FACILITYCalgary

January 19, 2016

I was pointed in his direction by someone I regard highly – as someone worth getting to know. He’s Mark Olson, Calgarian, practitioner in the Osborne Group’s Western Canada operation – and its Managing Partner. Not sure if that means he has the largest stake, or largest workload. It appears after meeting with him, both!

I’ve learned a bit about the Osborne Group, and Osborne Interim Management before. I’ve interviewed one of their guys, Simon Batcup, before – but this name Mark Olson kept surfacing in conversations around town. I heard he was Interim-CEO at Simon House, where I started my search. As it turned out he was just completing that assignment (though he continues to work with them in an advisory capacity) having installed a new CEO – so back to his ‘regular job’ which isn’t really a regular job …

Nice guy, accomplished – and a peculiar collection of credentials to be doing what he’s doing. I was expecting perhaps a long-serving early-retired exec who wasn’t ready to quit. Instead I found an eclectic guy with an intriguing path … meet, Mark Olson:

Born and raised in Winnipeg, #3 child of three, mom was a clerical worker in health care, dad was a manager in the meat packing industry – they divorced when Mark was seven. He lived with mom. Both parents remarried. Tuxedo Shaftesbury High School – but detoured from post-secondary education [he was registered at University of Manitoba] by a part time job in radio. He was reporting high school sports to a local station as a volunteer and worked into a job. Well, perhaps better stated it was a 30+ year career in broadcasting that took him to Hamilton, Toronto, Halifax, Edmonton and Calgary. Our conversation was like time-travel in terms of sports and broadcasting names from the sixties-nineties; Pat Marsden, Kenny Ploen, Ted Rogers, John Bassett, lets say it worked it well! His times in radio – saying things on air that he shouldn’t have got him into his share of hot water. His zeal for the business, and for sports, were his stepping stones from market to market, from radio organization to radio organization – inspired in many ways by the thrill of the Pan Am Games when they were in Winnipeg.

He’s had some opportunities that were forks in the road – appealing a firing to John Basset, he was advised to go back to school. His other choices were to work for Dick Irvine in Montreal, or take a job with CBC in Edmonton or Winnipeg. He chose Winnipeg – he certainly knew that beat. 

His radio career involved sports director roles and wove in and out of – and ended in advertising sales and management, to KISN Country in Edmonton, lastly based in Calgary with the Rawlco Radio Group. He took a package, took some time off in Salvador, and joined Osborne Group in 2002/3, becoming a Principal in 2004. Currently 12 Principals, 40 Advisors – offices in Calgary, Edmonton and Vancouver.  

At twenty-one while working at CFTO, he met his future wife Debbie (39 years and counting), on a blind date set up my Pat Marsden’s secretary. They have three children – two boys and a girl.

Why are you successful? “I’m doggedly persistent by nature. No matter how tough the odds, we are going to overcome it. A sense of humour. We need absurdity in the face of adversity. I feel very good about having re-invented myself a couple of times along the way. I’m spiritual.”

What has held you back? “I believe regret is the most useless of emotions.”