All my life I have loved solving puzzles. Mathematics came alive when we moved from arithmetic to algebra and problem solving. Once in college, my days were filled with Mathematics, Physics, and Computer Engineering and I was a happy camper!

My love for research and development (R&D) projects involving software development began in graduate school in Computer Engineering. This continued when I began twenty-five wonderful years at Nortel Networks. My wife used to say I didn't go to work, I went to play - with computers.

Once in management there was no looking back. At first I resisted leaving the software development world, but people are much more interesting than lines of code. And I learned I could tackle far more interesting problems (for me they were puzzles) with the help of a really talented team.

My life changed forever when I discovered coaching 25 years ago. Our company hired a professional coach to train a group of us to become coaches. We had a coaching network in our workplace where achievers worked with a coach on a learning objective, and coaches worked with our trainer honing our coaching skills. During these years of coaching training, I learned my favorite request was 'Brian, do you have a minute?'

Coaching put the heart in my leadership style. It taught me how to have conversations for effective action, how to grow trust, and how to respect the feelings of others while still calling a spade a spade. The following words from our coach Gordon Collins changed my life:

In 2001 I was able to retire. The dot com bomb had created a morbid and stressful climate of project cancellation and downsizing, and I was fortunate to be able to request a pension, retire, and let some other young engineer keep their job.

Always having a love for the R&D project environment, I started my own business. For several years, I had clients who needed to turn around a stalled project or business. My tag line was "Bringing order to chaos".

Looking back, my favourite memories are coaching. I remember in my R&D management days, returning to my desk to be met with dozens of voice messages. The first messages I returned were from people I was coaching.

In the past year, I decided to re-kindle my love of coaching for all professionals. I decided to offer a service to any professional seeking to recharge their career. Now, I bring order to career chaos going on in so many professional lives these days.

A more formal CV with education and job experience from Nortel is viewable by clicking here.

If you feel we'd work really well together, call me at 905-702-1420 or send an email.