Kevin Tawil

I was teaching soccer schools or soccer clinics throughout Prince Edward Island.

the opportunity to be my own boss, and I even started McGill Classmates, a small consulting firm, during one of the summers.

So this idea of starting a company, being an entrepreneur, it goes back to the beginning.

And so when I was in my second year of business school, along with a handful of other classmates, we'd get together maybe Monday, Tuesday, every week, and we'd bat ideas back and forth, maybe brainstorming, trying to come up with

Some company that individually or as a group could start.

And I struggled at finding the right idea, what would make sense.

Interestingly, this is in 91, 92.

Had we been coming out of business school maybe five or six years later at the dawn of the internet where eyeballs were everything, I'm glad we didn't because I think any one of our dumb ideas then could have gotten funded.

Yeah.

as they all ultimately got funded five or six years later.

I took the job as a case writer, Will, because I had no other offers.

I may have interviewed for one consulting firm, maybe one or two other types of jobs, but I didn't get the offers.

And then it was getting late in the year.

And my then girlfriend suggested I apply for this case writing job.

Spoiler alert, our story arc is about to intersect with Irv Groesbeck.

The job was to be case writer for three professors, Irv Groesbeck, Jim Collins, the author of Built to Last and Good to Great, and Bill Azir, another wonderful professor and friend who's passed away.

And

was a great influence on my life.

And they had interviewed a number of candidates.

They had offers out to two of those candidates for one position.