Ian Telfer is one of the most successful businessman in Canada. A self admitted screw-up, he chairs Vancouver's Goldcorp, the largest publicly traded company in British Columbia, and the second largest gold mining company in the world (by market capitalization). He offered 12 lessons for people starting their careers, and for people in the middle part of their careers at a recent speech to the Vancouver Board of Trade.
Read the whole piece. My favorites?
"People are prepared to charge up a hill behind a competent leader, even if it's the wrong hill. Many of the times, the wrong hill is better than no hill at all."
and…
"You're screwing up when you're not screwing up."
To which I would add "learn to fail, fast."
Alec Saunders is the Vice President of Developer Relations for BlackBerry make Research in Motion. This is his personal blog, with his personal viewpoints. Prior to this Alec was the CEO and co-founder of Calliflower — the easiest way to hold a meeting, online, on a conference call, or on the go. A double-decade veteran of product management and marketing, he spent nine years at Microsoft where he helped launch Windows 95, the first two versions of Internet Explorer, the Universal Plug and Play initiative, the push into home markets, opt-in email marketing and what might well go down in history as the very first direct email list ever.
