Is equality the best big goal for a society

Equality or equal opportunity for all? Equality in a society is a major goal for many - I get emails and Facebooked about this topic all the time.
So is equality for all the best goal? What are the long term consequences? I know when I see my tax bill, I often want to put my resume on Monster and get a union or government job.
I am not sure if this is a true story, but it resonates with me - a business owner, a job creator and a tax payer.

An economics professor at a local college made a statement that he had never failed a single student before, but had recently failed an entire class. That class had insisted that Obama's socialism worked and that no one would be poor and no one would be rich, a great equalizer.

The professor then said, "OK, we will have an experiment in this class on Obama's plan". All grades will be averaged and everyone will receive the same grade so no one will fail and no one will receive an A.... (substituting grades for dollars - something closer to home and more readily understood by all).

After the first test, the grades were averaged and everyone got a B. The students who studied hard were upset and the students who studied little were happy. As the second test rolled around, the students who studied little had studied even less and the ones who studied hard decided they wanted a free ride too so they studied little.

The second test average was a D! No one was happy.

When the 3rd test rolled around, the average was an F.

As the tests proceeded, the scores never increased as bickering, blame and name-calling all resulted in hard feelings and no one would study for the benefit of anyone else.

To their great surprise, ALL FAILED and the professor told them that socialism would also ultimately fail because when the reward is great, the effort to succeed is great, but when government takes all the reward away, no one will try or want to succeed.

It could not be any simpler than that. (Please pass this on)

Remember, there IS a test coming up. The 2012 elections.

These are possibly the 5 best sentences you'll ever read and all applicable to this experiment:

1. You cannot legislate the poor into prosperity by legislating the wealthy out of prosperity.

2. What one person receives without working for, another person must work for without receiving.

3. The government cannot give to anybody anything that the government does not first take from somebody else.

4. You cannot multiply wealth by dividing it!

5. When half of the people get the idea that they do not have to work because the other half is going to take care of them, and when the other half gets the idea that it does no good to work because somebody else is going to get what they work for, that is the beginning of the end of any nation.

Next 36 Ventures tonight at MaRS and on BNN The Pitch

The energy in the room will be at nuclear fusion level tonight. Why? Imagine 36 of the young, newly selected participants in an entrepreneur incubator in one room with Canada's leading entrepreneur community and now you get the idea. It is a lethal combination of excitement.

I am meeting the Next 36 Ventures Finalists at MaRS and Claudia Hepbourn has done an incredible job of developing emerging entrepreneurs and making young people build their careers and business ideas.

Several of the better concepts made it onto the business owner show where they pitch for VC and private equity money. 

See "Whadyathink?" and  "Playfit Mobile" pitch to Jacoline Loewen, Loewen & Partners, private equity expert on BNN's The Pitch.

Whadyathink - http://vod.bnn.ca/Video/507127

Playfit Mobile - http://vod.bnn.ca/Video/507128

The Decision - http://vod.bnn.ca/Video/507129

or view at

http://vod.bnn.ca/Video/507127

Birch Box creates a new channel for make up and cosmetics

Cosmetic brands are the female equivalent of game apps. As a founder, if the brand catches on, the pay off can be great.
I was talking with a cosmetics business owner and a private equity fund from San Francisco and The Shopping Channel is one high risk and expensive way to get a brand boosted but there is an exciting new company called Birch Box that has created an entirely new channel to reach make up hungry females who can never have enough lipsticks or eye shadows.

Bayley Barna and Katia Beauchamp got their investor partners on board and learned that there is a dangerous side of shipping cosmetics.

Birchbox is the startup that VCs can't stop talking about and that new startups are trying to emulate.

The company, which sends its customers a box of beauty products samples every month, launched just over a year ago and it has been growing exponentially with more than 45,000 users and various upscale cosmetic partners such as Khiels, Carol's Daughter and Kerastase.

Read more: http://www.businessinsider.com/what-is-birchbox-2011-11#ixzz1ej6fTHG7

Private Equity wants you to have more than one client

A revolution, rather than an evolution, is happening in the natural gas and oil markets in North America and the world. The revolution results from the impact of fracking and horizontal drilling, and the resulting discovery and development of huge, unconventional oil and gas reserves around the world in shale formations.

The US has potentially two Trillion barrels of unconventional oil reserves in shale and other formations, which can be developed, making it the world’s largest oil producer.

This is followed by China at 350 Billion barrels and Israel with 250 billion barrels. These are all as compared to  Saudi Arabia’s current 260 billion barrels of conventional oil. For Canada, it is 179 Billion Barrels.

The recent US and Canada diplomatic slap in the face over the pipeline between the two countries, as reported by MacLean’s, is around the politics of environmentalists, but also rumored to be the large US oil and coal lobby groups pressuring the US government not to allow any competitors into the US market. Canada would be a big threat to these companies. As the Canadian government said, “The pipeline is a no brainer.” Not to the US government though.

Patrick Daniel, CEO Enbridge,  says that most of the transportation is not through a pipeline anyway, but he supports that the pipeline is a no brainer and the delay is a serious issue. Instead, Canada will now be pushing up the Gateway project to do a pipeline to Kitimat, not Prince Rupert. This pipeline will then transport energy for Asia and our geographic position puts Canada geographically closer to the Asian markets than the Middle East, a huge competitive advantage. Daniel said that environmentalists like to "mob the mike" and that other voices need to also make themselves heard. He said that technology companies say they are revolutionizing medicine but he believes energy already did that by making sure the patient got to the doctor. When you look at that reasoning, we do take for granted our transportation and lighting.

Having one client which is Enbridge's current client situation, the USA, would not be liked by a private equity investor. Enbridge and Canada are now being forced by the USA's politicking to look for their next big client. Asia is the next no brainer, but the Vancouver Port is too full so Kitimat needs to be developed. Enbridge says there will be environmental rules in place to ensure only top quality ships are allowed to be accepted. 
Providing energy to Asia is a race.

A recent article in the National Post titled “Democratic Jackpot” highlights the new sources of energy and how it will be an incredible game changer . Most of the finds are in democratic countries – interesting. They will also be coming online within 10 years.

 The game-changer is "unconventional fossil fuels," much of it trapped in shale - rock that often contains oil or gas. In the case of gas, the U.S. is developing so much, so fast in so many places that the domestic price for natural gas has more than halved. Whereas five years ago the U.S. planned to build major terminuses to import gas, it is now becoming a major gas exporter. America's Marcellus Shale formation alone - a natural gas reservoir that lies more than a mile underground beneath Pennsylvania, New York, West Virginia and Ohio - has enough gas to supply the Eastern U.S. for decades.

Europe, though a novice in the unconventional energy game, has already discovered vast amounts. The U.K., in the first shale gas field it drilled earlier this year, discovered a gas deposit close to half the size of Marcellus, enough to fuel the entire British economy for decades. France and Poland have comparable finds; Germany and the Netherlands smaller ones. Europe has also discovered immense amounts of natural gas in the Mediterranean, which Cyprus, Greece and Israel have begun to develop for delivery to the European mainland. Among the Western democracies, Australia, too, has massive amounts of exportable natural gas, as does Canada, Brazil and others in the Americas. As does China and other Asian countries. All told, the International Energy Agency estimates a world store of natural gas sufficient to last 250 years.

A similar tale of unconventional riches is unfolding in oil, where the U.S. has in excess of two trillion barrels, the world's largest store. China comes next, with some 350 billion barrels, followed by Israel's 250 billion barrels, an amount close to Saudi Arabia's 260 billion barrels of conventional oil. Thirty-five other countries, including 15 in Europe, are believed to have lesser amounts of unconventional oil, but they may not remain lesser for long - with each new assessment in recent years, the estimates have climbed with new discoveries.

The cost of developing these unconventional resources, meanwhile, continues to drop. In the case of Israel, which has developed an unusually clean and efficient drilling technology, oil is expected to flow at a cost of US$35 to US$40 per barrel, or less than half today's world oil price of US$90 a barrel.

The diversified democracies of the world - the U.S. and European countries among others - will profit big time from the world's endowment of unconventional oil and gas, partly because many of them will become energy exporters instead of importers and mainly because low energy prices will spur their advanced economies. Not so for today's undiversified, energy-export dependent countries.

Maxime Bernier delights the business owners at the Globe and Mail Small Business Summit

Maxime Bernier blew me away with the government's positive approach to business. He spoke at the Globe and Mail Small Business Summit about how everyone should be grateful to business owners and how hard it is to get past the politics of envy of success.
Never thought I would hear that in Canada.
There is more and I recommend that every business owner sign up on this new website. It is wonderfully easy to use and very practical.

The Honourable Maxime Bernier, Minister of State (Small Business and Tourism), today announced that BizPaL is becoming a permanent service available to small and medium-sized enterprise (SME) owners.

“The Government of Canada supports SMEs by putting in place initiatives that enable them and entrepreneurs to continue to grow and create jobs,” said Minister of State Bernier. “BizPaL is a concrete example of an initiative designed to cut through the red tape that small business owners encounter.”

BizPaL is an innovative and cost-effective one-stop online service that provides simplified access to information on permits and licences that entrepreneurs and small business owners need to establish and run their businesses.

This unique partnership among federal, provincial, territorial and municipal governments is designed to cut through paperwork burden and red tape. The $3 million in annual funding provided in Budget 2011, the Next Phase of Canada’s Economic Action Plan, will allow the program to provide even greater value to small businesses through continued expansion and service improvements.

In the coming months, BizPaL will become available to more Canadians as additional municipalities join the program. To date, 11 provinces and territories are participating in BizPaL, with more than 600 municipalities offering the service, making it available to over 57 percent of the Canadian population.

Visit the BizPaL website (www.bizpal.ca) for additional information or to access the websites of participating partners.

We are the 99% - Occupy spreads

Surprisingly, this anti-capitalist protester is not getting a lot of press...

Family Firms Perform Worse Without Professional Management

 Economists have found that family firms that pass the company down to the next generation perform worse than if they had brought in professional management. Freakonomics confirms this view. They report that:

+ Family firms are particularly dominant in less-developed countries, which tend to have weaker markets and rule of law. Here’s Vikas Mehrotra on that point:

In the developed world, you have good contracting environments, a good system of law enforcement, and so on. So, in the developed world, you can hire professional managers and expect a certain, you know, sticking to the contract law, and so on. It’s rather more difficult to have the same kind of adherence to the rule of law in emerging economies. So, in emerging economies, family firms sort of provide a second-best solution to this poorly developed institutional problem.

+ The U.S., despite having many highly visible family firms, is in fact far less enamored of inherited leadership than most other countries; Japan, meanwhile, is an exception, a wealthy country with a lot of handoffs to the next generation — but with a very strange twist.

Photo: Alessio85

+ If the above points are of any interest to you, then you should definitely read this Journal article titled “Culture Built on Family Firms Tests Italy’s Plan for Growth.” Note that it is hard to see what is the chicken and what is the egg — e.g., does the business environment, set by the government and the courts, dictate the proliferation of family firms or does the proliferation of family firms lead to a business environment whose habits are enabled by government and the courts?

Key excerpts:

Italy’s economy today is only about 3% bigger than a decade ago. Many factors have contributed to the country’s stagnation—from its rickety education system to its low rates of employment among women, youths and older workers. But a central reason, say economists, is that its private sector consists mostly of small mom-and-pop businesses that seem unable to grow.

And:

Behind the country’s stunted businesses lie the habits and fears of a long line of family entrepreneurs who cling to control of their companies late into life. Hemmed in by a thicket of regulation and legal restrictions, many of these families have learned to survive by doing business within networks of trusted customers and suppliers, rather than taking risks by dealing with outsiders.

“These firms have less propensity to innovate, engage less in research and development and rarely penetrate emerging markets,” said Mario Draghi, ECB President and former Bank of Italy head, in a recent speech.

And:

Italy’s legal and regulatory environment discourages firms from taking a leap in size, according to recent research. Businesses need an average of 258 days to get the permits they need to open a new warehouse in Italy, compared with 26 days in the U.S., according to the World Bank. And an entrepreneur who goes to court to enforce a contract must wait an average of 1,210 days for a resolution, compared with around 300 days in the U.S. or France.

As a result, entrepreneurs prefer to deal informally with people they know, rather than rely on public institutions if anything goes wrong. Thus they stay small even when they have the chance to grow, says Bank of Italy economist Magda Bianco. “The inefficiency of the court system is a widespread problem,” she says.

How Tom Jenkins tackles the urgency of innovation in Canada

Tom Jenkins is the dynamic founder of OpenText and when you hear his ideas about how to push Canada, you know why he was able to build OpenText in a growth capital starved environment. He has just concluded the Jenkins Report for the government to understand what role it can play in building businesses. I am grateful that he is giving back. Here is his blog post about how Canada can grow in innovation:

In this series, I discussed the urgency behind stimulating innovation in Canada and how, in particular, innovation in digital media boosts productivity which is a key driver for prosperity. In this blog, I’d like to take this conversation to another level to examine how we as Canadians can do this. How can we build an innovation nation? 

1. We need to tell our stories. There is folklore here and it needs to be shared. The Canadian Digital Media Network (CDMN) and Canada 3.0 provide platforms for Canadians to tell, share and celebrate our success stories.  Both are laying the foundations for resources for future entrepreneurs, including access to mentors, information about VC funding, success stories, and more. OpenText has facilitated that conversation by powering the CDMN social collaboration platform used during and between Canada 3.0 forums.

Keynote Speech at Canada 3.0, 2011

2. We must shake off a cultural legacy of modesty and an aversion to risk taking.  This calls for a cultural shift. Starting at the elementary school level, we can form strategic programs that encourage future generations to become risk takers, welcome competition, and embrace the unpredictability of entrepreneurship that drives innovation.

3. The time is right to establish and connect communities of practice around innovation. For example, there is a gap in the VC community post dot com meltdown that we as a country need to fill.

4. It’s imperative to continue to invest in business in areas like Research and Development. Along with this investment, we need to introduce the tools and technologies to suppport the new demographic—digital natives—that are entering the workforce. This group will expect to use the same tools in the workplace that they're using at home to access, share, and manage information. Investing in R&D will lead to breakthroughs in business applications of these digital consumer tools, and push Canada to the forefront as a leader in developing breakthrough technologies.

5. Finally, we need to think globally not nationally… all the world is our stage for great accomplishments. It is crucial for Canadian businesses and academic institutions to reframe their perspective to reach beyond North America, and consider themselves competitors in the global economy.

Why Every Business Woman Should Want Aussie X

 If you watch the TED talk by Facebook’s Sheryl Sandberg on work, she talks about encouraging young girls to “lean forward”. What does she mean by that? I knew exactly what Sheryl was saying because it is what females in business face daily – how to push a point, get ahead, make a move, face down misunderstandings, quickly adapt, throw over a new proposal even though it may get rejected, get smacked down, try again in the face of failure. In other words, Sheryl wants girls to play the business game at a higher intensity than today. 

This is why the Dragons’ Den pitch by Aussie X (life changing sports programs that teach Canadians footy, cricket and netball) and their lead presenter, Kaela Bree, is so important for young girls. Kaela is actually selling shares in a company to help young girls find their inner strength. Playing netball is a wonderful training to teach girls to stand up for themselves and take action.

When I grew up in Zimbabwe, I spent hours playing netball. It took up minimal space and was mini-basketball, but far better suited to girls with nimbleness and fast analysis required to win, rather than the height or strength of basketball. I was crazy about this game and disappointed it was not in Canada. I often think about netball as I make snap decisions, pick team mates, throw the ball assertively, get yelled at by the team and work with stress. You have to lean forward, as Sheryl Sandberg says, every day and netball is one of those developmental experiences that helped me.

Although I dislike separating female from male in business and prefer to focus on pure business, I have come to see how the right attitude is critical. Instead of being “polite, young ladies” we need to encourage girls to grow their “animal spirits” as John Keynes called the drive to do business.

Female entrepreneurs who build a start-up from nothing to a small-medium sized company are doing the remarkable. The uber-pitcher on Dragons Den, Kaela Bree, happens to also be one of those female entrepreneurs achieving the impossible. Her title is Goddess Partner which I could see her Aussie X team believed. Goddess and, yes, partner who you would want on your team.

Would the Dragons see the potential though?

Yes! They got Big Jim Treliving to commit and the Aussie X team looked as if they were the Australian rugby team who had just beaten the All Blacks at the World Cup. Kaela and Aussie X succeeded in getting Jim, Boston Pizza owner, to invest as a partner. She got her strength and ability to be forceful from her netball, no doubt. 

Hmm, I wonder if Kaela asked Jim what was his favourite animal and what is his motto for living life?

I am a leopard and I choose the motto “Lean Forward” from Sheryl.

Jacoline Loewen, MBA, is a Director of Loewen & Partners Inc., a corporate finance firm working with business owners and family businesses. Loewen & Partners has raised over $150 million for owner-managed Canadian companies, as well as managing family business succession, acquisition, and final sale. She is an advisor, lecturer and writer of business strategy and private equity. Her latest book "Money Magnet: How to Attract Investors to Your Business," published by Wiley, was selected by the Entrepreneurship course at The Richard Ivey School of Business.

Jacoline began her career working for Granduc Mines in Northern British Columbia and went on to work with Deloitte in their strategy unit. She developed a strategic planning model and published it in a book called "The Power of Strategy" which went on to be a best seller. She also wrote "Business e-Volution" which helped teams understand the business opportunities created by the Internet. She writes for the National Post, Globe & Mail and hosted Financial Post Executive podcasts (available on iTunes). She organizes CEO Roundtables and other conferences in alliance with Ivey Business School, Rotman and leading law firms.

Jacoline is a Director on the Board of the Exempt Market Dealers Association (EMDA), working with the Ontario Securities Commission to establish transparency in the private placement industry. She is on the advisory board of DCL International, Bilingo China, and Flint Business Acceleration. She was on the Board of Directors of the Strategic Leadership Forum where she ran the Knowledge Café series. Her other roles include serving as a judge for the U.B.C. and the Richard Ivey School of Business' Business Plan Competitions, mentoring for Canadian Youth Business Foundation as well as being a member of The Ticker Club.

Follow Jacoline on Twitter at @jacolineloewen

What can government do to help companies attract investors?

Speaking to a returning Canadian in the pharma industry, I asked him how Canada could improve its innovation. Not surprisingly, he said through investment dollars. He did want government to get out of the way and tax less but seems that theme is not heard. As he says, Government should not be picking the winners and losers. It is too hard for people who do not have industry depth and who are spending tax payers' money, not their own.
Here are more of his comments:

Our government needs to promote investment so that companies can access some much needed capital and expertise. On the VC side, for example, the Ontario government shut down tax credits for venture funds in biotech in the same year that it launched the Ministry of Research & Innovation, which effectively directed funds destined for biotech VCs towards academia. 

VC money is smart, vetted, and accountable, whereas academic grants are not.  Academia is important, but the lack of accountability suggests it is a much riskier "investment" than similar VC funds going into a company, so governments should adjust their investment portfolio accordingly to reflect this risk profile.

On the growth capital side, small, profitable, companies are often forced into two paths to access capital: (I) IPO prematurely (at least when capital markets are healthy) and (II) seek U.S. investors.  (I) leads to management distraction and an agency cost that has the potential to side track companies that need to focus on building their business rather than appease a large segment of near-term focused capital market investors.  (II) enables companies to access deep U.S. pockets and expertise, which is great.  But U.S. investors are more likely to move companies to the U.S., especially for knowledge-based companies, leading to the hollowing out of Canada that seems to continue.  Government can help mitigate the above two fates by facilitating a stronger Canadian PE industry.  I don't know enough about PE regulation to know how this can be achieved, but promoting the raising and deployment of capital for the mid-sized businesses, not just early stage, should be a pressing goal.

 On the flip side, governments do have deep pockets and some mandate for direct investment to foster critical mass in a given industry (isn't that the whole point of subsidies?).  Government can offer grants to companies as a form on non-dilutive funding.  But I don't think government should be allocating these funds and the money shouldn't be "free".  Perhaps some kind of process could be developed where companies can access grants if they can come up with matching funds from investors that ultimately manage the co-funded investments.  Red tape does need to be minimized, or else the money just goes to the best paper pushers rather than the best investors. 

Finally, because investors need to share risk on cash-flow positive companies with lenders, I wonder if there is some kind of mechanism for government to lubricate this process (but not participate in it).  They of course do this on a macro level with lower interest rates, but perhaps there is something they can do more specifically to promote investor-lender interaction.