Laurent Ferreira is blunt when he assesses the state of Canada’s economic trouble. “The status of our economy is red,” he said in a June 9 conversation with Goldy Hyder at the Conférence de Montréal . The president and CEO of National Bank of Canada stressed the urgency for Canada to strengthen its economy in light of geopolitical uncertainty. But he’s optimistic the country will take action, saying now is the time to “get projects built across the country, get to the bottom of what are the caus...
Jun 12, 2025•26 min•Season 8Ep. 10
Roy Gori started his first job – a paper route – at age eight. At ten, he was delivering medications to seniors for a local pharmacy. He got a job with Citibank straight out of high school at 17 and has been working full time ever since. So it’s perhaps not surprising that, at age 56, he’s decided to try something new. In early May, he retired as President and CEO of Manulife after eight years leading the international financial services group. The Canadian company has a massive global footprint...
May 14, 2025•30 min•Season 8Ep. 9
Scott Balfour has some simple career advice for his three sons: stay humble, work hard and be kind. It’s what he learned from his mother and grandmother and he maintains those “fundamental skills” have been the most important throughout his career. Born and raised in Oakville, Ontario, Balfour spent a year working on the assembly line at the local Ford plant before returning to Laurier University to complete his degree. He went on to work in commercial banking, corporate finance and infrastructu...
Apr 17, 2025•32 min•Season 8Ep. 8
When Dean Setoguchi thinks about Canada’s energy industry, he sees a bright future, and it’s partly due to tariff threats from the United States. “I’m an optimist,” he tells Goldy Hyder on the Speaking of Business podcast. “I feel like there’s a recognition by Canadians that our national resources are our treasure, and I don’t think that recognition has been there for the past at least decade.” The president and CEO of Keyera hopes momentum will build to get Canadian natural gas to more customer...
Mar 18, 2025•31 min•Season 8Ep. 7
What can we expect from a second Trump presidency and how should countries like Canada respond? Those are some of the themes Goldy Hyder explores with bestselling author, columnist and CNN host Fareed Zakaria in a conversation recorded on January 13th – one week before the presidential inauguration. Zakaria discusses his latest book Age of Revolutions and reflects on changes to the geopolitical landscape, including the potential impact of tariffs on countries around the world. Revealing conversa...
Feb 12, 2025•44 min•Season 8Ep. 6
Éric Martel understands the transformative power of innovation. The President and CEO of Bombardier says it “has always been in the DNA” of the company – from the invention of the snowmobile 80 years ago, to the development of cutting-edge aerospace technology today. In an interview with Goldy Hyder on the Speaking of Business podcast, Martel discusses why fostering innovation and growing Canadian champions requires a strong partnership between the private sector and government. He argues that C...
Jan 23, 2025•34 min•Season 8Ep. 5
Deb Pimentel often tells her colleagues to be “loud and proud.” The President and GM Technology for IBM Canada believes Canadians need to be more passionate and vocal about their accomplishments. “It's incredible how many fantastic things we do that we don't talk about,” she tells Goldy Hyder on the Speaking of Business podcast. Speaking at IBM Canada’s Software Lab in Markham, Ontario, Pimentel expresses great pride in the innovation that happens there. The Canadian-developed software is being ...
Dec 04, 2024•36 min•Season 8Ep. 4
The man who oversees the $650-billion pension portfolio of millions of Canadians started out his career in the relative safety of a chemistry lab. Back then, John Graham was a research scientist with a PhD in physical chemistry. He spent nine years working in a lab before he jumped from the world of science to the world of finance, joining CPP Investments. Now, as president and CEO of one of the world’s largest pension funds, he recognizes that investing in financial markets is more art than sci...
Nov 12, 2024•21 min•Season 8Ep. 3
After 100 Speaking of Business interviews with Canada’s leading CEOs, we decided to mark the milestone by putting a few of them together in a room. We brought together a former CEO from one of Canada’s most established companies, an executive from a Canadian success story that started small and became big, and a company founder from a brand-new sector. They had more in common than you’d think. Host Goldy Hyder wanted to know: how do you maintain a startup mindset, even in organizations that are ...
Oct 03, 2024•59 min•Season 8Ep. 2
As the fourth generation leader of a family business, Galen Weston recognizes the responsibility he shoulders – to his employees, his country, and his great-grandfather’s legacy. Weston’s Real Home-made Bread began in Toronto in 1882. Today, George Weston Limited is one of Canada’s largest private sector companies, with more than 200,000 employees. “It makes you think in decades, not in quarters,” he says. “You think about what is this company going to be not just a year from now, but 10 years f...
Sep 04, 2024•31 min•Season 8Ep. 1
When Elio Luongo started working for KPMG in Canada in the 1980s, artificial intelligence was the stuff of science fiction movies. Remember when The Terminator hit the big screen? Now, as Luongo prepares to retire as CEO, AI is no longer the purview of sci-fi imagination. It’s increasingly the day-to-day reality in a modern workplace. Luongo is encouraging all KPMG employees to experiment with and learn from AI. “Businesses need to help their people develop skills around AI,” he says. “That is p...
Aug 22, 2024•35 min•Season 7Ep. 10
Carolyn Wilkins is fully aware how “geeky” it is to talk about economic growth. But the former senior deputy governor of the Bank of Canada has made a career out of it, and she is inviting everyone else to get in on the conversation – because it’s the very lifeblood of our quality of life. “The economy is the foundation of peoples' financial and social well-being,” she says. “The kind of jobs people have, how much money they have at the end of the week, whether they can afford a vacation, that a...
Jul 31, 2024•35 min•Season 7Ep. 9
John Kousinioris describes 2015 as a wakeup call. Back then, his company, TransAlta, relied heavily on coal plants to generate electricity for Albertans. The Alberta government had other plans. It announced a phase-out of coal-fired electricity plants and gave TransAlta until 2030 to comply. Rather than challenging the government’s decision, Kousinioris says TransAlta decided to embrace the change. Over the next six years the company converted all its Alberta coal plants to natural gas, dramatic...
Jun 25, 2024•44 min•Season 7Ep. 8
As a child growing up in Pembroke, Ontario, Meghan Roach remembers driving more than an hour out of town to shop at a Roots store. “Roots was always something special,” she recalls, pointing to the durability of their well-worn products. “I love the Roots TUFF Boots. You would buy these things and you could not wear them out.” Little did she know then that she would one day become CEO of the iconic Canadian company. With humble beginnings in Toronto in 1973, Roots has grown into an international...
May 29, 2024•25 min•Season 7Ep. 7
For decades, the names John Risley and Clearwater Seafoods were practically synonymous. The story of Clearwater’s founding is the stuff of legend in Atlantic Canada. It’s a story of how John and his business partner Colin MacDonald started selling lobsters in a store on the Bedford highway in 1976 … and how they grew Clearwater into a global seafood giant. As the Chairman and CEO of CFFI Ventures, Risley has been involved in many other enterprises throughout his career – including telecommunicat...
Apr 30, 2024•34 min•Season 7Ep. 6
They’re taking on underground construction obstacles, tackling mining and energy quandaries, and don’t hesitate to brainstorm daily about how to address climate change. Hatch is an engineering and professional services firm that employs 12,000 people in 150 countries around the world, all from its perch in Mississauga, ON. But you may have never heard of them, and that’s by design. “It's true that we're not a household name,” says Hatch Chairman and CEO John Bianchini. “We're employee-owned and ...
Mar 28, 2024•34 min•Season 7Ep. 5
When Jennifer Wong was an economics student at the University of British Columbia, she walked into an Aritzia store with her resumé. The company at the time was only three years old and operated two locations. She landed a part-time job, which led to other Aritzia jobs as the company grew. Three decades later, she became Chief Executive Officer of the clothing retail giant that now boasts 117 stores in two countries, plus a global online presence. “My journey has really been about figuring thing...
Feb 22, 2024•29 min•Season 7Ep. 4
When the last spike was driven into the Canadian Pacific Railway track on November 7th, 1885 in British Columbia, CP became the first transcontinental railway to connect Canada from east to west. Last April, the iconic Canadian company marked another first, when – in Kansas City, Missouri – a ceremonial final spike connected Canadian Pacific with Kansas City Southern. The new railway, now named CPKC, became the first and only single-line railway connecting Canada, the United States and Mexico. I...
Jan 25, 2024•46 min•Season 7Ep. 3
It was a summer job that sparked Mike Rencheck’s lifelong career in the energy industry. He started out as an intern at the Beaver Valley Power Station in Pennsylvania in the 1980’s, and never looked back. “It really opened my eyes to what was possible in nuclear energy,” he says. Skip ahead a few decades and Rencheck is now the President and CEO of Bruce Power. The nuclear plant on the shores of Lake Huron produces 30 per cent of Ontario's electricity – that’s half of all the province’s nuclear...
Dec 05, 2023•33 min•Season 7Ep. 2
Iggy Domagalski is a big believer in having fun at work. “Work can be enjoyable,” he says. “When people know that they can have a bit of fun and that they can take five minutes to spend some fun time with their peers, I think that sends them back to their desk smiling.” Domagalski is the President and CEO of Wajax, a Canadian industrial products and service company. With 3000 employees working in 120 branches across the country, a strong corporate culture that embraces positivity is a big priori...
Jun 22, 2023•33 min•Season 6Ep. 7
François Poirier and his co-workers see themselves as problem-solvers . The problems are many, and familiar to anyone who follows North America’s energy industry. The need to reduce emissions from traditional energy sources like oil and natural gas. The need to transition to lower-carbon sources without raising prices for consumers. The need for energy security in a world that is increasingly unpredictable. It’s a tall order, but Poirier – President and CEO of Calgary-based TC Energy – is optimi...
May 25, 2023•28 min•Season 6Ep. 6
Twenty-seven years ago, WestJet took to the air with just three aircraft and five destinations. Today, the Calgary-based airline serves more than 100 cities across four continents. Overseeing the operation is CEO Alexis von Hoensbroech. He's a newcomer to Canada but not to the industry, having spent two decades working for and running airlines in Europe. When he arrived in Canada last year, he was struck by the country’s rugged geography and “sheer size”, which brought home to him the importance...
Apr 20, 2023•36 min•Season 6Ep. 5
If you filled up your car’s gas tank recently, or popped into a convenience store, there’s a good chance you visited a Parkland location. The Canadian company supplies fuel and operates convenience stores across Canada under many banners, including On the Run, Chevron and Ultramar. Founded in Red Deer, Alberta, in the 1970s, Parkland now operates 4,000 locations in 25 countries. The company has expanded quickly. “We're a 50-year-old company, yet 80 per cent of our employees joined us within the ...
Mar 20, 2023•30 min•Season 6Ep. 4
Growing up in rural Saskatchewan, Tracy Robinson liked to watch the trains roll by. Little did she know then that trains would have a lasting impact on her life. She spent 27 years working at Canadian Pacific Railway before switching to the energy sector for almost a decade. Last year she returned to her roots when she was appointed President and CEO of CN, a job she calls “the best in the world.” Overseeing 30,000 km of track across Canada and the United States, Robinson understands the integra...
Feb 27, 2023•32 min•Season 6Ep. 3
Rania Llewellyn spent 26 years working at Scotiabank before making a move she describes as a “big leap and a big change” – becoming President and CEO of Laurentian Bank . And yet she says the hardest part of that transition was joining a new institution in the middle of a pandemic. The inability to walk through the office and meet people created unique challenges, she says. “Organizations are made of people. You need to be a really good listener to be a good leader.” In a wide-ranging conversati...
Dec 13, 2022•31 min•Season 6Ep. 2
When Deanna Zumwalt became President and CEO of Coril Holdings in 2021, she took on responsibility for an organization with a rich Canadian legacy. The Calgary-based company, with roots in the railway industry, has evolved considerably since its beginnings nearly 125 years ago. Now Zumwalt is looking ahead to the next century. “Being a family enterprise for 125 years, we think across generations – we think in 25-year chunks,” she tells Goldy Hyder on the Speaking of Business podcast. Zumwalt cha...
Nov 15, 2022•25 min•Season 6Ep. 1
Canada needs a new foreign strategy that positions it to compete successfully in a changing world, according to former Canadian ambassador Louise Blais. “There are major shifts occurring in the geopolitical landscape,” she says. “Canada will either come out as losing or winning from an economic and security perspective, but we need to have a plan.” Blais served as a senior diplomat in Canadian embassies and consulates around the world including Tokyo, Paris, Washington and the United Nations. Sh...
Jun 02, 2022•32 min•Season 5Ep. 17
When Dani Reiss took over his grandfather’s apparel business more than two decades ago, he gambled on Canada. He resolved to continue making high-end outerwear in Canada, at a time when others in the industry were moving production abroad. The bet paid off. Today Canada Goose is recognized around the world for its luxury clothing. Reiss credits part of that success to the decision to stick with a “Made in Canada” label. For international customers, he says, “a Canada Goose jacket made in Canada ...
May 19, 2022•24 min•Season 5Ep. 16
COVID-19 created an “inflection moment” that offers Canadians a chance to build a better future, according to Penny Wise, President of 3M Canada . “We have a huge opportunity to make a difference and really change the growth trajectory of Canada if we really seize that moment,” she says. In a conversation with Goldy Hyder on the Speaking of Business podcast, Wise points to three ingredients that should be part of the country’s economic recovery. First, she urges the country to develop an industr...
May 05, 2022•23 min•Season 5Ep. 15
Is Canada poised to be a winner or a loser as the world transitions toward cleaner sources of energy? Charles Brindamour, the CEO of Intact Financial Corporation – the country’s largest provider of property and casualty insurance – is convinced that Canada has everything it needs to be a global leader in the drive to net-zero greenhouse gas emissions. He points to the country’s highly skilled and diverse workforce, its robust energy supplies and its abundant natural resources as areas in which C...
Apr 21, 2022•32 min•Season 5Ep. 14
