I recently shared an article on Twitter that I picked up from a friend south of the border. I was surprised to receive a bunch of negative feedback from my tweet! The article was about turning tech off on vacation. This hit home as I just returned from traveling for 10 days with my family. I realize that this is not the sort of topic I normally write about here, but it is near to me as it is probably the topic my wife and I *discuss* more than any other in regards to my work. Click to continue »

I was deeply moved yesterday when I read Vivek Wadhwa’s post A Better Formula for Economic Growth: Connecting Smart Risk Takers. He directly dispels the theory of clusters, research parks, university tech commercialization programs and every other top-down approach to create innovation and entrepreneurship. I highly recommend you check it out.

I completely agree with this notion and started thinking about what entrepreneurship really is and how to build a striving tech eco-system in a given area. Click to continue »

This past weekend Chris Dixon wrote a blog post titled “Builders and Extractors” that resonated with me more than almost anything I have read before. For about the past 10 years I have been passionate about this same topic and have explained my position to people countless times, of course, not nearly as articulated as Chris was able to.

About 10 years ago, when I was in my 2nd year of university, an opportunity came to me from a friend of a family member (that should be the first warning sign) of an amazing investment opportunity supposedly leveraging debt instruments and bank lending ratios to produce amazing returns. Yes, it did turn out as sketchy as it sounds. However, I learned a ton about myself and those around me through this experience. Click to continue »

I have had a few things in the past week get me thinking more about working in start ups.  The first was having the privilege of sitting on the keynote panel at the ICE Conference in Edmonton.  A number of the same issues came up among the many IT professionals.  Why don’t IT positions have access to management positions?  What do I do if I don’t like working in a very structured company?  Among the managers of these large corporations, the questions were also around issues with employees.  How do I keep a young IT professional for any extended period of time?  How do I deal with this new generation of Millennials? Click to continue »