Canadian Lawyer InHouse

Apr/May 2008

Legal news and trends for Canadian in-house counsel and c-suite executives

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PROFESSIONAL PROFILE CN's general counsel keeps work on track Canadian National Railway general counsel Olivier Chouc says the most rewarding aspect of his job is the chance to make policies and decisions that influence company growth. By Bill Rogers truck when Chouc fi rst climbed in, but he soon learned it had unusual capabilities. "It had a set of railway wheels on it," he recalls. "We came off J the road and onto the tracks, and the train wheels were lowered. We could then operate on the tracks with what a few minutes before used to be a regular pickup." If you can call this a perk — and many would — it comes with the territory when you work for a railway. These train-trucks are used primarily for repairs and inspections, and Chouc was taken for a ride on one as part of his orientation when he joined CN in 2000. "After a couple of times you don't even notice it," he says. "These guys are good — they have to know exactly where they stand. Then they just lower those wheels and you feel the truck going up a bit, and then off you go. It's like driving, but you can't turn left or right." Appreciating this kind of thing is the mark of the "true rail- roader," as Chouc calls it — people with a passion for locomo- tives and steel. He is defi nitely one of them, if his impressive knowledge of CN's workings is any indication. For example, he has become quite well versed in the "preci- sion railway" model that the company has adopted. Precision is all about "building the train" and making sure the sequence of rail cars makes sense for the journey ahead. ames Bond would no doubt approve of the vehicle Olivier Chouc found himself riding in as general counsel for Ca- nadian National Railway. It seemed like an ordinary pickup "CN operates on a very different model than the traditional railway model," he explains. "We have a trip plan. We know from the get go where a given car is going to start and where it's going to end and how much time it's going to take. If you look at one railcar, it's fairly easy — you just have to fi gure out the best route from point A to point B," he explains. "But when you have a train of 150 cars and you drop some along the way, how you build the train will make a huge differ- ence to how effi cient your operation will be. We are one of the most effi cient in the industry." He also knows a thing or two about railway congestion. Sometimes the only way to alleviate it is to buy another rail- way. That's what CN is doing. Remember buying "Short Line" in Monopoly? Chouc is doing it for real. "We're in the process of buying a short line called the Elgin Joliet & Eastern Railway, an old steel-industry line which goes around the congested Chicago area," he says. It's the only place in the U.S. where six major railways converge. The congestion is appalling. It takes just as long for a train to pass through Chicago as it does to trek from Prince George, B.C., to Chicago, says Chouc. "Once we can bypass that, we can improve our fl uidity. Hope- fully it will help others as well — it's one less railway going through Chicago." At the moment, some of Chouc's 20-lawyer staff are working with CN's governmental- and public-affairs departments, mak- ing presentations to U.S. regulators and to the communities and C ANADIAN Lawyer INHOUSE APRIL 2008 23

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