazardous Material (HAZMAT) suits to a Chemical Biological Radiological Nuclear Explosive (CBRNE) truck designed to respond to instances of terrorism –these are the tools of the trade for today’s modern hero.
(Click here for full profile)

Of Rape and Rehabilitation

By Peter Mitchell

When it comes to throwing stones at environmental sinners, quarries make an easy target. On the surface they rape the countryside, displace local wildlife and leave a gaping wound in the earth in their quest to supply the materials we demand for our roads and buildings. You can’t be less eco-friendly than that.
(Click here for full profile)

The Not So Impossible Dream

By Peter Mitchell

The proliferation of giant propeller-style turbines sprouting up in cities and countrysides across the globe bring to mind Don Quixote tilting at windmills in his efforts to make the world a better place. His heart was in the right place but many believed his mind was not. Yet he slowly developed a band of associates who recognized the deeper truth behind his crusade and supported him against all those who refused to come round to his way of thinking.
(Click here for full profile)

The Accidental Success

By Peter Mitchell

Retirement gives you the opportunity to pursue those hobbies you’ve put off for years. You can putter around the garden for hours on end, finally start writing the next great Canadian novel, or build a million-dollar baking enterprise in your own backyard.
(Click here for full profile)

Down the Stretch with Charles Juravinski

By Peter Mitchell

Reporters’ dreams are plagued with nightmares. Their sleep repeatedly shattered by terrifying images of missed deadlines, fire-breathing editors, or the ultimate horror: misplaced notes. That was the nightmare I found myself in when Charles Juravinski called me at home one afternoon. I had interviewed him on what had been a frantic day spent juggling priorities, jumping through hoops, and trying to appear in more than one place at the same time. It was a circus act I couldn’t quite pull off, and my notes from that interview had mysteriously vanished.
(Click here for full profile)

2007-12-30T11:31:00.001-05:00

Heroes For Hire

By Peter Mitchell

Step aside Mr. Bond, there’s a new hero in town.

It is the home of TEAM-1 Environmental Services Inc., a Hamilton based emergency response company that, in twelve short years, has grown to provide North America wide coverage. With a local staff of fourteen full time and thirty-five part time employees, they are ready 24/7 to respond to truck rollovers, “white powder” calls, in-plant emergencies, and many other threats to the environment and ourselves. Their services are retained by many businesses and industries, and they are frequently called upon by all levels of government, the OPP and local police and fire departments. They do what no else can.

Mitchell Gibbs is TEAM-1’s Manager of Emergency Services. A giant of a man, he could probably grind any of today’s big screen heroes into the dust, and is the type of person you would want to take charge in an emergency. He began his career in waste management before helping start TEAM-1 in 1996. He is regarded as an expert in environmental emergencies, compliance and planning, and is sought after across North America as a speaker. He has also written on the same issues for many publications, and in 2003 co-authored a book with Debbie Connor, TEAM-1’s Manager of Technical Services. Entitled ‘Another Day In Paradise’, it provides a rare glimpse into their dangerous, often horrific, work.

“We’re sort of the Navy Seals of HazMat,” Gibbs says. “We’re very specialized. Everybody thinks the police and fire departments do all this stuff, but most don’t. They leave it up to private responders. Imagine a big tank of acid letting go in a plant and flooding the place. They’ll respond, they’ll do a search and rescue, and they’ll be there for health and safety; but they’re not in the clean up business. They’re there to fight fires and do extrication, not respond to HazMats or clean up chemical spills inside a plant.”

It’s not a case of passing the buck as it is of possessing it. Fire and police departments are already operating with strained resources and simply don’t have the budgets to add the millions of dollars of required equipment and instruction for Hazardous Materials and other related training. The economics of environmental response give private industry a distinct advantage.

“If we see there’s a return on our investment, we get into that business. I’ve got several million dollars worth of equipment here which is not supported by tax base. It’s out of my own pocket. We need a return on that equipment obviously, and that’s usually arranged or derived through retainers: an industry pays us a monthly retainer to be available to them. For example we have a truck that goes to chemical fires to monitor the air and we’ll tell the emergency workers how bad the air is so they know how to handle the fire. That’s a very expensive unit but it’s the only one, I’d say, probably in all of Canada. It has been at train derailments. It was at the Plastimet fire. We’ve seen the return on that.”

The facility is licensed to bring back toxic waste where it is processed in the safest means available. When possible, the waste is sent to recyclers. If recycling isn’t an option, every attempt is made to dispose of material through incineration rather than landfill. There is a hazardous materials landfill in Sarnia, but incineration is the preferred, greener option.

The tools of private enterprise also allow for greater diversification. TEAM-1 also responds to crime scene clean-ups: murders, stabbings, crack houses, meth labs and marijuana grow operations. And yes, they do respond to instances of terrorism.

Gibbs says, “We don’t have a whole lot in the province of Ontario but there are a lot of instances of ‘White Powder’ calls. Anthrax calls. Even though it’s not necessarily a Bin Laden terrorism cult, it could be the wacko down on James Street that wants to send stuff through the mail. That does happen. We’ve done in excess of 300 of those. Six months ago, a housewife was turned down for a loan and she sent ten threatening letters to ten various banks. It’s like a fire-alarm going off in a high-school. Ninety-five per cent of them are false alarms, but you have to respond as if it’s a real threat; because if it isn’t the school burns down. If you don’t treat it as Anthrax and it is one day, then everyone’s exposed. You go in thinking, ‘Hmmmm. This is probably a false alarm’; but you still have to go through all the motions to protect yourself.”

Terrorist acts are still relatively few and far between, particularly in Ontario. The truth is we should be in a higher state of alert from our own commercial endeavours than from the Taliban; and we are in more danger from human error than human malice. Highway and in-plant accidents are almost daily occurrences.

“I can’t tell you how many times we respond to a forklift that’s gone through the bottom of a drum,” Gibbs says. “Any day, any hour, there’s always something. You don’t just shut down on Friday at 5:00 and wait for Monday morning to start up again like an accounting office. There’s no rhyme or reason when anything happens, and things do happen. We’re running four or five hundred occurrences a year, 365 days a year. Sometimes there’s three or four a day.”

Highway accidents are inevitable at any time of year, but are more frequent in the summer when drivers are on the road more often, and are more complacent. Truck drivers tend to drive for longer stretches of time to take advantage of the daylight, passing motorists are more likely to cut in front of them, and everyone tends to put the pedal to the metal. It’s a daily headline waiting to happen. When it does, the accidents themselves are also more dangerous.

Gibbs explains, “In the winter when a truck wipes out on the highway, it tends to slide through the snow in the ditch. Whereas on a hot August day the truck’s going to hit the dirt on the side of the road and rip right open. Because they put these big fuel tanks on the side of the trucks, the fuel rips open and that can cause a lot of environmental panic. As soon as a spill gets into a sewer, the sewers are designed to carry water away and exit to a stream or a creek and that’s when you get exposure to fish and wildlife. So it’s very, very important to find out if it’s reached a sewer because it changes the whole scale of the incident: now you’ve got to clean the sewer, and you’ve got to catch it on the other end if it hasn’t already gone into the lake.”

“One of the most difficult jobs to do is to drill into the side of a gasoline tanker. A truck flips over onto the side, and you can’t hook up to the valve. You have to drill holes into the side of the tanker truck. That’s quite something to have to do that. It’s essential to have the proper equipment and training.”

Training is another area that has proven lucrative for the company. TEAM-1 provides an Emergency Services Training Academy that offers courses in a variety of fields including Fire Extinguisher Handling, Confined Space Rescue, and Hazardous Materials Technician. Their site includes railcars, chlorine cylinders, an underground sewer system, and a three storey fire fighting structure. The courses are designed to be site specific to the trainee’s needs. Registration is open to the public, and many companies are prepared to open their wallets.

“Training is a huge thing now with industries just to reduce their liability. They want to minimize their risk of having a spill, so a lot of companies send eight, ten, twelve people every six or eight months to get trained. We also get a lot of people training to become firefighters trying to get courses in theory and practical. We’re running around five to six hundred courses a year.”

No one can deny that stepping into a room filled with cyanide, combating a chemical fire, or cleaning up a murder scene drenched with blood ranks high on the stress meter. But when you’re running the company, putting your life on the line doesn’t pardon you from sweating the small stuff. The same old business pressures apply.

Making sure enough staff and equipment are available and in good working order are common headaches. Multi-tasking without dropping the ball is critical when handling multiple calls that are kilometers apart and lives are on the line. Budgets must be written and adhered to even though there is no telling what the next day will bring. It doesn’t matter if you’re saving lives or the planet, the bottom line still rules.

“Our best piece of equipment is our line of credit,” Gibbs says. “The tough part about this business is accounts receivable because insurance companies are tougher and tougher to deal with. They start to dictate what pricing should be. We don’t have a deal with the insurance company; we have a deal with the customer. And I constantly fight with them to say ‘These are the prices that are in place.’ We do big chemical fires --$400,000 jobs, and it takes the insurance company six months to sort it all out. In the meantime we’ve paid for the disposal; we’ve paid for the response. And they make you hang on. They don’t pay any interest and after six months they say there’s no coverage. We’re saving the planet but there’s no guarantee we’re going to get paid. And that leaves me very bitter sometimes when insurance companies don’t step up to the plate.”

Sadly, when it comes to the bottom line today’s heroes don’t always get the credit or respect they deserve. Someone has to save us from our disasters and clean up our messes because we can’t do it ourselves. It’s a dirty job, but somebody has to do it.

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Biz Hamilton is published by Town Media Inc.

2007-12-29T11:34:00.001-05:00

Of Rape and Rehabilitation

By Peter Mitchell

But dig a little deeper and you will find that quarries actually take their environmental responsibility seriously and, like the rest of us, do their part to try and make the world a greener place. Burlington based Nelson Aggregate Co, has supplied the limestone for many local landmarks. It has been used in concrete for the CN Tower, the Rogers Centre, and the Skyway Bridge. Yet they are also working with a number of partners to provide the building blocks that allow us to heal the wounds our demands have created.

“When it comes to the environment it has to be a partnership between various organizations,” says Norm Elmhirst, president of Nelson.

He cites their most recent endeavour that saw the company working hand in hand with the Bruce Trail Association to allow hikers safe access across the company’s land. Nelson’s north perimeter runs along Colling Road, a shoulderless concession road with a lot of traffic. Their fence along the boundary was deteriorating and badly needed repair.

“We started looking at it,” he explains. “And we thought if we were able to replace the existing fence with a new fence situated further away from the road, it would give hikers a safer route less traveled by traffic. We started talking with the Bruce Trail folks right away to see if they were interested, and they thought it was a perfect idea. Our target was to have it available for the summer hiking season.”

It was a team effort from the start. After permission was granted from the Ministry of Natural Resources to move the licensed boundary, the kilometer and a half long fence was erected last fall at a cost of approximately $16,000. The Bruce Trail Association provided everything else.

“Theirs was mainly the sweat and labour that went into it. They leveled the path and created mini-retaining walls out of logs to make the path walk-able. They constructed an A-frame ladder to cross over the fence at one end; and a bridge at the other end to block access from snowmobiles and ATV’s. They put a fair bit of work into it.”

This isn’t the first time Nelson has donated land and materials to its surrounding communities. In 2003 they donated 23 hectares of land to the Grand River Conservation Authority, a year before clearing its adjacent aggregate pit to sell for industrial development. The area, which includes 800 meters along the east bank of the Grand River, is now the focus of study on recreational use and fish habitat under the provincial “Exceptional Waters” program for its combination of natural features and quality of natural habitat.

Nelson has also worked with the City of Burlington to restore their abandoned quarry in Kerncliffe Park; the type of used and abused landscape that environmentalists like to wag their fingers at. Swallows now call the cliff faces home, and the area has become a natural habitat for many varieties of foliage including nine rare plant species that are rare to the area. In 2005, the City of Burlington received the Bronze Plague Award from the Aggregate Producers Association of Ontario for the exemplary rehabilitation efforts provided at Kerncliffe.

“We were pleased to participate in that with the city,” Elmhirst says. “And it’s amazing how much quarries kind of self-rehabilitate. Nature adapts to its environment. It’s a different type of environment than you normally see around here, but I guess nature finds a way to make it work.”

Nelson has been engaged in recycling and rehabilitation programs for two decades, long before it became the cause du jour, and has put every effort into supplying recycled aggregate to the market. The material comes from local streets and buildings, and the finished product is used for granular type applications like roads, driveways and other municipal work that doesn’t require high-quality material. The process is a major undertaking.

“We bring it in and sort the bricks, blocks and reinforced concrete into separate piles. When we crush it we extract all the reinforcing steel and that is piled separately to eventually be melted down again. However, they can’t be used totally on their own. You need to mix virgin aggregate with it to make it a usable product. For most specifications you can only put about 25 per cent of recycled material into an aggregate product. Seventy five percent has to be new aggregate to produce a usable product. One of the benefits of having the limestone right here on the site gives us the ability to recycle those materials. We’ve recycled probably hundreds of thousands of tons that would otherwise have gone into landfills.”

Sadly, for all the people willing to put the time and effort into help clean the landscape, it seems an equal number are content to continue using it as their personal garbage dump. People may pat themselves on the back for tossing their cans, bottles and newspapers into a blue bin, but when the process requires a bit of extra labour their green aspirations seem to go out the window. This fact that became evidently clear when Nelson’s employees participated in this year’s Earth Day Clean-Up on April 21^st.

“People throw away tires, batteries and a lot of heavier items. It’s amazing the kind of stuff you find out there in the ditches,” Elmhirst explains. “We had 41 employees and family members collect all the garbage from the area and we disposed of it ourselves.”

Before disposing of it however, they weighed it, and discovered they had gathered an astonishing two and a half tonnes of garbage. It serves as a grim reminder that before we point to businesses and demand they clean up their act, we need to make sure we’ve cleaned up our own. Let he who is without sin….

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Biz Hamilton is published by Town Media Inc.

2007-12-28T11:37:00.001-05:00

The Not So Impossible Dream

By Peter Mitchell

The same can be said for the burgeoning wind energy industry. The wind turbine has long been acknowledged as a theoretical power source, but not a very practical one. Critics have pointed to issues relating to structure, vibration, noise and cost that prevent wind turbines from becoming a viable source of energy. But supporters are rallying in ever-increasing numbers as Cleanfield Energy’s president and CEO, Tony Verrelli, can attest.

In 2002 Verrelli founded Cleanfield with his partners Mihail Stern and Alexander Trica. Their goal was to create a smaller turbine system for residential and commercial applications. Finding investors proved difficult as most people concluded they were dreaming the impossible dream.

Verrelli explains, “There are a lot of nay-sayers out there who have always said, ‘A turbine cannot be installed on a rooftop. You’re just developing a pipe dream. Don’t waste your time.’ Nobody was talking about the environment, and energy was not a major issue. It wasn’t top of mind.”

Undaunted, they forged ahead investing their own money and manpower, and soon found support from a far-off source: Romania. Stern and Trica were graduates of the Engineering program at the University of Timisoara, and their alma mater proved willing to assist with the research and development required to turn their dream into reality.

Then, in August 2003, fate intervened and the public started to see the light –as luck would have it– because the lights went out. After the infamous blackout that left much of eastern North America shrouded in darkness, attitudes changed dramatically. People realized that if it could happen once, it could happen again. Almost overnight the impossible dream became a plausible one.

The University of Toronto and McMaster joined the cause to provide further research and development. The first prototypes became available for outdoor testing in 2004. The business community began paying attention, and in September 2006, Cleanfield became a publicly traded company. In June of this year they proudly unveiled their Vertical-Axis Wind Turbine (VAWT) from their home office in Ancaster. Orders have already started coming in from Hamilton and Toronto, and interest has been shown by seventeen countries around the globe. The dream is slowly becoming reality.

The smaller, eggbeater style turbine has many advantages over the horizontal windmill- style turbines the public is more accustomed to seeing. Horizontal systems have a tail or vain that must always be directed into the wind. Winds change directions causing frequent tail movement that can burn out a system. The egg-beater style always ‘goes with the flow’ so to speak, and hits the wind no matter which direction it’s blowing. There are fewer moving parts which places less stress on bearings and generators to ensure longer product life. They also operate on a much lower RPM which reduces noise.

“I hate using the word silent because I think it’s misleading,” Verrelli says. “Every single piece of machinery makes some sort of noise. But it’s so low it would be very difficult to hear any noise whatsoever.”

There are cost advantages as well. Horizontal turbines must be mounted on large towers ranging from 60 to 100 feet. The VAWT can operate at lower heights, and can be mounted on rooftops, silos, and towers. However, as an energy source it still has one distinct disadvantage.

“There are restrictions to wind because, let’s face it, you need wind,” admits Verrelli. “With solar it’s the same thing: you need sun. And geothermal power has restrictions just by where it has to be installed. The best solution is to combine multiple applications down the road, so we are also getting involved in solar and geothermal energy sources. That’s where we’ll be doing a lot of our packaging.”

Verrelli sees the future of clean energy following the same path as today’s cable and internet providers. Customers want to deal with just one source. By bundling wind, solar and geothermal packages Cleanfield and other providers will be able to offer a one-stop source for all their clean energy needs. The dream is growing, but a lot of work has yet to be done before that day comes to pass.

“You really have to change your lifestyle. It’s not just a matter of purchasing real energy; you have to reduce your consumption. It’s more cost effective to reduce a kilowatt of power, than to create a kilowatt of power. It has to be a total philosophy where you’re creating and reducing your power.”

The government also needs to do more to encourage businesses and individuals to invest in clean energy solutions, and to protect consumers from potential outfits that may simply be blowing a lot of hot air.

“From a customer standpoint the funding just isn’t available right now. In the U.S. several states have incentive programs in place. In California for a customer to buy our system, they would be reimbursed by the state government by 50 per cent. In New Jersey it’s a 60 per cent rebate. Internationally, the UK and Australia have programs. We definitely are behind.” Verrelli says. “We also need to establish guidelines to ensure when customers do purchase systems or turbines they buy a real system able to perform what it’s supposed to perform. There’s a lot of misleading and false information out there.”

In the meantime, the technology is still in its infancy and Cleanfield continues to work with its partners to find ways to improve the system. They are not just getting the technology ready; they’re getting the people ready too by developing programs with Mohawk College to train the technicians and installers that will be needed to keep the turbines spinning. And VAWT’s are springing up around the city.

“Hamilton has so much to offer,” Verrelli says. “There are so many experts here, especially on the manufacturing side. We have a mayor that believes in the environment right now. We have a councilor, Brian McHattie, who believes in the environment, Use these guys, use their vision, and use it to create a greener city. That’s what Toronto is doing. Toronto is becoming a much greener city, and they’re leaders. Hamilton could also be a leader, there’s no doubt about it.”

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Biz Hamilton is published by Town Media Inc.

2007-12-27T11:14:00.001-05:00

The Accidental Success

By Peter Mitchell

The latter is exactly what John and Ellie Voortman did when they started Oakrun Farm Bakery in 1978 with a small outlet on Carluke Road that was intended to be nothing more than a post-retirement hobby. It has since put the gold into their golden years.

On March 28, Oakrun Farm Bakery won the Hamilton Chamber of Commerce’s 2006 Special Recognition Award for Business Achievement. The bakery is only the eighth company to receive this honour in the 24 years the Chamber has been presenting awards to local businesses; and the first that is family owned and operated.

Oakrun produces a variety of baked goods from English muffins to Danish pastries both fresh and frozen, and they supply products to McDonald’s, Tim Hortons and many retail outlets across Canada, the U.S., Mexico and Puerto Rico. Late last year, they began importing Amish pies to outlets in the United States, and are pursuing plans to distribute them to Canada. Their most recent deal, completed in March, will see them supplying various supermarket chains and food distributors in Thailand. It was quite a coup for the bakery but, as John Voortman says, “Every customer is a coup.”

That was certainly the case in the very early years when customers were initially slow in coming. Voortman remembers, “We started with 2,000 square feet, two employees, and we struggled for three years. Every once in a while we’d say ‘One more day and if it doesn’t get any better, maybe we have to quit.’ But you know what? We said it but we didn’t really mean it.”

Rather than quit, they sought some expert advice from Voortman’s brothers Harry and William, co-founders of Burlington’s Voortman Cookies. Harry suggested they expand their product range to include more than bread. In 1979, Oakrun began making Englilsh muffins and opportunity soon knocked –albeit elusively at first.

“One day McDonald’s called us. They came, looked at our bakery and said, ‘Your equipment is not up to McDonald’s standards,” John recalls. “That hurt my feelings. When they were gone I remember saying to my wife, ‘Nobody’s going to say that again.’”

There must have been something about their bakery though, because in six months McDonald’s was back. “They called back and said, ‘Can we come and talk to you”’ They came and told me they required a larger freezer. I told them I didn’t have enough money to build a freezer, and they said, ‘Well, we’ll help you do that.’ They helped us get started and from there it grew.”

In September of 2006, Oakrun completed its latest expansion that saw the facility increase to 260,000 square feet, and included a $2.8 million renovation for yet another freezer. The bakery now produces more than 20 product lines and employs 480 full-time and 20 part time staff. Sales for 2006 totaled $113,580 million.

That’s a lot of dough in every sense of the word, but the Special Recognition Award is not earned through success alone. What a company does with its success is also a key factor. As devoted Christians, the Voortmans run their business with the values they apply to their faith and their lives. It guides their working philosophy through the tenet that by treating your employees well, they will respond in kind.

Oakrun has also built a loyal workforce through its profit-sharing program, and has received recognition for providing recent immigrants the opportunity to join their team and build new lives of their own. Immigrants themselves, the Voortmans know first-hand the difficulties faced by those who arrive from foreign shores to build a new life.

John Voortman first came to Canada in 1948 and worked for a canning factory in Picton. He then moved to Hamilton to work for the National System of Baking. The money was barely enough to support his family, let alone save for his dream, so he turned to real estate to improve his chances. It took another 25 years to make his dream a reality.

“I couldn’t afford to go out on my own,” Voortman says. “But I figured if I do something where I can make a little bit more money, maybe I can get enough to start a little bakery. It took until I was 50 to start that little bakery.”

So when he received a call from his church asking if Oakrun could provide employment for some recently arrived Vietnamese people, he was happy to help. “They sent us three brothers. We thought we were doing them a favour, but they did us a favour because they were so good. They brought a whole lot more than we ever could have expected. That set the tone for the rest of the years.”

They also work with St. Leonard’s Halfway House in Hamilton to give adult offenders on conditional release a chance to start again. “We don’t turn anybody down, Voortman says. “It works, and the beautiful part is it adds to the atmosphere. Everybody cares for each other. You can’t mistreat people if you pray for them in the morning. That’s where it starts. It affects everything you do.”

That philosophy has helped Oakrun rank 34^th in Hamilton’s current list of Top 100 Employers.

Shortly after adding the Special Achievement Award to their list of ‘post-retirement’ achievements and accolades, the Voortmans decided to do something they originally meant to do way back in 1978. Tony Tristani, vice-president of Oakrun, explains: “John and Ellie decided to move on to greener pastures. They took a good hard look at potential companies that would maintain the legacy and philosophy of Oakrun and not make any changes to their key programs like profit-sharing.”

They found a perfect fit. On April 30 they sold Oakrun to Brampton-based Pine Ridge Foods, which also owns Western Creamery, Liberty Brand Products Inc., and Gourmet Baker. Tristani promises the company will still operate according to the Voortman’s values and methods, and the relationship with Pine Ridge will allow Oakrun the ability to expand.

As for John and Ellie? They were unavailable to comment on the sale. Almost 30 years late they have finally retired, and are taking a well-deserved rest.

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Biz Hamilton is published by Town Media Inc.

2007-12-26T10:50:00.001-05:00

Down the Stretch with Charles Juravinski

By Peter Mitchell

“I bet you’re wondering where the hell your notebook is,” he said when I picked up the phone.

I stammered as I teetered on the edge of a very short plank; the word ‘HACK’ emblazoned on my forehead. He let me teeter for a few seconds before reeling me back in. “Well don’t worry. I’ve got it right here. There’s only a couple pages. Between the two of us we should be able to figure this thing out.”

Fortunately the interview had been recorded; but my notes contained points of emphasis and leads to pursue, along with supplementary career advice and potential story ideas that he had offered during our discourse. I was grateful for his assistance, and impressed at his ability to decode my virtually unreadable scribbling.

“Well, there you go. You’ve got what you need,” he said when we had finished, “And I’ve got myself a notebook worth one dollar and nine cents.”

That telephone call, though brief, captured the character and qualities the Juravinskis share with everyone whose lives they have touched –and they have touched thousands. Charles and Margaret have led rich lives juggling the countless balls and jumping through the hoops life has thrown in their path. They have teetered on a few planks of their own but never jumped ship; choosing instead to face their challenges head-on and take control of their journey.

As a result, the Juravinskis possess an appreciation for what it means to be human and, more importantly, what it means to be humane. They firmly believe in the importance of community, and the value of people working together to achieve their goals. While there is always an eye focused on the bottom line, they are keen to lend a helping hand, and that hand is extended with an often self-effacing playfulness that the recipient can grasp without losing face or dignity. Their hands have been extended throughout the region to help thousands of lives:

· $1 million to McMaster University to establish a Surgical Fellowship Fund

· an additional $1 million to McMaster’s Medical Centre

· $2 million to Hamilton Health Sciences’ General Hospital

· $2 million to the Wellwood Centre

· $5 million to the Hamilton Regional Cancer Centre which has been named in their honour

· $5 million to St. Peters

· $5 million to St. Joseph’s Villa

· $7 million to St. Joseph’s Hospital

But don't let their philanthropic generosity fool you into thinking the Juravinskis were born into days of wine and roses. They were not fed with silver spoons as babes. In truth, spoons of any sort were a luxury.

Charles says, "There wouldn't be one penny in my father's house that you could lay your fingers on and say 'That's my penny. I own that penny.'" Charles says. "We didn't starve but there was absolutely no money."

His father was born in Blaine Lake, Saskatchewan in January 1898, just two months after his grandparents had arrived from the Ukraine. The Canadian government was trying to tame the wild west by enticing immigrants with tracts of land to clear, settle and work. Many leapt at the opportunity, and Saskatchewan became home to countless German, Polish and Ukrainian settlers who, in Charles words, "helped open up that wilderness."

Life was hard for Charles’ father. His mother died when he was young, so he and his siblings were raised by a father whom ultimately gave up on life and turned to drink. There were no schools in the area and their days were spent trying to scratch out a meager living from the land.

His formal education was regrettably short. Charles explains, “When school finally came to that area he was seventeen years old. He went for half a day. The other kids were little kids, much younger than him, and they laughed at him because he couldn’t speak, read, or write English. He was embarrassed, so he walked out of the school-room and never went back. And he never learned to read or write English.”

“As a matter of fact when I was growing up I actually taught my father to sign his name. When we came to Ontario my father used to sign his name with an X. I would put a pencil in his hand, then take his hand and make him write Nick or N. Juravinski. I even tried to get him to stylize it as best I could.”

Though he lacked schooling, Nick Juravinski didn’t lack for smarts. He didn’t need his ABCs to master the basics of life: work hard, support your family, and contribute to the community any way you can. These lessons passed from father to son and proved invaluable.
Charles was born on November 1^st, 1929, just days after the infamous Stock Market Crash that dragged the world through the despairing days of the Great Depression. Unemployment was rampant throughout Canada, reaching never-before-seen levels of 30 per cent. Jobs were scarce. Money was scarce. Basic survival was the name of the game. And Saskatchewan was hit even harder during those Dirty Thirties by a drought that made the land virtually barren.

He remembers those early days vividly. His parents struggled to to the best they could for him and his six siblings. There were none of the conveniences we take for granted today: no plumbing, no running water, and no heat. Winters are notoriously brutal in the Prairie Provinces, and the window panes would freeze inside the house. The only light was filtered through the encrusted snow and ice. Only after it melted in the spring were they finally able to see outside through the window.

"The house we lived in, the rent was twelve dollars per month, so you can imagine the kind of house it was." Charles says. "When you went to bed at night in the wintertime, you wore long underwear and you had these great big, thick feather ticks that were light. You would bury yourself under there for the warmth. If you had to take a leak, you had a piss-pot under the bed. You would piss in the piss-pot, but when you got up in the morning you didn't have to pour it out because it would be frozen. Absolutely frozen."

“You had one pair of shoes, and that pair of shoes would last you forever because when they got holes in the soles you couldn’t afford to fix the damn things. I used to pick through the garbage and get Shredded Wheat separators –in the Shredded Wheat box they used to have thick cardboard separators– you would take a couple of them and stick them in the sole of your shoe and you walked on that.”

The entire family worked day and night to keep hearth and home together. Young Charles developed a work ethic he carried with him his entire life, and learned the fundamentals of commerce by peddling poultry for 25 cents a chicken. He also saw first hand, the entrepreneurial spirit his father employed to get by. While the United States government was chasing illegal bootleggers capitalizing on that country’s Prohibition Laws, the Juravinskis were engaged in a little bootlegging of their own –with a deliciously Canadian twist.

“Pasteurization had come in and the government forbid anybody to sell milk straight from the cows because the milk had to be pasteurized. Some people were afraid of drinking the pasteurized milk because they didn’t think it was pure. My father got the idea that if we had a good producing cow, we could sell their milk. So we rented three cows and sold bootleg milk. It was just like making your own booze and undermining the legal people by bootlegging it. We would sell the milk at twelve quarts for a dollar. All that did is provide a stop-gap operation so we could earn enough money to pay for the cows and then pay the general store. All it bought was the staples”

Two events changed Charles’s path; one had global consequences, the other, more personal. The Second World War broke out, and the Juravinski family moved to what they hoped would be greener pastures in Hamilton’s east end.

“It’s a terrible thing to say,” he says “But the Second World War was the best thing that happened to all of us, because it generated jobs. Everybody was hustling for all they were worth, working as hard as they could, and trying to earn and save as much as they could. Everybody was concerned that once the war ended, everything would go back to the way it was during the Depression because the war effort would be over and all the commerce would be gone. When we came to Ontario we thought we had died and gone to heaven because my father had a job as a janitor at Westinghouse. My mother had a job. I had a job. Everybody worked.”

Charles was just twelve years old when the Juravinskis arrived at their new home on Princess Street; too young to join his brothers in the Armed Forces. But even at that young age, he was making adult contributions, by lending his father five hundred dollars to buy their house. He spent his first summer in Hamilton picking beans. Then he became a delivery boy for Polan’s Grocery Store on Ottawa Street. It wasn’t long before people started to take notice of the ambitious delivery boy hustling on his bicycle. Polan’s competitor up the street, Jim’s Fruit Market, made him an offer he couldn’t refuse: six dollars a week as opposed to the four Mr. Polan was paying him. Charles readily accepted and stayed with that job until he was 15 years old.

In addition, the young boy who had repaired his own shoes with cardboard plucked from the trash began shining the shoes of Hamilton’s businessmen to earn an extra 15 dollars a week. He also held a paper route. It would be a difficult workload for anyone at any age, but Charles had inherited his father’s entrepreneurial genes.

“I subbed out my paper route to another kid on a percentage basis so I could maintain the jobs,” he remembers with a chuckle.

His first shoe-shine job was located on the corner of Sherman and Barton. It wasn’t long before the Prairie-bred work ethic again caught an influential eye, and he was enticed to shine shoes at the Royal Connaught Hotel, Hamilton’s crown jewel of the time. However, it wasn’t long before he fell from grace.

The shoe-shine parlour shared a washroom with a barbershop, and part of Juravinski’s duties included whisking off the barbershop patrons’ coats when they washed their hands. Juravinski could keep any tips he earned from shining shoes, but the owner insisted on keeping the tips from his extra duties.

“That didn’t suit with me, and it didn’t take me long to learn how to palm nickels and dimes. If the customer gave me a quarter, I would palm the quarter with some change in my hand, and I would give the owner the dime. He cottoned to it and one day he turned my hand upside down. There was the quarter. The only way I could defend myself was to give him the biggest shove he’d ever got, knocking him on his ass, and run out onto King Street. That was the end of that job.”

The kid from the Prairies was becoming a man in the mean streets of Hamilton, and he wasn’t going to let anyone push him around. He continued to toil at many jobs, gradually working his way into the construction industry and taking a position with Piggott Construction. He was so busy in fact, he didn’t notice Cupid hovering over the steel mills with his bow and arrow raised, waiting for the right moment to strike.

When he was about 16 or 17, Charles’ girlfriend at the time suggested going to the candy counter at Woolworth’s because her friend, Margaret Hudeski worked there. They met, but didn’t think of themselves as anything more than acquaintances. The seed had been planted, but it took a friendly hand to help love bloom. While taking an evening course through Piggott, Charles befriended another employee, Bill McCann –who was dating Margaret’s sister, Kay. It was McCann who eventually brought them together.

Juravinski explains “ He got to know me a little bit, and he used to say to Marg, ‘Listen, this guy, Charlie Jug-a-liquor’ –he used to call me Jug-a-liquor because he couldn’t pronounce Juravinski—‘this guy Jug-a-liquor; he’s a pretty good guy.’ Then he would say to me ‘Listen, why don’t you take out Kay’s sister, Marg?’ Lo and behold, I did take Marg out.”

Margaret too, had known the sting of poverty. She and her two sisters were born in Hamilton to Polish parents during the early years of the Depression. Her father was a butcher by trade and Margaret also remembers growing up with no money in the family. Eventually her father scraped together enough money to buy a home on Bold Street. He later found work reading meters for Union Gas. Years later, when he grew too old to walk around reading meters, he took a job as janitor, just like Charles’ father.

Charles and Margaret married in September 1956; creating a partnership that would carry them through the ups and downs of the next fifty years.

“Margaret has always been a success, and helped make me successful in my decision-making. Yes. She would second guess me on occasion, and being a husband and the type of guy I was, I wouldn’t always listen. But notwithstanding that you might not listen, it’s nice to bounce things off your better half. Margaret has also been extremely protective, and when I say protective, I mean in not wanting me to kill myself by working myself into the ground. And one of the beautiful parts, especially notwithstanding the station of life we might have enjoyed, never said ‘I want this. I want this. I want this.’ She has always been supportive; a true soul-mate.”

“I’m not going to say that everything was sweetness and light. You’re bound to bicker from time to time. But the destructive problems couples have are self-inflicted. If there’s a shortage of money that can create a problem; there’s no question about it. But if you’re going to be a drunk; if you’re going to piss away your money; or if you don’t want to go to work and be a provider, it’s self-inflicted. Look at my mother and father: there was no money. None. But they stuck together for over 60 years. It was the same with Margaret’s parents, and with my brother-in-law, who eventually became my partner in the business.”

McCann married Margaret’s sister, and the two work colleagues became brothers-in-law. They soon became business partners as well; leaving Piggott to form Wilchar Construction Ltd. in 1958. Once again Charles found himself in the centre of a family working together to build a better life. In the process, they built many projects that adorned the region: housing subdivisions, the original Hamilton Teacher’s College, office buildings, Highland Secondary School, nursing homes, the original Wentworth Lodge in Dundas, the swimming pool at Dalewood School. No project proved too big or too small. Charles remembers most of them, but one in particular remains a favourite.

“I think one of the most intriguing jobs we ever did was the Barton Street Bridge at Wellington Street,” he says. “We actually built that bridge and kept Barton Street open because the train still had to run. We demolished the bridge entirely, kept one lane open, built the one lane, and then built the other side.”

Juravinski and McCann originally conceived a fifteen year game plan with the goal of retiring at 45. But in 1971, McCann decided he was ready two years early and they closed the doors of WilChar Construction. McCann settled into retirement and never looked back. Charles found he was not quite ready to go into the home-stretch without a few more laps around the track.

“The first day I didn’t have to go to work, I was lost. I just knew I couldn’t do it,” he admits.

He flirted briefly with politics, and considered reopening the construction business when he met Ray Connell, the outgoing Wentworth North MPP and minister of public works.

“He seeded me with the thought of a harness racetrack,” Charles says. “And I said no because I didn’t know the first thing about it and wasn’t about to learn. But it piqued my curiosity, and I started to research the business. As I researched it, I got more interested and saw the possibilities. The short of it is Flamboro Downs.”

But he found himself facing a new struggle. There were many nay-sayers. Flamboro Downs almost didn’t see the light of day.

He explains, “I went to 42 different individuals/institutions and nobody would take a chance, saying ‘They can’t do it.’ ‘What do they know about running a racetrack?’, ‘They’ll never make it go.’ Nobody would loan us the money. With one exception: the Federal Business Development Bank which was a federal government funded bank for entrepreneurs. We discussed our plans with them and they loaned us a couple of million dollars. At the time it was the second largest personal loan that the Federal Business Development Bank had granted in the Dominion of Canada.”

Three years after the seed had been planted; Flamboro Downs came to fruition on April 9, 1975. It grew into Canada’s premier half-mile track and became home to one of harness racing’s signature events, the Confederation Cup.

“Of course many people kicked themselves in the ass subsequently. When we got it up and running all kinds of people came forth and said ‘Look I’d like to buy a piece of this.’ I used to give them a big smile and say ‘Who needs you?’”

Like his father, Charles was not going to let his lack of formal training prevent him from achieving his goals. He threw himself head-first into the world of horse racing; learning as he went, and quickly finding himself playing with the big boys in the world of breeding.

“If you want to know what a war is all about; start one and go to war,” he says. “I got involved to learn a little bit about it so I could empathize better with the professional horse people. But the main catalyst came in 1981 with the first major horse I bought –Conquered. I paid $250,000 U.S. dollars for that horse as a two year old and he went on to earn almost a million dollars the next year. Then we sent him out to stud and we syndicated for something over a couple million bucks at the time. Obviously that whetted my appetite and I just kept on going.”

Many horses crossed his path over the next 30 years. A few even trotted their way into his affections. But his absolute favourite was a spirited pacing mare called Ellamony, who, like Charles, came from humble beginnings to take the world by storm; winning an astonishing 53 of her 73 starts, and breaking many records in the early nineties.

“She was really something else. Margaret and I thought if we get down to one horse, it’s going to be her. Her mother couldn’t run from here to the end of the property. She was the laziest thing you ever saw in your life. But we bred her to a horse called Cam Fella, and she threw off Ellamony. That old lady is now about 27 years old. She should be dead, but she’s still alive.”

“I can explain luck in breeding. If you take a deck of cards, the high cards are Ace, King, Queen, Jack, and Ten. When you talk about genetics a horse has only got so many Aces. The trick is to breed and catch an Ace to an Ace. If you catch an ace to a king, maybe you’re going to get a pretty good horse but you’re not going to get the top horse; not the World Champion. But they also have genes that are down to two that will throw off nothing. You can get the best stallion bred to the best mare and you got nothing except a name. I had one. I paid $350,000 US dollars in 1981 and he was so royally bred, the bloodlines were Ace/Ace. But they never threw off an Ace. However, you don’t cry over those things because we’ve had an awful lot of success with the horses we’ve had –more success than we’re entitled to, there’s no question about that.”

Sadly, his favourite Ace was dealt the worst of all possible hands. In 1996, Ellamony suffered a leg injury that led to her death. The Juravinskis were devastated.

“It was terrible. That literally destroyed my want to continue in the horse business,” he admits.

Adding to the loss was the unavoidable fact that, more than fifty years after struggling through the Depression, Juravinski again found himself in the centre of a community struggling through a decline.

“In the late 80’s and early 90’s the industry took a nosedive from which it hasn’t recovered as far as the horse racing aspect of it is concerned.”

Juravinski says a number of factors contributed. The advent of lotteries and other means of gaming provided people with new ways to play the odds. The rise of television brought hockey, football, and other sports directly into people’s living rooms. Most damaging was the fact the original people who grew up with horse racing gradually died. The younger crowd never took to it.

“Maybe we can fault the racing industry because we didn’t do anything to excite the kids,” Charles says. “If you want a future for something it’s got to be for the kids, because they’re the future of anything you’re trying to sell.”

Salvation came with the one-armed bandit. The Ontario Lottery and Gaming Corporation brought in 750 slot machines, and provided the track with a much needed shot in the arm.

“I would argue that if it wasn’t for the slot machines you wouldn’t have a racetrack going in the province of Ontario today. Horse racing cannot sustain itself on its own by virtue of the cost of the operation and the magnitude of the places they have to have. I question whether there’s a race track in Canada that is making any money by virtue of horseracing.”

Disaster had been averted, but the industry was changing irrevocably and Charles felt it was time to move on. In 2003 Magna Entertainment Corporation bought Flamboro Downs for $72 million, and he finally settled into the retirement he had eschewed thirty years before.

Retirement proved to be a relative term. The Juravinskis are still involved in horse breeding today, albeit on a much smaller scale. Their main efforts are now focused on helping Hamilton’s growing health care industry with donations already totaling $28 million; and the possibility of more to come.

“We knew before we sold Flamboro Downs that we were going to be doing something. We had discussed it and health care always came up. Health is the most important thing to all of us. At Flamboro Downs people would come in and you would talk and find out this guy’s had a heart attack, this guy’s had a bypass, this guy has lung cancer, and so on. When you look at that spectrum, health absolutely rises to the top. And how can people that want to contribute to the well-being of others get a bigger bang for their buck then to know they are contributing to their health.”

Charles is adamant when he says “If more people stepped up to the plate, it just might be a better world to live in. It is so gratifying. Until you get involved in something like that, you have no idea how gratifying it is to help others. With what we’ve given away I could have bought a hundred Rolls Royces. Where would I put a hundred Rolls Royces? I could have probably bought four custom made helicopters. Or a Lear Jet. Or I could have had 20 houses in 20 different countries. But you know what? That would be a pain in the ass.”

He downplays the importance of his own rise to success, but when pressed offers the following advice:

“Number one: you have to work. Number two: You have to invest. You just can’t go to work every day, get your stipend and spend it all and expect to make it. If you want to achieve anything monetarily, you’ve got to invest in whatever; you’ve got to take chances in whatever. Every failure you learn something and you go on to the next thing. And you try again. And you try again. You have to keep trying. It’s like Kenny Rogers said ‘You gotta know when to hold them, know when to fold them, and you’ve got to know when to walk away……’”

It is tempting to segue into an image of these two Aces who gambled and won riding into the sunset with a stoic dignity earned from lives of struggle and success. But life ain’t that purdy, and the Juravinskis are too practical, too self-effacing, and too down-to-earth to be insulted by such cheap literary manipulation.

Far more appropriate is another image from his Depression-era youth. Charles recalls, “In the wintertime, the farmers used to come in to town on horse and sleigh. The horses would defecate and it would freeze. We used to take the horse manure and fashion them into hockey pucks. We would make dozens of them and play hockey with the horse manure pucks. They would disintegrate after a while and break up, and if we ran out of pucks then we would take a horse ball because it would be frozen like a tennis ball and play hockey with that.”

From those childhood games played in the dust-bowl of Saskatchewan comes what is perhaps the Juravinskis’ ultimate secret of success: it’s not the shit life throws in your path, it’s what you make of it.

-30-

Biz Hamilton is published by Town Media Inc.

2005-12-31T10:12:00.003-05:00

History

For over 40 years IMAX® has been taking audiences to places they have never been before, and taking technology to ever-increasing heights of innovation. When the original founders envisioned a dream of developing a large format motion picture projection system at the Montreal Expo in 1967, they established a commitment to innovation and technological progress that has made the IMAX® Experience the most recognized and respected cinematic experience around the globe.

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Big Thinkers

Rosa Parks

Sometimes the simplest of acts can lead to the mightiest of consequences. On December 1st, 1955, forty-two year old Rosa Parks boarded the Cleveland Avenue bus after working her shift at the Montgomery Fair Department Store in Alabama and took a seat in the first row of the “coloured section” reserved for non-white passengers in the middle of the bus. When the first ten white only rows reached their capacity, bus driver James Blake moved the “coloured” section sign and demanded those passengers give up their seats. Three of the passengers complied. Ms. Parks refused.
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2005-12-30T11:56:00.003-05:00

History

THE PLAYERS

ROMAN KROITOR

While working for the National Film Board of Canada, Roman Kroitor co-produced and co-directed Labyrinth, the NFB's contribution to Expo 67 in Montreal. The film, which chronicled man's heroic life journey in three multi-screen walk-through rooms, was strongly received and Kroitor was asked by the Fuji Bank of Japan to contribute a film for Expo 70 in Osaka, Japan. He invited Graeme Ferguson and Robert Kerr to form a company with him and IMAX^® was born.

GRAEME FERGUSON

A graduate of the University of Toronto, Graeme Ferguson was an independent film-maker working out of New York when he was asked by the Canadian Expo Corporation to make a film for Expo '67 in Montreal. That 18 minute film, Polar Life, dazzled audiences with its display of arctic images that moved from screen to screen while the theatre itself revolved. His ideas, combined with Kroitor’s, formed the creative foundation on which IMAX^® was built.

ROBERT KERR

Robert Kerr was serving as mayor of Galt, Ontario and managing the printing company he had formed, when his old school-friend Graeme Ferguson asked him to help produce Polar Life for Expo '67. His involvement in this venture was part-time, predominantly looking after the business end while Ferguson focused on the creative end. He would continue this role in IMAX^®, handling the business side of the company. A school-friend of Ferguson and Kerr from Galt, Shaw began his career with the Ford Motor Company before moving on to CCM, a maker of sporting goods and bicycles. Although he had no cinematic experience, he was approached by former friends Ferguson and Kerr to help develop the IMAX^® projector because his knowledge of chain drives -similar to those used on bicycles- was a crucial factor.

WILLIAM SHAW

A school-friend of Ferguson and Kerr from Galt, Shaw began his career with the Ford Motor Company before moving on to CCM, a maker of sporting goods and bicycles. Although he had no cinematic experience, he was approached by former friends Ferguson and Kerr to help develop the IMAX^® projector because his knowledge of chain drives -similar to those used on bicycles- was a crucial factor.

THE UNSUNG HEROES

JAN JACOBSON

Norwegian-born inventor Jan Jacobson, based in Copenhagen, Denmark, designed a radical new camera for IMAX^® that moved the 65mm film horizontally, and allowed film-makers to shoot images on the larger film frame.

RONALD JONES

Ronald Jones, a machine shop owner in Brisbane, Australia, designed the original Rolling Loop projector from whom IMAX^® acquired the patent for further development. His creation was further refined and developed to create the first IMAX^® projection system.

Both men personified the ongoing commitment to innovation and worldwide partnership that IMAX^® has nurtured throughout its history and will continue to develop as it takes the cinematic experience to even greater heights of accomplishment.

THE VISION

Asked to produce a giant-screen film for EXPO '70 in Osaka, Japan, the IMAX^® founders wanted to create a single, powerful projector for the large screen and a standardized format that could be used by all film-makers instead of the multiple projection systems then being used. Their aim was to make the large screen venue commercially viable for everyday audiences. They achieved this goal on time, and on budget; and it proved to be the first of many innovations to make the IMAX Experience^® the most recognized and sought-after movie viewing event in the world.

INNOVATION

From large-screen movie projection systems to digital conversion each new product continues the IMAX^® legacy of providing state-of-the-art technology to expand the movie-going experience. The IMAX^® brand is synonymous around the world with being a thought leader in technology and a model of innovation as it continues to drive the limits of cinematic entertainment forward.

TECHNOLOGY

IMAX DMR^®

Introduced in 2002, the Digital Re-Mastering process allows virtually any Hollywood film to be converted into The IMAX Experience. Each frame of the 35mm film is scanned and converted into a digital image, then cleaned up to remove grain and imperfections to make images sharper and more life-like for audiences. The film is then transferred onto IMAX's 70mm format.

IMAX MPX^®

The IMAX MPX^® format is a new theatre projection system that allows mulitplex operators to enter the IMAX^® theatre business by converting their existing theatres. The cost is much lower than building a new theatre and allows exhibitors to present their audiences with the larger than life presentations the IMAX Experience^® provides. The systems can be installed with the IMAX^®projection, sound and screen technologies with a simple retrofit.

IMAX^® 3D

Over 20 years of experience lies behind the advanced twin-lens projection system that allows images to jump off the screen in the most realistic theatrical 3D experience in the world. Theatre-goers are provided with special polarized glasses or cordless electronic headset. Films released in IMAX^® 3D have proven extremely popular with many reaching or surpassing the $100 million mark. The IMAX Personal Sound Environment^®^® (PSE) provides the perfect aural complement to the IMAX 3D visuals. Additional stereo sound boosts the theatre’s existing multi-channel digital sound system allowing filmmakers to position sound anywhere in the theatre.

2D - 3D CONVERSION

Ten years in development, this groundbreaking innovation converts live-action 2D 35mm films to IMAX^® 3D. This technology was used in "Space Station 3D" and "Deep Sea 3D"."Superman Returns: An IMAX 3D Experience" was the first Hollywood feature to use this technology. Recently “Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix” used the conversion process to add to the movie magic.

DIGITAL

IMAX^® will launch its state-of-the-art digital projection system in 2008, earlier than originally anticipated. The new system eliminates the need for costly and cumbersome film prints at IMAX^® theatres, and increases the number of movies that can be shown on IMAX^® screens allowing for greater program flexibility. Hollywood movies and original IMAX^® documentaries will benefit from the enhanced imagery, light output and contrast the system provides to deliver the incomparable image and sound quality consumers expect.

IMAX SANDDE^® (Stereo Animation Drawing Device)

Developed by founder Roman Kroitor, this revolutionary technology allows animators to draw freehand in 3D giving the appearance and feel of traditional cel animation without the use of a keyboard or mouse. A wand translates the movements of the animator's hand into 3D coordinates, allowing the animator to almost literally create an image out of thin air. It is complemented by GEPPETTO^® which allows animators to create long complex sequences of animation from these drawings by creating the drawings in between the key frames. First used in the two-minute short "Paint Misbehavin'" and developed even further for sections of the 44 minute feature "Cyberworld 3D", this exciting new technology.

THE IMAX EXPERIENCE

IMAX^® is recognized around the world for presenting high quality family entertainment. The IMAX^® and IMAX Dome^® projection systems provide audiences with a degree of clarity and detail that they cannot find in conventional movie or home theatre systems.

The larger screens combined with the most advanced and powerful projectors ever made deliver the most immersive cinematic experience available, making people feel they are truly a part of the action.

The six-channel, multi-way digital IMAX^® speaker systems further intensify the realism of the cinematic experience. treating the audience members to the highest quality sound no matter where they are seated.

Almost one billion people in 40 countries have been immersed in the on-screen action making IMAX^® one of the few cinematic brands that is immediately recognized and actively sought by consumers.

2005-12-29T12:04:00.003-05:00

Big Thinkers

Rosa Parks

That simple act of defiance had far-reaching consequences. Ms. Parks was charged with disorderly conduct and fined $10.00 and $4.00 in court costs. Her arrest resulted in the Montgomery Bus Boycott that lasted for 382 days. It also served as one of the sparks that launched the Civil Rights Movement that changed the fabric of American society forever. The boycott later served as inspiration for similar actions throughout the world, including South Africa during the nightmare of Apartheid.

When she passed away on October 24th, 2005 Montgomery decorated the front seats of their buses with black ribbons in her memory. She became the first woman, and the second African American, to lie in honour in the Capital Rotunda in Washington D.C. She was buried in Detroit at the Woodlawn Cemetery in the chapel that was soon to carry her name. Her headstone, already prepared by Ms. Parks herself, read simply “Rosa L. Parks, wife, 1913 – 2005”: a humble epitaph for the woman that became the Mother of the Civil Rights Movement and helped change the world.

Terry Fox

When the going gets tough, the tough get going. They let nothing stand in their way. Terry Fox was born in Winnipeg Manitoba on July 28, 1958; and raised in Port Coquitlam, British Columbia. As a youth he was actively involved in sports, participating in soccer, rugby, baseball, and his favourite, diving. Even as a child he refused to let disadvantages get in his way. He was determined to play guard for his junior high basketball team despite being only five feet tall and not particularly good at the game. With a never-say-die attitude and a lot of practice, he became one of the best guards on the team by Grade Ten.

On November 12, 1976, the promising young athlete who was about to embark on a career as a physical education teacher slammed his car into a truck and sustained an injured right knee. In 1977, the leg was diagnosed with osteosarcoma, a form of cancer that was likely triggered by the accident. The only treatment was amputation. At the tender age of 18, his bright future was over.

He never succumbed to despair. In fact, he turned tragedy into opportunity and became one of the great modern heroes. On April 12, 1980 Fox dipped his legged into the Atlantic Ocean at St. John’s, Newfoundland and began his cross-Canada “Marathon of Hope” to raise money for cancer research. The world cheered his every step. Sadly, the cancer had spread and he never completed his journey. After 143 days and 5,373 kilometers, he was forced to stop near Thunder Bay in Ontario. He died on June 28, 1981.

Terry fox has been memorialized in books, film and song. He has had a mountain and a park named in his honour and been commemorated on the Canadian dollar coin. Every year the Terry Fox Run is held around the world to raise money for cancer research; and he remains an inspiration to millions. His body may have succumbed to the ravages of cancer, but his idea lives on.

Sun Tzu

The greatest weapon when fighting any war is the human mind. Even after centuries of tactics and technological development, the greatest military strategist of all time remains Sun Tzu.

Little is known about the man himself. His birth name was actually Sūn Wŭ –the title of Sun Tzu, meaning “Master Sun”, was given after he achieved fame. He was a general who lived in the Chinese Kingdom of Wu in the 6th Century BC. Records indicate he was a member of the shi, descendants of Chinese nobles who had lost their lands in territorial disputes. He spent many years as a mercenary during which he wrote The Art of War, his famous treatise detailing the stratagems for military success. Soon after he was hired by King Helü of Wu, and is credited with turning the kingdom from a semi-barbaric territory into one of the most powerful Chinese empires of the time. He vanished into a peaceful retirement and his date of death remains unknown.

More than two thousand years later, Sun Tzu’s ideas continue to influence the world. His theories and philosophies became cornerstones of the martial arts. His techniques are still studied by military strategists today. The Art of War is considered one of the greatest literary staples of all time, and has in recent years been applied to the world of business with great success. Little may be known of the man himself, but his ideas continue to have a big impact.

Thomas Edison

The symbol of a light bulb flashing over somebody’s head has long been synonymous with the birth of a big idea. We have one man to thank for that: Thomas Alva Edison. Not only did he create the light bulb, he is arguably one of the biggest big thinkers of all time, with an astonishing 1,093 patents to his name in the US alone. Credited with saying “Genius is one per cent inspiration, ninety-nine per cent perspiration,” his mere one percent alone is mind-staggering.

As a child growing up in Port Huron, Michigan in the mid-1800s, he was home schooled by his mother after his teacher claimed his mind was “addled”. His career started humbly as a telegraph operator, and many of his inventions are related to that field. His first patent, granted on June 1 1869, was for an electric voice recorder, but he didn’t gain public attention until 1877 with the creation of his phonograph. He subsequently formed the Edison Electric Light Company in 1878, which lives on today as General Electric. In 1891 he built a kinetoscope that allowed people to watch short films, and continued to move the fledgling movie industry forward, culminating in the creation of the Motion Picture Patents Company in 1908.

These few examples would be accomplishment for any lifetime, and they barely scratch the surface. It is safe to say that every person living today is touched by at least one of his ideas daily, and he is often credited as being one of the most influential people to ever live. Not bad for the young student who had been casually dismissed as an intellectual dim bulb.

Helen Keller

Helen Keller was born in Tuscumbia, Alabama on June 27 1880. She was a healthy baby until an illness at the age of nineteen months left her blind and deaf. Despite the barriers, she initially learned to communicate with the help of Martha Washington, the six year old daughter of the family cook. When Helen herself was six, twenty year old Anne Sullivan, was brought into the family to provide her education. Though the relationship was initially rocky, it became the guiding force that helped Helen learn to read, and talk through a method that involved touching the lips and throats of others as they spoke. Her formal education continued through various institutions and she became the first deaf and blind person to graduate from college in 1904.

She spent her life traveling the world as a lecturer and author; writing a total of twelve books and countless articles on a number of topics. She campaigned for people with disabilities, pacifism, socialism, and worker’s rights. In 1915 she founded Helen Keller International, a non-profit organization for preventing blindness, and spent many of her later years raising funds for the American Foundation for the Blind. She passed away on June 1, 1968 at the age of 87. She may have lost her sight. She may have lost her hearing. But her vision continues to inspire.

Galileo

Big ideas are not always welcomed with open arms. Often the larger the concept, the greater the resistance; as was discovered by the man who gazed at the heavens and changed the way we see the universe.

Galileo Galilei was born on February 15, 1564 in Pisa, Italy and grew up in relatively privileged circumstances. His formal education encompassed a number of fields including mathematics, physics, philosophy, astronomy and astrology. He excelled in every area.

Though he spent his life making dozens of contributions to science and technology he is most famous for taking the earth out of the centre of the universe and putting it in its proper place. Using his telescopic observations of Jupiter’s moons, he proved that the universe as was then known actually revolved around the sun. Needless to say this did not sit well with the religious authorities, who denounced his findings and accused him of heresy in 1614. Galileo spent the rest of his life defending and finding further proof in support of his theories; but was forced by order of the Inquisition to recant his beliefs and he spent his final years under house arrest. He died on January 8, 1642. Though scorned at the time, he is now hailed as one of the founding fathers of the scientific revolution and his methods are still used to expand our knowledge of the universe and debate our place in it.

Orville and Wilbur Wright

Big thinkers are frequently accused of having their heads in the clouds. It is meant only in a symbolic sense, but the Wright Brothers were among the first who actually did.

At the start of the 20th Century people still had their feet planted firmly on the ground, but were itching to fly the friendly skies. The race was on, with inventors around the world moving heaven and earth to be the first to conquer air travel. They scrambled to build experimental gliders and airplanes with varying levels of success. Finally, on December 17 1903, Orville and Wilbur Wright took off from Kitty Hawk, North Carolina to boldly go where no-one had gone before.

Orville made the first flight, traveling 120 feet in 12 seconds. Wilbur completed the second attempt at 175 feet; before Orville took the controls again to journey 200 feet more. The fourth and final flight of the day saw Wilbur manning the cockpit again, covering 852 feet in 59 seconds.

Technically, it was not the first manned flight; but it had the distinction of being the first airplane that allowed the pilot to steer and maintain the craft’s equilibrium through the “three-axis control” mechanism the brothers had invented. That control was the necessary component needed to make commercial flight a practical endeavour. The Wright brothers continued to guide the aviation industry to even greater heights throughout their careers. They dared to kiss the sky, and in so doing revolutionized transportation forever.

Socrates

The greatest thinker of all time was not a scientist, strategist, or scribe. In fact, his exact occupation is unknown. He was simply a man who, many at the time would argue, liked the sound of his own voice. He turned dialogue into an art form, and left his growing number of followers hanging on his every word. In so doing, he laid the foundations for Western philosophy. His method of inquiry –asking a series of questions to help a person or group examine the validity of their beliefs, knowledge, and morality by eliminating contradictory hypotheses– shaped the very way we think. He also made a lot of people very angry.

The ancient Greek philosopher Socrates was born in the latter part of the fifth Century BC. He lived during a critical time in history when Athens was licking its wounds after a crushing defeat by Sparta during the Peloponnesian War; and the public was questioning the soundness of democracy. His lectures on the pursuit of knowledge, virtue, and morality challenged the Athenian establishment, and garnered a large following. He further exacerbated the situation by making many people look foolish with his line of questioning.

He was charged with heresy and corrupting the Athenian youth. Despite being given many opportunities to basically put a sock in it, Socrates was eventually found guilty and sentenced to death by ingesting hemlock. It was too late. The ‘corruption’ had set in and Socrates’ ideas lived on through his followers; notably Plato and later, Aristotle. The man was silenced, but his thoughts still echo today.

Leonardo da Vinci

On April 15, 1452, a peasant woman in a small Italian hamlet gave birth to the illegitimate son of a local notary. As was often the case at the time, the newborn was not even given a proper surname, but was simply named for the local town. At the age of five the child was taken from his mother to be raised by his father, uncle and grandparents. His father soon took a sixteen-year-old bride, who treated the child as if he were her own. Sadly, the bond was soon broken as she died at a very young age. Such a maudlin childhood did not bode well for his future, likely condemning him to a lifetime of hardship and misery.

But that child was Leonardo da Vinci, and he possessed one of the most powerful minds in all history.

The list of da Vinci’s contributions to the fields of art and science would fill volumes. In fact they already have, and many of his diaries have survived as a testament to his genius. He truly was ahead of his time and created plans for a helicopter, tank, calculator and solar power centuries before the technology was able to make his ideas feasible. His scientific activities produced tremendous advances in an array of fields including mathematics, astronomy, anatomy and engineering. His works of art still touch our souls today, notably through his paintings of the Mona Lisa and the Last Supper.

On May 2, 1519 da Vinci passed away in France where he had spent the last years of his life in the service of his close friend, King François the First. The illegitimate child had come a long way from his meager beginnings, proving that great minds know no limitations.

Buckminster Fuller

Even as a child Buckminster Fuller showed a flair for design and invention, often creating things from materials he had found while walking through the woods near his home. His early years were not particularly charmed; by his own admission he was a misfit. He studied at Harvard, but was expelled twice due to irresponsible behaviour and lack of interest. An early attempt to start a business with his father-in-law ended in failure. In 1927, at the age of 32, Fuller was unemployed, bankrupt, and had just lost his daughter to complications from polio and spinal meningitis. He struggled with alcohol and pondered suicide, but ultimately did not succumb to despair.

Instead, Fuller went to work for Black Mountain College in North Carolina where he created his most famous invention in 1949: the self-supporting geodesic dome building. It was designed as a tetrahedron and constructed from aluminum aircraft tubing and a vinyl-plastic skin. The US government immediately saw the military applications and contracted Fuller to build them for the army. Fuller’s domes have dotted landscapes around the world and even played a role in IMAX history. Not only was a dome featured at Montreal’s World Expo in 1967, the giant Cinesphere constructed at Ontario Place in Toronto became home to the first Imax theatre in 1971.

Fuller was awarded a total of 28 US patents during his life, and received many honorary doctorates, including one from Bates College at Harvard. He also wrote more than thirty books and delivered lectures relating to his personal crusade to finding out what the individual can do to improve humanity that governments and organizations can’t. Basically he wanted to prove his theory that one person can make a difference. Ironically, he need only have looked in the mirror for his answer.

Guglielmo Marconi

“Never say never,” is a common theme that links many of history’s greatest minds, and is best epitomized by Guglielmo Marconi who silenced a cacophony of nay-sayers by revolutionizing the world of communications.

He first started conducting experiments using equipment he often built himself in the attic of his home in Pontecchio, Italy. His aim was to find a way of using radio waves to create a system of wireless communications technology that would not rely on the fragile cables required for the electric telegraph. Countless others had strived to create such a system for over half a century with limited success, and the growing consensus argued that it was impossible. In the summer of 1895, Marconi moved his experiments outside, and positioned the transmitting and receiving antennas so they touched the ground, using the earth to act as a waveguide resonator. By so doing, he was able to transmit a signal for a distance of 1.5 kilometers. At the ripe old age of 21, Marconi had proven the skeptics wrong.

In 1896, he left his native home in Italy to continue his research in London, England with the assistance of William Preece, the Chief Electrical Engineer of the British Post Office. He continued to increase the distance the signal could travel until finally, on December 12, 1901, Marconi became the first person to transmit a signal across the Atlantic Ocean from Cornwall, England to St. John’s, Newfoundland. This feat has been hailed as one of the greatest scientific advances of all time, and arguably established Marconi as the world’s first electronics geek.