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Tyler Saito: Sharing Knowledge, Building Resilience

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 “Once we start on the learning path, the addiction to knowledge acquisition takes over. Life-long learning becomes embedded in everything we do…. Acquiring knowledge is only the beginning of a journey.  Sharing knowledge sustains us on the road ahead.

Tyler Saito, Class of 2016

Tyler Saito, MBA(FS) Class of 2016

Tyler Saito, MBA(FS) Class of 2016

Tyler Saito, Director, Wealth Management Business Solutions at Coast Capital Wealth Management crossed the stage in 2016 to receive his MBA(FS).  In a July 2017 virtual interview with CEGE Connection, Tyler shared his thoughts on the idea of “Deeper Learning” as presented by Martine Durier-Copp and Joyline Makani’s award-winning research.  A recent MBA(FS) grad, Tyler outlined his next steps within the context of this research:

Reconnecting with friends and family.  They were an invaluable support and encouragement all through my years of study. As well, I am committed to utilizing and mastering what I have learned in my chosen career path with Coast Capital Financial Management, an organization that reflects my values and gives a purpose to work. I enjoy engaging in community endeavours and have used my Dal experience to coach little league fast-pitch and establish a communication strategy within this dedicated organization. Acquiring knowledge is only the beginning of a journey.  Sharing knowledge sustains us on the road ahead.

Fast forward to 2019.  In a following up interview with CEGE Connection, Tyler spoke of his commitment of reconnecting with family and friends, sharing knowledge and engaging in community endeavours.

Tyler Saito:

Since graduating, my family became my focus.  My wife and children gave me their full support during the time that I was involved in professional development.  They kept me grounded.

Summer has come and I am right in the middle of softball season with my girls. Both of my girls play fastpitch.  It is an exciting time.  I have enjoyed being their coach, for at least one of them, over the past four years.  Being a coach of a softball team has given me an extraordinary opportunity to foster sportsmanship, collaboration and discipline, values that will build resilience as these children grow into adulthood. Simple acts like sitting with the team before and after the game and sharing how they felt during the game or practice helps them bond and trust each other, knowing that they are in a safe environment.  While the focus of the team is playing a game, I have learned that one of the keys of keeping kids in the game is helping them make great friends and gain a sense of belonging.

With warmer weather, I am back to cycling and running outdoors.  Last year I was able to complete two triathlons and two Gran Fondos.  When I am putting in a couple hours of running or cycling, it gives me time to think and mentally reset a bit.  It is also nice that these activities are excellent enablers of disconnecting from electronics and just focusing on breathing and moving.  There is an interesting sense of camaraderie among cyclists and among runners.  We are all out to beat our own times and efforts.  Neither activity ever gets any easier with time, you just get a little faster.

Tyler Saito, Global News Morning, Money Matters

Tyler Saito, Global News Morning, Money Matters

Editor’s Note:  Tyler’s commitment to sharing knowledge and research is evident on Global News Morning, Money Matters.  Check out Tyler’s recommended  “Summer Financial Reads to Help Your Bank Account.”

Tyler Saito, Global News Morning, Money Matters

Tyler Saito, Global News Morning, Money Matters

Scott Coghill: What Are You Reading Now?

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“Most people would rather die than think and many do.”

Bertrand Russell

 

Scott Coghill MBA(FS) 2016

Scott Coghill MBA(FS) 2016

Ever since the ancient Greeks refused to do any work and sat around discussing where we came from to modern times, where the Brain asked his e’er unanswered question, “Pinky, are you pondering what I’m pondering?“, mankind (and apparently, mousekind) has pondered the vicissitudes of life.  Where did we come from?  Why are we here? How come the “Snuggie” exists?

These are the questions that have plagued us since the beginning.  After centuries of pondering these conundrums and after multiple methods of experimentation, someone invented something called a thought experiment, defined by the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy as “devices of the imagination used to investigate the nature of things.”

I was first introduced to thought experiments through Farnham Street, a regular blog that encourages people to think outside their normal thought processes.  (There is a clear line to the MBA here, as the author regularly references Charlie Munger, a student of multiple disciplines and long-time business partner of Warren Buffet.)  It was this blog that also introduced me to the book, The Pig That Wants to be Eaten by Julian Baggini.

Aptly subtitled “100 Experiments for the Armchair Philosopher”, Baggini’s book explores unique moral and ethical questions, some of which are so bizarre that one fully expects Rod Serling to appear at any moment.  The experiments are brief, about a page in length each, and allow for rumination or discussion (try reading one at the dinner table…mostly blank stares) Each thought experiment is then followed up by Baggini’s input and opinion. (Baggini is the co-founder of the Philosopher’s Magazine, so he has plenty of input to offer.)

Some of the experiments are based in the classics, like Racing Tortoises, which is based on Aesop’s fable of the tortoise and the hare.  In this experiment, the basic principles of physics are on trial.  How is it possible that Achilles could lose a foot race to a tortoise?  Do we apply logic and the immutable laws of physics or rely on experiences and fanciful notion of what could be?

Other experiments are based on more recent ideas, such as The Pig That Wants to Be Eaten, which is loosely based on Douglas Adams’ The Restaurant at the End of the Universe.  Here the thought is:  is it morally wrong to eat meat and, if so, if there was a genetically modified animal that wanted to be eaten, is it still wrong to eat it?  If we refuse to eat it, we are denying the pig’s sole desire in life.  Is it wrong to deprive him/her of that?  (I’m sure PETA would have an opinion on this question!)

There is also a throwback to Star Trek in Beam Me Up… where a lawsuit is pending against a company that builds transporters. The lawsuit claims that a person is not actually transported but is killed in the process and a clone arrives at the destination in their place.  This experiment explores the fact that a person’s mind and soul are continuous and more important than their bodies and the body is merely a container. That being said, if a person’s body is entirely irrelevant and only the continuation of soul and mind are important, can murder exist?

Baggini references The Matrix [I am a Brain] and Minority Report [Pre-emptive Justice] and touches on current subjects like terrorism [The Torture Option] and war [No One Wins].  The book is not difficult to read and provides entertaining and thought-provoking questions and encourages the reader to adopt a unique perspective.  Also, because of the layout, the book does not need to be read cover to cover. It can be picked up when convenient as each experiment stands on its own.  If you are new to philosophy or just want some short, entertaining experiments to work through, The Pig That Wants to Be Eaten may be a good place to start.

“Imagination without reason is mere fancy, while reason without imagination is sterile.” 

Julian Baggini

Scott Coghill MBA(FS) 2016, Senior Manager, Commercial Banking and Real Estate at National Bank of Canada, delivers innovative financing and investment solutions for growing businesses. Working with the Specialized Lending Sector, Scott is responsible for the maintenance, growth and development of the Commercial Real Estate sector in Southwestern Ontario.  Scott has graciously agreed to be a repeat contributor on CFAME Connection.

John A. Luchetti: Cover-to-Cover

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“In our family, books were more than a path to knowledge! They were period pieces that spoke to the culture and human spirit at a point in time. They were windows to the soul of the author.”

John A. Luchetti

John Luchetti MBA(FS) 2015

John Luchetti MBA(FS) 2015

Books have always been an integral part of my family history. My grandfather had a library in his house in Italy with over 10,000 books. The oldest book I perused was printed in 1550. It was called Ciceronis Orationum. Unfortunately, this book, like most of the books in this collection, were lost to family politics. The only remaining books finding their way to Canada was a 1775 version of the same titled book, and a series of Jules Verne classics printed in the mid-to-late 1800s.

In our family, books were more than a path to knowledge! They were period pieces that spoke to the culture and human spirit at a point in time. They were windows to the soul of the author. They were springboards to new ideas, innovations, and inspirations. They made us think, laugh, cry, escape, and even ponder alternate realities through fantasy and science fiction. Books took us places, and led us through journeys not possible anywhere else.

In short, books stirred feeling in us that expanded our realm of possibilities, what could be more human than that?

On a trip to Rome in 2008, I fondly remember performing several very clumsy pirouettes in the center of the Roman Coliseum. It wasn’t the first time I was there, however, it was the first time I was on a trip where I felt absolutely insignificant. I marveled at the history of this place, the people that lived, worked, taught, learned, created, and died here throughout the ages.

John (white t-shirt) and his brother visiting their Grandfather's library in Italy.

John (white t-shirt) and his brother visiting their Grandfather’s library in Italy.

My mind was bombarded by the historical possibilities, the realities of lives lived, and lives lost in this time-weathered place. What stories are known? Which are unknown? What key learning has been brought forward through time? Have we missed more than what we know? And what will we never know? Forever lost to history.

The rush of information which permeated my senses as I stood in this place trying to recall what I knew about Ancient Rome was overwhelming. What experiences, hardships, heartaches, successes, failures have this place seen?  I shivered with delight and shuddered with insignificance of my own mortality. I thought, how could I live multiple lives in one lifetime?

I remembered, decades earlier, when picking up Ciceronis Orationum.  It was illegible, written wholly in Latin. Reading the book was not an option, however, I do remember saying: “Dad, I’m holding history. How many hands do you think touched this book? What kind of person would have read this book? What would they say of its content?”

My father was an intellect. He was very cerebral – logical and precise, I guess as a chemist, you need to be. He thought deeply about many things and one example he had hanging in his study which now hangs in mine, its origin is unknown to me.

The Message

English translation:

Here live men who have outlived themselves

Here they speak silently

Here they listen and remain quiet

Here they are interrogated and mute is there response

The feelings and the questions inspired by this old book so many years ago where similar to the feelings and thoughts I had standing in the Roman Coliseum.

This book inspired me to love books as did standing in the center of the coliseum in Rome inspired me to love a life of life-long learning. This was the impetus that led me to Dalhousie’s MBA(FS) program. A thirst for knowledge and experiences.

Having completed my MBA(FS) in 2015, and with some serious time on my hands, I have started to collect books, all kinds of books. I tend to shy away from digital books because there is no better feeling then immersing oneself in a book, flipping the pages, using a bookmark, and reading it cover-to-cover.

John A. Luchetti MBA(FS) 2015 is PMO Lead at TransUnion, specializing in project/program/portfolio management. His areas of expertise cover a broad spectrum from relationship management and cross functional team management, to negotiation, conflict resolution, and mediation.  John has graciously agreed to be a repeat contributor on CFAME Connection.

 Photography Credit:  John A. Luchetti

 

 

 

Dr. Rick Nason: What Are You Reading Now?

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What do you spend the most time at – work or play?   

And by play, I mean an activity that serves no solemn purpose other than for pure enjoyment.

If you have left childhood behind to enter the sophisticated world of adults, I suspect you answered “work”.

What are you better at –  work or play? 

Alas, you most likely answered “work” because, given your answer above, you probably allotted your creative energies and prime time to developing your “work” skill-sets.

Think back.

Rick Nason

Rick Nason

When was the last time you played with Legos or an Erector set (Meccano set for Canadians or Britains)?

When did you build something out of wood just for the heck of it – not because it was needed?

When was the last time you did math problems simply because it was fun to do so?

When was the last time you let your mind think about things for the sheer pleasure of thinking about things?

These questions came to me as I finished the wonderful biography of Claude Shannon by Jimmy Soni and Rob Goodman, titled “A Mind at Play: How Claude Shannon Invented the Information Age”

While you may not recognize his name, Claude Shannon, has influenced your life in ways that you would never have imagined.  Whenever you make a phone call, watch a streamed movie or send an email – or basically anything with digital information – a large share of the credit for these indispensable technologies goes to Claude Shannon.

Claude Shannon was a mathematician who worked at the famous Bell Labs.  His ability to see problems in a new light were legendary.  He virtually created the conceptual underpinnings that transformed analogue systems to digital, allowing us to watch our movies and communicate through our smart phones from anywhere, at any time.

Claude Shannon was legendary for his playing.  Shannon used the uniquely relaxed and undemanding work atmosphere at Bell Labs to not necessarily work on the problems at hand.  Rather, he would let his mind – and his body play.  Although an extreme introvert, he was well known for juggling while unicycling down the narrow hallways of the Bell Labs complex.  He liked to develop robots – including one to juggle – and perhaps is most famous for developing a robot mouse that could work its way through a maze to find a magnetic piece of cheese.  He created an early computer playing chess device and fashioned a wide variety of bizarre unicycles.  His house was filled with gadgets, many of which he built from his Erector set that his wife bought him as a Christmas gift.

You might ask why did Bell Labs allow this mathematician so much leeway?

One can only guess at the answer, but it may Bell Labs recognized Shannon’s play produced novel insights that changed the world and generated tremendous profits for their company.   Make no mistake though – Shannon was not into playing for profit – he was a person of very modest expenditures and repeatedly turned down lucrative opportunities.  Shannon was into play solely for the sake of play.  He understood the obvious – playing is fun.  The delightful unintended consequence when his mind was at play produced significant outcomes.

Claude Shannon demonstrates that play and success are not mutually exclusive, but in fact are likely highly correlated.

Now, you are probably sitting there with a stacked inbox and a set of looming work deadlines.  You may be wistful, even slightly envious, that Shannon received compensation for engaging in juggling and unicycling.  Indeed, it is a sad truth that few, if any, of us will get directly compensated for playing.  However, no one controls your mind on your off-time.

Here is my challenge to you.   Let your mind play.

Instead of watching a mindless TV show, turning to a computer game – including solitaire, or reading a formula-written pulp-fiction novel, go back in time and awaken your four-year-old brain.  It’s time you had fun!  It’s time you embraced play again!

Ask yourself the silliest question you can think of and then try to work your way through it – simply for the absolute delight of doing so.  While you may not develop ideas as path-breaking as Claude Shannon did with his mind play, you will open yourself up to innovative opportunities.

Go play!

Dr. Rick Nason is an associate professor of finance in the Rowe School of Business at Dalhousie University. Rick’s research interests are enterprise risk management, complexity, financial crisis, financial risk assessment, derivatives and hedging strategies. His recent book, It’s Not Complicated, published in 2017 offers a paradigm shift for business professionals looking for simplified solutions to complex problems.

 

 

The Virtual Book Club: What are you reading now?

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Abbotsford House, The home of Sir Walter Scott. Scottish Borders, near Melrose, on the south bank of the River Tweed.

Abbotsford House, The home and library of Sir Walter Scott.
Scottish Borders, near Melrose, on the south bank of the River Tweed

Two millennia ago, Marcus Tullius Cicero declared that “A room without books is like a body without a soul.”

In the 20th century, Ernest Hemingway maintained, “There is no friend as loyal as a book.”

The narrative of humanity is recorded on the pages of books, whether in print or digital format.  We turn to books because they challenge, motivate, entertain and educate.  Best of all, they connect us in ways that circumvent the constraints of time and location.  Which is why book clubs have become ubiquitous in our age of technology.  After all, doesn’t everyone belong to a book club?

Welcome to CFAME Connection’s new column, “What are you reading now?” a result of a telephone discussion with Rick Nason a few months ago.  We lead busy lives with full agendas and competing interests and responsibilities; reading often becomes relegated to in-between spaces of time.  As Frank Zappa mused, “So many books, so little time.”

Books stimulate conversations, as demonstrated by the responses from CFAME Connection contributors:

Rick Atherton:  I have two books on my desk, which are focused on Operational Excellence:  Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind by Yuval Noah Harari and What To Do When Machines Do Everything by Malcolm Frank, Paul Roehrig, & Ben Pring

Michael Ford:  I am balancing Dr. Rick Nason’s book It’s Not Complicated: The Art and Science of Complexity for Business Success with a biography on Leonardo da Vinci.

John Luchetti: Since finishing my MBA in 2015, with no assignments, no required reading, no virtual classes to attend, no exams – what to do? I’ve been buying books. I have biographies to read from Alexander the Great to Elizabeth Smart – Clinton, Da Vinci, Jobs, Lama, Mandela, and Malala.

Steen Madsen: Currently I am reading an older science fiction book, Consider Phlebas: A Culture Novel by Iain M. Banks.  I had heard that Elon Musk is a big fan of Iain Banks and used the book’s title as one of the names for his remote-landing-drones for the Falcon9 rocket-returns to earth.  If you like science fiction, this is a must read.  Very well written and the work holds up well through time.

Jim Spitali: Leadership BS: Fixing Workplaces and Careers One Truth at a Time, by Jeffry Pfeffer. So far, it is an interesting read and highlights some of the myths of leadership.  I also enjoy many Harvard Business Review articles.  I find them quite insightful.

Yvonne Thevenot: I just finished reading The Millionaire Next Door Thomas J Stanley, William D Danko.  A group of colleagues at work decided we would all read the same book and chat about it.  While I would not have ever chosen this book to read myself, I enjoy the community sense of trying something new by tagging along with someone else’s suggestion.  It takes me outside my comfort zone and exposes me to ideas and opportunities I would not have had otherwise.  Now, that being said, I can’t say I found the book particularly engaging, but I did finish it, learned some interesting things, and had fun in sharing the ideas with my colleagues.  The next book on my list is The Gift of Mentoring, by Doug Lawrence and Emily Hunter.  I have had the privilege of meeting Doug through my mentoring certification and have a world of respect for what he is doing for the professionalization of mentoring and so am eager to see how his views and values are captured in print!

Binod Sundararajan:  I am currently, slowly, plowing through a book called The Society of Mind, by Marvin Minsky. It is heavy reading, but it is brilliant.

Dr. Carolan McLarney:  This past summer I read Tolstoy, Dante, Elizabeth George and Tom Robbins. My reading list has moved on to my Christmas gifts:   The Art Thief (N. Chaney), The Economic Consequences of the Peace (J.M. Keynes), Finding Piglet (adapted from A.A. Milne), The History of Bees (M. Lunde) and In Memory’s Kitchen:  A Legacy from the Women of Terezin (Berenbaum & Silva)

Dr. Rick Nason:  To find out, stay tuned for the next post, on “What are you reading now?”

We invite you to join the conversation and share books that have inspired your journey.

Rebecca Budd
Blog Coordinator

P.S.  I’ve been reading, The Hidden Life of Trees: What They Feel, How They Communicate—Discoveries from a Secret World  by Peter Wohlleben and have discovered that trees communicate as communities. I continue to learn…