Darcy Rezac plans to write books, consult, teach and spread the word about effective leadership following his 24 years as the Vancouver Board of Trade’s managing director
Mission: To inspire and connect people as a way to promote individual and community advancement
Assets: A wealth of private- and public-sector experience and 24 years as managing director of the Vancouver Board of Trade
Yield: Countless contacts, two books and another set for release later this year
Don’t expect Darcy Rezac to lounge around or get detached from Vancouver’s social scene when the 65-year-old officially leaves the Vancouver Board of Trade April 5.
The tireless networker who cultivated countless contacts during 24 years as the board of trade’s managing director has an appetite for writing books about leadership, business consulting, teaching university courses, speaking and researching that is as strong as ever.
“When you’re invited to go somewhere and do something, your first answer should be, ‘Yes,’” mused Rezac, while sitting in his 2010 Volkswagen Beetle convertible, squinting in the March sunshine and looking across False Creek at the city that he has spent his life trying to improve.
“So many times [my wife] Gayle [Hallgren-Rezac] and I have been asked to go somewhere and we thought, ‘Let’s skip this one,’ or ‘Let’s play hookie.’ We always came away saying, ‘We’re so glad we went.’”
That’s because networking provides chances to help people and move community projects forward.
Still, Rezac won’t miss the many management meetings that he had to attend while directing activities at the board of trade.
Besides attending the odd board of trade luncheon, Rezac will be free to channel most of his energy toward writing, speaking and basically inspiring others.
He expects his third book to be available late in 2011.
Co-written with University of British Columbia Sauder School of Business dean Dan Muzyka and University of Victoria business school dean Ali Dastmalchian, Looking for Ted Williams: An Engaged Leadership Matrix will use baseball metaphors to communicate effective leadership strategies.
Rezac’s first two books focused on networking.
He is more than simply an inspiring and social creature.
The man who was recently named the board of trade’s permanent managing director emeritus has a depth of knowledge about how to effect political change and will be hard for the organization to replace.
Before Rezac joined the board of trade, he was Ottawa’s top bureaucrat in B.C.
Officially, his title was the federal economic development co-ordinator for B.C. in the Department of Regional Industrial Expansion (DRIE).
His biggest accomplishment in that role was co-writing with John Hansen and John Weibe the pivotal Asia Pacific Initiative memorandum of understanding – a 1986 document that had wide-ranging ramifications for how B.C. evolved following Expo 86.
It laid the groundwork and provided funding for the feasibility study to allow the Vancouver International Airport to become an independent entity able to raise money and determine spending priorities instead of being under federal control.
But the Asia Pacific Initiative also provided funding to help create Vancouver’s International Maritime Centre, which successfully lobbied Ottawa to provide tax incentives for multinational shipping companies to set up shop in Canada.
Dozens of shipping companies, such as Teekay Corp. (NYSE:TK), established head offices in Vancouver and created more than 1,000 local jobs.
The Asia Pacific Initiative also provided funding to create the International Financial Centre British Columbia, which promotes the province as a favourable location for investment and encourages corporations to take advantage of tax breaks under Victoria’s International Business Activity Act.
Grayden Hayward will serve as the board of trade’s interim managing director until the organization completes an international search and identifies a permanent replacement.
What kind of person should the board be searching for?
Rezac lists qualities such as the ability to contribute to a community vision, competence at developing public policy, extensive contacts and an innate sense of how Vancouver is distinct from other cities.
Then came a eureka moment.
Remembering the man he helped recruit to be CEO of the newly created Vancouver International Airport Authority in 1992, Rezac said, “You want a guy like David Emerson, only 15 to 20 years younger.”
Emerson laughed when Business in Vancouver relayed this anecdote.
Now on many corporate boards and panels such as the Alberta Premier’s Council for Economic Strategy, Emerson, like Rezac, relishes being free to spend time as he chooses.
There will be no return to politics for Emerson, who is a former minister of international trade likely best known for controversially crossing the floor to sit as a Conservative after being elected as a Liberal in Vancouver-Kingsway in 2006.
“Darcy is one of those people who has no shyness or reservation,” Emerson said. “You can always count on him to come out swinging and speak his mind. Lots of politicians are bothered by that, but if you’re going to be the head of an association such as the board of trade then your job is to be more forthright and a bit more cranky than your members.”
Winnipeg-born Rezac moved to Montreal when he was two years old.
His father was a manager at Trans-Canada Airlines (now Air Canada), and the family moved as dad progressed from one post to another.
This meant Rezac would live four years in Kingston, Jamaica, and 10 years in Goose Bay, Labrador. During his time in those two locales, he learned, among other things, to scuba dive and fly planes.
While he was studying for his science degree at McGill University, Rezac served in the army as the resident staff officer at McGill and the other English-speaking universities in Montreal.
His first post-university job was as a foreman at a General Motors plant in St. Therese, Quebec.
Five years later, in 1973, Rezac moved to Toronto to take his first government job: regional manager of operations at what was then called the Unemployment Insurance Commission.
Two years later, he transferred to Vancouver for a five-year stint as the deputy director general of the B.C. and Yukon region of Employment and Immigration Canada.
There, he oversaw 85 offices.
Wooed by Alcan Canada, Rezac accepted a job as the aluminum giant’s director of corporate services until 1984, when he moved to DRIE.
“For the first time in my life, I’m going to be doing my own thing, and I’ll have more time for my family,” said Rezac, who has four children and two grandsons.
Precious retirement moments are likely to include fishing with his grandchildren from his home along the Fraser River in Fort Langley. He will also explore on his motorcycle the kilometres of trails that start at his front door.
“I can pursue some opportunities that I wouldn’t have been able to do before because of time and what I did for a living.” •