THE RAND HOUSE 1.0 - LAURIE SCHULTZ

by Michelle Livingstone
(click images to enlarge)

Unicorns are real, and Laurie Schultz is a testament to that.

Born and raised in a blue-collar town in Alberta, Laurie found the ability to reach for greatness thanks to a teacher who saw her in her most vulnerable state, helped her recognize her potential at an early age, and was instrumental in helping her take the next step.

From a background of bullying, shyness, insecurity, and floundering, she went from strength to strength and worked her way to the top of what might be called a man's game. Yet, when asked about that, she doesn't even notice any pushback; such is her ability to shrug the world's pressures off her shoulders.

An intellectual from the start, and ridiculously good with numbers, it was inevitable that the young Laurie would find her way from smart kid to top CEO in Vancouver. As director and CEO at Galvanize from 2011 to 2021, she became Canada’s first female CEO to lead a technology company to unicorn status on its April 2021 sale to Diligent for $1B USD.

She is the recipient of eight prestigious awards - including 2021 BC Technology Person of the Year, 2019 EY Entrepreneur of the Year - Pacific Region (Technology), 2019 Business in Vancouver’s (BIV’s) CEO of the Year, WXN Canada’s Most Powerful Women Top 100 (2016, 2017, 2018 and 2019 Hall of Fame), the 2015 Gold Stevie® Award for North America’s Female Executive of the Year, the YWCA's 2015 "Women of Distinction" award, BIV’s 2014 "Women of Influence" award, and Minerva Foundation's 2013 "Excellence in Leadership" award, and yet she remains down to earth.

Laurie is one half of the wonder pair, along with Randy Smallwood, soon to be featured here as well, who brighten our lives and draw crowds of happy folks downtown to satisfy their sense of wonder year after year.

You are likely familiar with that gorgeous heritage house on the north-west corner of Bute and Nelson, that favours the brightest of lights in the West End at Halloween and Christmas and some of the key moments of the year, scooping up our gloom and reminding us what it's like to be kids again, to let go for a moment and allow the ‘oohs’ and ‘ahhs’ that we all crave to soothe our psyche.

Built for Henry Town in 1896, the Rand house is one of the oldest remaining houses in the West End. After Town died whilst away on a business trip in Australia in 1905, it was left to his sister, Laura. Laura’s husband, Edward E. Rand, was prominent in real estate and co-founded Rand Bros Real Estate, today known as Rand and Fowler Insurance. The Rands remained at 995 Bute from 1919 to 1925.

IT WAS MEANT TO BE

When you consider that the first lady of the Rand house was called Laura, it doesn't seem too far-fetched to imagine that it has come back around. As if our Laurie already belonged to the B-listed Vancouver Heritage home, it seems. First stepping into the house for a poker game, she noticed there was no Christmas tree, which made it feel sad. Little did she know that a few years later, she would be putting her own touches on the many Christmas trees that now breathe life into a house that provides and promotes such joy.

There's lots to love about the Rand House. From the outside, it is a stunning heritage home, the likes of which are no longer built. Sadly, our city seems all too rife with glittering towers that loom and sway like huge metal trees in the wind.

Back on the ground, I note the little things that make this 1896 building a true delight. Laurie glides through the interior in the same way she draws. Yes, she is a consummate graphite artist too. I was lucky enough to see some of her early drawings, of which she is proud but prefers to keep private.

One of the more stunning aspects of the house is the huge black birdcage chandelier hanging in the extremely tall hallway, left by Duncan Wilson and Rowly Johnson, the couple who brought this beauty back to life in 2005. The birdcage is a nod to the 1996 American comedy film of the same name, produced and directed by Mike Nichols, in which the inimitable Robin Williams partners with Nathan Lane as the couple Armand and Albert Goldman. It is a beautiful, eye-catching piece and perfectly suited to this amazing interior.

Add to that the sliding bookshelf that hides a secret room, a painting that hides a safe, a fabulous turret straight out of medieval times replete with a huge tub instead of archers, and a secret rooftop balcony, and you almost forget about the lights that draw so many every year.

Laurie's previous life held a truckload of all things Halloween, a veritable skip of costumes, couture, lights, and all manner of scary things. She is the original Halloween queen of scream, you might say, yet as busy as she remains, she still finds time to do huge amounts of costume and face painting (for which, again, she has an extraordinary talent) for herself and others on the actual day.

Laurie talks through some of her favourite costumes with me, and shows me a shot-by-shot of her turning her face into a scary jack-in-the-box, which may or may not be responsible for a few heart flutters along the way. What is really obvious is that she loves it; her face absolutely lights up, and the seven-year-old inside takes over.

After dancing in the lights of success for over 30 years, she now intends to devote the rest of her time to coaching CEOs with her own special style. She makes it seem so easy. I sit listening and swear I could start my own company after 30 minutes with her.

She recounts her youth and what made her, her.

“My parents broke up when I was young, and in grade seven, I was in this kind of horrid situation. I was bullied at school. I didn't have a lot of self-confidence. And this teacher, Mr. Templeton, said, ‘Laurie, would you like to join the basketball team?’ And then he said, ‘Laurie, would you like to join the badminton team? And how about the track team?’ And, you know, the fact that someone like him noticed someone like me, and went out of his way to put me in an environment where I could practice developing a skill, all the way back from when I was in grade seven, had a profound impact.”

STARTING OUT

Laurie's first job was at age 14, working at Safeway, which she did all the way through high school and for a little while as she continued at university. She says “It was really good. It taught me all kinds of things.”

Following university, her next job was with Alberta Government Telephones, now TELUS. She was pivotal in the rollout of calling line ID on phones, which, whilst a wonderful success, created its own monster. So, after listening to what the customers needed, the next step was the *67, which prevented the called party from seeing who was calling.

She says: “It was such a core value for me; it's like you can be successful. You can have a great product with overnight 100 percent adoption, and you can also do the right thing. That doesn't mean you can't also be successful financially. That was a great first lesson.”

Laurie got her first taste of the Lower Mainland, BC, through working at Simply Accounting. The iconic BC founder software program, now called Sage.

According to Laurie: “I got this opportunity to come out and run that business. And I lived in Edmonton at the time. And so it was quite exciting to come out here.”

Having worked for several software companies for the better part of 30 years, she was headhunted in 2011 by Galvanize (then called ACL), a governance, risk, and compliance company. She took it on at its lowest point, a head-hanging donkey needing love, guidance and vision. They wanted her to dive in and change the culture, which she did. She brought life and vitality to the company in her own inimitable way. She turned the donkey into a gorgeous, tail-swishing unicorn, replete with a silver alicorn granting wishes for everyone. Galvanize was sold in 2021 for $1 billion, and Laurie became the first female CEO in Vancouver to achieve this.

She says: “I had an amazing team with 500 employees. We weren't pedigreed Harvard businesspeople; we were brave, courageous people with integrity of intent. We took some risks, did all kinds of crazy things, and ended up with this outcome. I think that a key role of a leader is to discover and enable people, even before they realize that they can be good at something.”

PIVOTAL EXPERIENCES

You might think that to get ahead, let alone create a unicorn in business as a woman, you may have to be loud, brash, pushy and nasty, but as I discovered from Laurie, that is very much not the case; in fact, it is the absolute polar opposite.

**LAURIE STANDS BY HER VALUES AND HER WISTERIA.**

“You know, I wouldn't say I'm like a formally religious person, but if you do the right thing over time, you kind of get what you deserve. Follow your heart, follow your mind. It actually feels great. You can have a great experience, for example, like the sale of the business. That's a life MBA. And then you can maybe have a horrible experience, like one pivotal, horrible professional experience I had. I blew the whistle once on a CEO and a CFO who were cooking the books. And I pretty much thought I would never work again. I thought I would be physically assaulted for like the three months that I stayed in that workplace, and then I left, and then I got headhunted, and you know, it's just kind of reinforced that first value.”

As we touch on global problems, Laurie shares her concerns about nationalism.

Laurie says: “Everybody's looking out for themselves. Obviously, it's concerning for everybody. I appreciate, you know, that Canada needs to diversify its relationships, but this world of fear and the breakdown of trust with old allies is deeply disturbing. I find myself thinking, I just want to outlast this. Hopefully, you take the lessons from the current environment and build a new foundation so that the next generation will benefit from them. Hopefully, we see a reversal of this lack of trust and fear-based environment. I mean, it's been a tough kick in the ass, but I respect that, you know, we're taking more control of our own destiny rather than being super dependent on everybody else.

“Sometimes I think about Canada's population; we're eight percent the size of the U.S., so then you think about it per province. Some provinces have less than one percent of the U.S. population. We have over 600 Indigenous groups, representing two percent of Canada's population. Such diversity - surely one of our greatest assets. But it's also one of our biggest liabilities because we are way too fractured and way too small in the global scheme to be fighting each other and carving up our small footprint within Canada's economic footprint. So I worry about the fracturing in Canada; I'd like to see more synchronization across political boundaries. Leading with core values, doing the right thing. And I don't mean to be too cheesy and simplistic about it. You can be highly competent from a financial or political perspective and still be a really decent person.”

Although basically retired now, I wonder if the word "retire" even applies to someone with a lifeforce like Laurie, as she is still a director and/or chair on the boards of Constellation Software, Lumine, Nitrogen, Boast.ai, and the BC Cancer Foundation; she says she would sometimes like to have a couple of weeks to just “get dirt under her fingernails.” But that's where the beautiful garden and her knowledge of plants come in. She loves her floral haven and can name all the flowers on her balcony, where she takes refuge and re-energizes.

**THE LUSH EXTERIOR AND ITS GORGEOUS WISTERIA.**

In summer, as we met, the mass of greenery on the fence weaves in and around the wonderfully lush wisteria that slips its violet fingers into everything, prying its tendrils into the walls, yearning to be part of the party. We talk about roses and lazy susans, perennials and annuals, which leads me back to the events that she and her husband, Randy, create and host.

TIME TO PLAY

In late October, the insane, immense, and oh-so-quick three-day Halloween extravaganza is now an annual treasure, a true West End delight. Something that so many people look forward to, with folks coming from miles around to have their photo taken next to a scary animatronic.

Asked which seasonal show she prefers, indeed, she finds it difficult to choose. The child in her sways towards the fun that is Halloween, but she is very much in love with Christmas at the Rand, when it gets wrapped in a big bow of goodwill, with more lights than Regent Street in London, it seems. It is a true North star, strong and free, for all to come and enjoy.

It's thanks to folks like Laurie and Randy who put on these displays that make our days brighter. Channelling the magic of a unicorn, with its ability to turn dark into light, and to bring smiles to a childlike soul.

Mr. Templeton would be proud.

Watch out for The Rand House 2.0, featuring the other half of this wonderful pair, Randy Smallwood, coming soon.