When John Rothwell received a phone call from executives at Vancouver-based Canaccord Capital Inc., asking Rothwell if he was interested in joining that firm, he knew it was more than just a call. It was a calling.

“I think Canaccord needs what I am able to bring,” says Rothwell, Canaccord’s new executive vice president and head of private-client services in Toronto. “I was compelled to make this move.

“Canaccord’s private-client service was in need of some leadership. And I think there is a big difference between leadership and management,” he adds. “Finding the existing potential and uncovering it is not all that difficult to do.”

Rothwell spent the previous five years as the president of Winnipeg-based Wellington West Capital Inc., expanding the presence of the investment dealer in Eastern Canada. Now, he feels he has accomplished what he set out to do at Wellington West. So, he is looking ahead and setting new goals for Canaccord.

Since joining Canaccord on Oct. 30, 2008, Rothwell has embraced his role to lead Canaccord’s private-client services division. His mandate is to focus on talent acquisition, product and service development, and revenue and asset growth. As Rothwell completes his first 100 days with Canaccord, he is looking forward to communicating to advisors what Canaccord has to offer and why he believes it is a great firm.

“In the beginning stages, it really was about reviewing the firm’s strategy and finding out whether or not we thought the strategic thinking was appropriate for what we wanted to accomplish,” Rothwell says. “Then, it was about putting the structure together to seize that opportunity.”

Rothwell, a self-described “freak” for strategy, structure, people and execution, was quick to assess what had to be tackled immediately. “Instantly, I found that the raw material was already here,” he says. “Canaccord has some terrific people in place with extreme talent, but those people needed to have some leadership.”

One of Rothwell’s first tasks was to re-assess the firm’s priorities. He also wanted to touch base with the firm’s “human capital.” Within his first month with the firm, he visited all 34 branches across Canada, talking with the dealer’s 426 licensed advisors who work on 350 teams.

“I listened hard for what the sales force was looking for,” Rothwell says. “Believe it or not, it is in the kind of market that we are experiencing today that people are able to recognize what they really need.”

Rothwell has established for himself that the firm needed strong regional management, a national sales manager, a stronger training and development program (a requirement of which the firm was already aware) and more disciplined focus on its recruiting efforts. And Rothwell is moving quickly to fill the gaps. Already, he has appointed a national sales manager, Peter Chandler.

The key to recruitment, says Rothwell, will be a matter of telling the story of Canaccord appropriately — something that has not been done well in the past: “We need to communicate who the new Canaccord is and what it is becoming. It must be one of the best-kept secrets in the industry. People just don’t know enough about Canaccord.”

Communicating a positive image for Canaccord has been difficult lately, considering the firm’s involvement in the non-bank asset-backed commercial paper crisis that began in the summer of 2007. Some 1,400 of Canaccord’s clients held $269 million in frozen ABCP assets. Canaccord responded with a commitment to reimburse small investors by crediting their accounts.

The dealer created the Canaccord Relief Program to reimburse clients who had invested $1 million or less in ABCP. The CRP repurchases, at par value, up to $152 million of restructured third-party ABCP from eligible clients.

Rothwell says he accepted the position with eyes wide open and did his own research into the ABCP situation. “Canaccord wasn’t the architect of this challenge,” says Rothwell. “We have been dealing with all the ramifications and have been stuck in the eye of the storm. It has consumed a lot of capacity here and a lot of talent — including the time and efforts of [chief operating officer] Mark Maybank. We have staff who have been devoted to dealing with that issue.”

Switching firms during turbulent times doesn’t faze Rothwell, either. While the state of the markets concerns him, he is confident that Canaccord, like many others, will ride out the storm. He speaks from the experience and knowledge gained over the course of 30 years in the financial services industry.

@page_break@Rothwell started his career in 1977 as a financial advisor at now-defunct Midland Doherty Ltd. in Waterloo, Ont. For more than 18 years, he worked in a variety of positions at the investment dealer on both the retail and institutional sides, including as sales manager and executive committee member. He stayed on through Midland Doherty’s 1990 merger with Walwyn Inc. But in 1995, he felt compelled to move to the product-manufacturing side and joined Toronto-based Mackenzie Financial Corp.

“I’ve only ever had a few callings,” Roth-well says. “But the opportunity to move to Mackenzie and learn the manufacturing side seemed like a really eloquent trade for me.”

His plan was to learn the manufacturing side of the business and then return to Midland Walwyn Capital Inc.

Three years later, in 1998, another opportunity arose when Rothwell’s close friend Kevin Kelly, then president of Fidelity Investments Canada, moved to Boston to work at the parent company’s U.S. headquarters. Rothwell took a position as managing director at Fidelity in Toronto.

“I picked up the phone and developed my career at Fidelity,” he says, “and for the next five years, I was extremely proud of the things I accomplished there.”

Yearning to get back to the distribution side, Rothwell got in touch with Charlie Spiring, chairman and founder of Wellington West, prompting a move to Wellington West in 2003.

Rothwell’s departure last fall from Wellington West came a few weeks after the dealer announced a deal with Montreal-based National Bank of Canada, which saw the bank acquire a 15% stake in Wellington West. Rothwell insists his decision to leave had nothing to with that deal and that there were no “push factors” involved.

“I am still a shareholder at Wellington West and I’d love it to be very successful,” Rothwell says. “The move was more about me feeling that I might be needed more at Canaccord now.”

Spiring confirms that the split was amicable. Indeed, Spiring is happy for Rothwell and for what he can bring to Canaccord. “I wasn’t totally surprised when he told me he was moving on,” Spiring says. “John had been having itchy feet for a few months. He has a lot to offer that Canaccord needs right now. I have so much respect for him and he was very honourable in the way that he moved firms.”

Rothwell and Spiring had first met when Rothwell hired Spiring at Midland Doherty; they have remained friends ever since. Although Spiring says he was sorry to see Rothwell leave Wellington West, he adds that he understands that Canaccord is in need of someone with Rothwell’s experience and that he (Spiring) would never hold someone back in his or her career.

In fact, Rothwell is the only person to leave Wellington West who has remained a shareholder. Spiring believes Rothwell helped build the firm to its current stature and thus deserves a piece of its future.

Looking back over his career, Rothwell says, it’s hard to pinpoint which position was most educational. “I learned the most about the brokerage business by being a producing branch manager,” he says. “But I certainly learned the most about the industry when I was at Fidelity because it pours education into you and turns you into a strategist.”

Looking ahead, Rothwell hopes to leave a legacy, he says, as “the guy who helped people unlock their potential, even if they don’t remember his name.”

And Rothwell hopes to stay with Canaccord for as long as the firm will have him. “I hope that because of the success of the company, advisors will also become more successful,” he says. “We created a platform that set [advisors] up for better service to their clients. We set them up with some of the values I personally stand for — that aren’t stereotypically about what money and Bay Street stand for. So, there is a culture shift afoot here that I not only want to be a part of but also help lead.” IE