RIMs CEOs never took the easy way out! G&M

Posted this in n&r to, but its that kind of day!
Thanks again guys!

RIM’s ex-CEOs never took the easy way out - The Globe and Mail


RIM’s ex-CEOs never took the easy way out
Globe and Mail Update
Published Friday, Jan. 27, 2012 7:30PM EST

The resignation of Jim Balsillie and Mike Lazaridis as co-CEOs of Research in Motion marks the end of an era not only for the BlackBerry maker, but for Canadian business. Their raw determination and unapologetic ambition, so uncommon among Canadian business leaders, transformed a small consulting company into a $20-billion global behemoth with an iconic brand sought after by presidents and movie stars.


Mr. Lazaridis and Mr. Balsillie are inspirational figures for their technological innovation, and the fact that they built RIM into a global company, but also for the way they have worn the maple leaf on their chests. They insisted, for example, on basing RIM in Waterloo, and in the process contributed substantially to the creation of what has been dubbed Quantum Valley, an R&D hub consisting of three communities and hundreds of high-tech companies.

And they have used their personal wealth to invest heavily in personal passions with global benefits.

Mr. Lazaridis gave $170-million to establish the Perimeter Institute for Theoretical Physics, and $100-million to the Institute for Quantum Computing. Mr. Balsillie has taken on world politics and international relations, donating $20-million to found the Centre for International Governance Innovation, in Waterloo and $50-million to establish the Balsillie School of International Affairs, and serves as chair of the Canadian International Council.

These are tremendous gifts and the payback, especially of Mr. Lazaridis’s far-sighted ambition, will not be known for many years, but they do have the potential to profoundly alter our world.

With respect to RIM, however, the ambition of Mr. Balsillie and Mr. Lazaridis has had its downside. RIM’s fantastic success, which confirmed the duo’s brazen bet on the completely new and untested technology of push e-mail, fed a culture in which they failed to recognize their fallibility, a not uncommon characteristic in highly successful people.

Mr. Lazaridis, an engineer who inspired his workers to achieve what many thought impossible, dismissed Apple’s game-changing iPhone as a toy. Mr. Balsillie, whose professed belief in governance was so great he founded a think-tank around it, treated RIM’s own board as a rubber stamp. Which is why, despite years of drift, disappointing devices and plummeting U.S. market share that slashed RIM’s stock price by 75 per cent in 2011, it took until this week for the two to decide to step down. Most CEOs would have been long gone. And their replacements, Thorsten Heins as CEO, and former RBC executive Barbara Stymiest as chair, are not, at least according to RIM’s sagging share price, what the market was hoping for. On taking the reins, Mr. Heins, RIM’s former COO, dismissed the need for any “drastic change,” saying the company just needed a “bit more of an ear toward the consumer market.” But it will take more than that. The former Siemens executive has inherited a conservative company, one much more at ease with incremental change rather than radical innovation.

RIM’s story is by no means written, nor for that matter are those of Mr. Balsillie and Mr. Lazaridis. Despite the slings and arrows being directed at them, they never took the easy way out. They could, like so many of their Canadian colleagues, have sold out rather than take on giants like Nokia and Apple. Instead, they proved a Canadian start-up could take on the world and win. And so, while one era may be over, it is to be hoped that another equally ambitious one for RIM, and Canadian companies inspired by their success, is beginning.

Its hard to believe that a good news story like this just gets viewed, yet nobody has any positives to say.
The last good news story I posted only managed to get a few trolls out to play. What is it, can we only focus on the negative aspects of the made up news? A quality reflective peice like this garners no interest. This lack of credit where do, is more worrying than lots of that other repeated BS.
Jim and Mike, with what they've done in Canada, would be tret like heros elsewhere! Yet many Canadians sit back and believe what others tell them. That they weren't good enough?
Quite sad rely.
I remember the 2010 olympics. They started slow for Canada with a few miss steps. The international media was fast to jump all over us, it didn't look good. Look how that turned out. Pick up your heads, remember who you are and the contibutions of others that helped you get there. Mike and Jim deserve the respect of Canadians, if not others.

So next time you bump a trolls post with a coment remember, it severs their purpose! Try being proud enough to bump a positive artcle once in a wile. :confused:

Thank you guys.

"So next time you bump a trolls post with a comment remember, it serves their purpose! Try being proud enough to bump a positive artcle once in a while"

Well said!

Love RIM and the boyz:p

Originally Posted by Dapper37

I remember the 2011 olympics.

Are you sure about that?

If you want a popular thread, you should have "nuts" in the title.

Originally Posted by Dapper37

I remember the 2011 olympics.

Oh yea?
I don't. I went to the 2010 Olympics in Vancouver & they were great....though I bet the 2011 Olypmpics were even better :D

The typo police are always cool.

It is a sad commentary on the condition of people that something "bad" will always attract more attention. Good article that tries to give some perspective to the impact of Mike L. and Jim B.'s impact on smartphones and on their giving back to their community.

Thanks for the good read dapper.

Great Read. **Gives CrackBerry Salute** to J Baller and Big Mike!

I am hoping RIM doesn't go the way of Palm. Palm had an excellent device, Treo, but wouldn't innovate and expand that device. RIM saw the opportunity to expand e-mail and other messaging services, and ate their lunch. The only thing was a lot Blackberry users carried Palm Pilots (pre Treo devices sharing the same OS,) to make up for a lack of applications.

In 2007, Apple shifted the paradigm of what a "smart" phone was. Their device had many things it could do better than the Blackberry. And, the major part of the paradigm shift was Apple viewed their phone as a handheld computer, not simply a messaging device. Lazaridis dismissed the device as a toy. Much like the computer manufacturers of the 1970's dismissed the PC as a "toy."

Anyway, once Palm was Tango Uniform, or not moving forward, Apple began selling iPod Touch devices. Look at the threads of die hard Berry users who carried an iPod Touch to make up for Blackberry weaknesses. When Apple/Google figured out how to fix the messaging problems, there was no need for the Berry. But the user was, for better or worse, addicted to their apps. They chose to migrate away.

Say whatever you will, the next 12 months will determine whether RIM survives or becomes the next Palm. I used both devices, but tonight I am debating getting rid of my 9650. The track pad is dying and I can't justify paying another $100 for another OS 6 device that was out of date when I bought it.

I am going to buy another phone outright, I hope RIM will dazzle me, but I am not holding my breath anymore.

Something that has aggravated me for year is this: alarm clock is one of the most common non phone/messaging functions of a cell phone. This has been true for about 7 years. So, why does RIM continue to ship phones with the pathetic alarm clock they have? A RAZR from 2005 has a better alarm clock. RIM had a flat learning curve.

Too bad they just won't listen.

Originally Posted by Exiled Bulldawg

Something that has aggravated me for year is this: alarm clock is one of the most common non phone/messaging functions of a cell phone. This has been true for about 7 years. So, why does RIM continue to ship phones with the pathetic alarm clock they have? A RAZR from 2005 has a better alarm clock. RIM had a flat learning curve.

Too bad they just won't listen.

Clearly your in the wrong thread.

Originally Posted by Exiled Bulldawg

Something that has aggravated me for year is this: alarm clock is one of the most common non phone/messaging functions of a cell phone. This has been true for about 7 years. So, why does RIM continue to ship phones with the pathetic alarm clock they have? A RAZR from 2005 has a better alarm clock. RIM had a flat learning curve.

Too bad they just won't listen.

You know there's an alarm feature built into the calendar right?

I don't see what the issue with the alarm clock is. Works perfectly for me.

Originally Posted by Dapper37

Clearly your in the wrong thread.

No, I think I am in the right thread. The problem RIM has is it's strategy hasn't been successful because the market they compete in has changed, but they didn't. If one wants to understand what a product should be, a market study is done.

Something to note is most people under age 25 don't wear a watch. Why? They use their phones as watch/clock. That is the most common nonphone/data use for any phone. The second most common use is as an alarm clock. The alarm that is built into my Berry chirps three times. I purchased third party software that does the job very well. My issue is if those two uses are common, it would make sense to ensure the software on the phone does that task very well. In my opinion, chirping three times isn't a very good alarm clock.

Hence my comment.

Also, the one that is built into the calendar isn't loud enough to function as an alarm clock.