On Friday November 30th, Report on Business magazine announced it has selected E. Hunter Harrison as Canada’s CEO of the Year for 2007.
“I’m very honoured to be awarded this prestigious recognition,” Mr. Harrison said. “Of course I am not receiving this simply for my own work.
It takes the efforts of the entire CN team to achieve the kind of successful profile you need to win an award like this. I want to thank all of the employees for their work in bringing our five principles to life, because they can all be as proud of this award as I am.”
Report on Business magazine is widely acknowledged as Canada’s most read business magazine, appearing monthly in the Globe and Mail newspaper.
He is an excellent CEO… as a shareholder I would give up a little profitability to ensure that the right of way is brought back up to snuff…I see too many derailments and that of course threatens profitability over the long term. I believe they are still a safety conscious company although they’ve spread themselves a little too thin in some areas.
Easy there, Max. People are going to be “hating on you” again if you don’t keep it civil. Perhaps you’d like to enlighten us why you have such a feeling of loathing for Mr. Harrison…keeping in mind that he has at least one person on the board that considers him a friend.
sorry, i’m not happy with what he’s been doing. i’m not talking about buying out WC and killing off the SD45s. that’s a business move to spend less money on fuel.
my point is. according to the DMIR fans, he bought that road out just for the bridge across the St Louis river. and he’s been retiring their power off without sending them anything new to use. because of this, DMIR is power-short.
remember when the CN crews went on strike? i read it was because hunter is trying to “americanize” the road and i read this would mean cutting wages among other things.
and wasnt there something about him wanting to change train crews to a single person now and cutting jobs on CN as a result?
and how about the derailments on the BCOL? i was told they’re mostly caused by making trains longer than that line can handle. wasnt one of the derailments so bad, CN had to BURY it?
sorry, but i have no love for hunter. i’m glad he was nice enough to donate 2 SD45s, but i just disagree with so much that he’s been doing lately
I believe CN only wanted the Interstate Branch (including the bridge). The past owners insisted he buy all of the DMIR, the lake boats, and the B&LE. Perhaps some of your wrath should be sent their way as well.
He is paid to make CN’s stock rise, and by that yardstick, he has been sucsessful.
I have done well as a shareholder with him (both at IC and CN).
Any CEO is going to be the lightning rod for comments. It is pretty much a revolving door for CEO’s these days. Perform or hit the road. Not a bad situation either. More people should be paid based on performance at high levels.
He sure knows how to run a ‘profitable’ railroad, at the expense of pretty much everything. You’ve gotta to money from somewhere, and EHH knows how to suck as much money out of everything as he can get away with.
You may want to look a little deeper into the financials before you make that comment. Sure, CN has the lowest operating ratio, but also take a look at the investments they make. It is all there in the annual report, either at their website or you can access it at Yahoo Finance or any other number of sites.
I am not going to get to much into the financial structure of a company, it tends to be rather dry and boring for most folks. But, for the most part railroads use a considerable amount of capital (read Tom Murray’s article in this months Trains, page 35 gives a great example) just to operate. In order to be an attractive investment, a company must offer either a healthy return on that investment (value stocks) or the opportunity to do so (growth stocks). CN, as with most railroads have very small growth rates and in order to compete must keep their costs under control. CN does this better than anyone else in the industry.
I have been employed at CN (GTW District) since 1994 and have seen alot of changes since then . My opinions are my own and I am not speaking for anyother engineer on the GTW system .
When I first heard that Hunter was going to be the new CEO at CN I had mixed feelings and I did not agree with some of his ideas on alot of issues , especially when it came to collective bargaining agreements .
I look at it like this . I want job security . I want the company that I work for to be successful . I would rather work for a company that is making record profits instead of a company that is on the verge of bankruptcy . I look at CN like a sports team . Everyone on the team needs to contribute . I respect Hunter . You don’t always agree with everyone in the workplace but I believe Hunter has done more good at CN than bad . CN is a great company . We are among the highest paid railroaders in the world . Why would I complain about our CEO ? I would like to say congrats to Hunter on being named CEO of the year .
Someone posted above the following …
sorry, i’m not happy with what he’s been doing. i’m not talking about buying out WC and killing off the SD45s. that’s a business move to spend less money on fuel.
Here’s my take on this …
Selling of SD45’s is a good thing from a engineers standpoint . Higher horsepower units are better for operating trains anyways . I would rather operate a SD75I or a new GE unit anyday than a noisy worn out SD45 [2c]
Very well put GTW…and well written. As a shareholder one ultimately invests in people…in the team…more than the infrastructure. CN has a winning team and I believe they’ll be able to overcome any of the challenges they’ve faced recently.
Thanks Ulrich . I purchase a share of CN stock every week . Hunter does realize the people and employee’s at CN are important . Every few months we get a company news letter and it always focuses on CN workers . And there is always a message from the CEO telling us how important that we are . I don’t know why many people dislike him , maybe it’s because he is an American running a “Canadian Railroad” .
I was fortunate enough to purchase IC stock back in 1995 and have seen it really take off. My only complaint with CN is they do not have dividend reinvestment program, in which the dividends are automatically used to purchase additional shares. That program also allows one to make additional voluntary purchases.
You sound pretty satisfied with your job. What is the toughest thing about your job?
BTW, I live in Valparaiso and listen in on the CN (GTW operations) on the scanner. What is your opinion of the EJE merger? Do you ever run on the J from Griffith to Mattson?
The toughest thing about my job . If you asked 20 engineers the same question you might end up with 15 different answers but I would have to say waiting for the phone to ring to to go work . It gets frustrating waiting all day to go to work and then when it gets late at night and you want to go to bed your getting called in , and it’s midnight and I was ready to go to work 12 hours ago at noon . It’s a good job and I am thankful to have it especially with the way the economy is in Michigan .
Opinion on the EJE merger . I really don’t have one . I have not operated on the South Bend Sub since around 1999 so I am not too familiar with operations around the Chicago area .
It’s not always easy to be so level headed about things CNW 6000 [8D] . I will tell you something that I seen a few months back . I was sitting outside on a bench at the hotel having a smoke , waiting for a ride to take my conductor and I to the yard office , and was I was not in the greatest of moods and I was missing my kids and then I see a homeless guy in the parking lot looking for empty pop cans to return for money and that put things into prespective . I think that any person reading this can figure what I am trying to say .