I spent last weekend at the Château Lake Louise, at a 50th anniversary celebration for Shaw Communications being held just before it joins Rogers. I have worked with Shaw — indeed it has represented about a third of my work time — for 27 years. I have bonded with, and even love, many of its people and family members.
Shaw had seven values: integrity, loyalty, customer focus, can-do attitude, team player, accountability and balance. He lived them. One of his lessons was that you never should ask someone to do anything that you would not do yourself. JR was driven and strived for perfection. One of his sayings was, “Give it 100% till you get the job done.“ He taught his people and modelled many lessons for success. At the celebration of his life, his wife of over 60 years, Carol, told the story of how they would drive down the streets of Edmonton when they were getting started. JR would look at a house remarking “there are three lines there“ and quickly add, “but they are only paying for two!” Nothing passed him by.
At his son’s Jim‘s funeral, many of the cable technicians lined up in front of Stampede Stadium as people arrived with their Shaw caps to their hearts, paying their respects, in the dead of a cold, cold Calgary winter. JR got out of his car when he saw this and went to thank every single one of them for what must been more than 30 minutes.