[00:00:15 ] Samuel Chiang: When I was probably 11, maybe 12 years old, I told my grandfather I wanted to be like him.   He was a lawyer, and he immigrated to Canada after us.

And he was a specialist in the Canadian government when he arrived in Canada, because he knew Chinese law.  When I said to him, I want to be like you, he said to me, your English must be impeccable. And I said, okay. He said, but I wouldn't want you to practice as a defense lawyer.

I said, why? He didn't answer the question right away. He said, you may want to be a corporate lawyer. That always stuck with me. And then he said, you don't want to be a defense lawyer because sometimes you could be defending somebody, and then in the midst of a trial, they confess to you everything.

[00:01:16 ] Samuel Chiang: And you're stuck. He said, it's very painful to handle that type of thing in the midst of a trial.

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[00:01:24 ] Tommy Thomas: Our guest today is Samuel Chiang. Samuel has a diverse and accomplished background that significantly influenced his leadership. He was born in Taiwan and later moved to Canada where he grew up and began his professional career. He graduated from the University of Toronto when he began his career at Ernst & Young in Canada.

In addition to Ernst & Young, Samuel has served in senior leadership roles with The International Orality Network, Trans World Radio and Partners International. He also served as the president and CEO of The Seed Company, a Bible translation organization within the Wycliffe family. Under his leadership, the organization focused on making scriptures available in oral and written forms for unreached and Bibleless peoples. Along the way he gained a great appreciation for using technology in the workplace. And he pioneered the use of AI in both the private and non-profit sectors.  He and his wife Robbi make their home in the Dallas Metroplex.

Let's pick up on the conversation with Samuel Chiang.

[00:02:46 ] Tommy Thomas: What's your happiest memory of childhood?

[00:02:51 ] Samuel Chiang: Yeah, it depends on which segment. I remember, in my early teens, playing my violin. Whether it was solo, whether it was ensemble, whether it was orchestral, that was very special, that I remembered. I remember playing tennis, teaming together in tennis.

[00:03:11 ] Samuel Chiang: It was great. You might not know this about me, I'm a five-time immigrant, and so my immigrant experience, even when I was younger, first arrived from Taiwan to Canada, everything was new. That was a wonderful memory.

[00:03:28 ] Tommy Thomas: At what age did y'all come to Canada?

[00:03:31 ] Samuel Chiang:   I was a little bit over 10 years old. And, so everything was new, yeah, all the senses were new. I only had the alphabet and seven phrases of courteous language, thank you, excuse me, will you please, those types of languages.  And that's how I started in Canada.

[00:03:54 ] Tommy Thomas:  Do you remember how long it took you to get reasonably fluent in English?

[00:04:01 ] Samuel Chiang: Oh, my goodness, it was quite a long time. Let's just say, you're grade five, grade six, grade five, in Canada. Probably I did not become fluent until I was nearly 16.

[00:04:15 ] Tommy Thomas: Wow. So, what's the greatest gift that your parents gave you?

[00:04:24 ] Samuel Chiang: I think immigrating to Canada.  They're both Christians. They said to us, we don't want you to be conscripted into the military in Taiwan. And so, we want to give you and your brother a chance to experience things very differently. And I believe the gift of Canada in that immigration and the growth in that environment was the greatest gift my parents gave to us.

[00:04:55 ] Tommy Thomas:   What was high school like in Canada?

[00:05:00 ] Samuel Chiang: I went to a high school that was 66 percent Jewish. And I knew the sons and daughters of literally captains of industries. And I watched how they grew up in a very unique setting. Jewish people, by and large, love the arts, are great contributors to society as a whole, from history to research, etc.

And when they love the arts, their sons and daughters are top in their forms in terms of music, et cetera. So it was, they pulled me along. I was a learner. I thought I was good at playing my violin, but these other students were even better than I am. And they pulled me along.

[00:05:45 ] Tommy Thomas:  You decided to go to university.  Did you consider a lot of colleges and universities, or did you pick one and say, I'm going there?

[00:05:55 ] Samuel Chiang: My goodness. in Canada, it's interesting in Canada, you get to pick three. I did. And then it was ultimately my parents saying to me, if you went to this university and lived at home, we'll pay for everything.

I accepted that and actually stayed home and went to University of Toronto, and studied economics and finance and accounting and it was good. It was good to be in Toronto.

[00:06:23 ] Tommy Thomas: How did you get into the econ and finance and accounting field?  Did you know somebody that had been a CPA or an economist?

[00:06:32 ] Samuel Chiang: No, numbers were always of interest to me. And, let me rewind the conversation a little bit, for myself. When I was probably 11, maybe 12 years old, I told my grandfather I wanted to be like him. He was a lawyer, and he immigrated to Canada after us.

And he was a specialist in the Canadian government, when he arrived in Canada, because he knew Chinese law and when I said to him, I want to be like you, he said to me, your English must be impeccable. And I said, okay, he said, but I wouldn't want you to practice as a defense lawyer.

I said, why? He didn't answer the question right away. He said, you may want to be a corporate lawyer. That always stuck with me. And then he said, you don't want to be a defense lawyer because sometimes you could be defending somebody, and then in the midst of a trial, they confess to you everything.

[00:07:42 ] Samuel Chiang: And you're stuck. He said, it's very painful to handle that type of thing in the midst of a trial. And I listened to that. And so, I thought, do I want to be a corporate lawyer? But reading was not my strong suit. Not yet at that time. And then I love numbers. And so, that’s the way I went into accounting, finance and economics.

[00:08:12 ] Tommy Thomas: So, what was your favorite part of college?

[00:08:21 ] Samuel Chiang:   At University of Toronto, there were two things. One was in social sciences, sociology, and then the other one was actually computer science which surprised me because in high school, I never took computer science, but at University of Toronto, at that time still had to use those card decks where you punch holes and all that, and we used that to solve problems.  That was solving problems and I loved it.

[00:08:50 ] Tommy Thomas:   You and I would be from that age. Yes. We took Fortran and COBOL, and we had those big, big boxes of cards. And, yes, I remember those days. What is something that people are always surprised to find out about you?

[00:09:13 ] Samuel Chiang: They would say to me, even most recently, they would say, oh, you speak English so well. I don't know what to say about that. That's a surprising thing. Actually, the world over, I have had people saying that to me.

[00:09:30 ] Tommy Thomas: Think back to your first management job when you actually had some people that you were responsible for.  What do you remember about that?

[00:09:40 ] Samuel Chiang: Yeah, I remember very specifically at Ernst & Young that even when I have people reporting to me, even though I was maybe really green in my experiences, people were just very respectful. They were very accepting and very professional.

[00:09:58 ] Samuel Chiang: That just made me feel like they were helping me to do what I needed to do. And even though I might not even have much experience in doing any supervision, I always remember the way that people accepted me. They were very professional, very respectful.

[00:10:21 ] Tommy Thomas: Each of us probably has times in our life where in the South, we would say our metal has been tested. I'm not sure what the Canadian equivalent with that, or the Chinese equivalent for that would be, but have you had times in your life when your metal was tested? And if so, how did you come out of it?

[00:10:39 ] Samuel Chiang: Yeah, so very specifically, I remember in high school, in one of the violin pieces in the ensemble, I worked hard to get the lead part in that ensemble, very specifically for a competition. I didn't get it. Another student who was a great younger got it.

And yeah, my heart was crushed. But that was one of those sorts of moments. I had to really console myself to say, okay, this is the Bach triple violin concerto. So, there are three leads. I got none of those, but I'm still the lead for the entire ensemble. And that's a role to play.

So, I better play it well. And so that was the first time. The second time was, that I recall very specifically, was in an organization. On the one hand, being interviewed to be the CEO of the organization. On the other hand, I had a whole group of people complaining about me and they were doing an examination about my ministry practices and procedures and all that stuff.

[00:12:02 ] Samuel Chiang: And, I remember during the interview that the board cha