He came for the hunting. He stayed for the branding. Sadly for us, he’s now leaving for romance.

Anybody who knows Steve, knows he’s a passionate sorta guy. What’s he passionate about? Pretty much everything: hunting, fishing, Yukon, marketing, wrestling, politics, faith, winning RFPs, food and yes, a woman named Hayley. When he gets going on any of this stuff, he can’t sit in his chair. He’ll get up, fist-pumping, hand-slapping, beaming from ear to ear as he shares his passion with whoever’s around.

When it’s time to go, your typical employee will give you a couple week’s notice. A good one will give you a month. With Steve, you get a year’s advance notice that he may have to leave for Victoria, as much as he doesn’t really want to. For the next six months, you’ll talk it back and forth, pros and cons. You’ll go fishing a couple times and really talk about stuff. Then he’ll make up his mind and give you six month’s notice so you can properly staff up.

Then he’ll talk to Corey about marketing contacts in Victoria. When a promising job comes along, you’ll hear a “whoop-whoop!” from the far end of the office, he strides into your office iPhone first, displaying the listing for a marketing manager for a fishing reel manufacturer. “Check it out! Can you believe it?? Fishing!!” 

Over lunch, we’ll review his cover letter and resume, and fine-tune it all using the classic aasman Three Rights strategy. By lunch next day, he’s got the job offer, and we are all “whoop-whooping” alongside him. It’s as if we’ve landed an account after a solid pitch effort, rather than sealed the deal on losing a valued employee.

Passion in the workplace will do that, and it’s his passion for the work we’ll miss most. It could carry us even when we were unsure, and gave us courage to forge new ground. Thanks for that, Steve. You leave us better for it than you found us.

All the best to you and Hayley in Victoria. Come back and visit some time.

What am I saying, you’ll be back… passion will see to that.