Portrait: adam blasberg
As part of this year's 30 Under 30 pack-
age—celebrating the best and brightest of
the Millennial crowd—we asked a series of
10 questions. They ranged from the light and
frothy ("what song is playing on your device
right now?") to the slightly more probing
("who inspires you to succeed?"). The final-
ists' responses, which you'll find excerpted
in the main feature (starting on page 29), are
by turns amusing and touching.
And surprising and humbling—particu-
larly in response to the question: "What is
your biggest regret?" The number one answer
from our aged panel of entrepreneurs? That
they didn't get their business started sooner.
Yes: being a rock star businessperson at 25 or
28 is fine and all, but what a shame it had to
come so late in life.
This anxiety about time, and time
wasted, is telling. Theirs is a genera-
tion inculcated with the importance
of rapid-fire accomplishment. No
matter what you read of the Millenni-
als—whether it's keeping them moti-
vated as employees or engaged as
consumers—the words "speed" and
"instant gratification" pop up. This is
no surprise: they are digital natives,
raised in the Internet age when every-
thing you could ever want is available
almost instantaneously. Should their
careers, their business ambitions, be
realized any differently?
As I contemplate that question,
I'm reminded of my friend Michael
Harris's recent Governor-General's-
winning book, The End of Absence.
The premise of Harris's book is that a
subset of the Millennial generation—
those straddling the age of 30, as he
is—are the last to remember what life
was like before the Internet came along and
changed our brains forever. They remember
(the older ones in particular) what it was like
to wait for a train and be alone with your
thoughts—no Angry Birds to play or Facebook
status to update. They were OK—some more
so than others, admittedly—with simply let-
ting time pass. Unproductively.
Different readers will take different things
from this package of high-achieving Millenni-
als. The stories are inspiring, to be sure. But
for me, there's a bit of wistfulness involved:
remembering a time when being "lost" in your
20s wasn't a four-letter word.
C O N T R I B U T O R S
Matt O'Grady, Editor-in-Chief
mogrady@canadawide.com / @bCbusiness
A shutterbug since he was 10,
photographer Paul Joseph
has worked on nearly 300
BCBusiness stories since 2002.
He says he especially likes
doing portraits and meeting
the people in them—see the
ones in this year's "30 Under
30" package (p.29)—but "just
give me a camera, give me
something to do, and I'm
happy."
FEBRUARY's most
popUlAR stoRiEs
on BcBUsinEss.cA
B.C.'s
Most Loved
Brands
This might be
the most B.C.
mansion ever
Best Cities
for Work
in B.C.
What B.C.'s
highest paid public
servants made
last year
What's killing
downtown Victoria
retailers
/marketing-media /real-estate /careers /finance /industries
10 BCBusiness aPril 2015
In "Water, Water Everywhere?"
(p.15), former Canadian Press
reporter Dene Moore looks at
B.C.'s new Water Sustainability
Act. "I don't think we really have
a grasp of how reliant we are on
water and how much we use
so it was interesting to me that
the province is trying to grapple
with that, " she says. Moore lives
in the South Cariboo and relies
on well water.
Kids These Days
editor's desk
In MAY
Speaking of the Internet age, tune in for next month's first-ever feature report on social media in B.C.
