When Asper skills meet island life

If you ask John Jabs [BComm(hons.)/05] why he ended up in accounting, he’ll answer with a story. 

“I tell this story to lots of people” says the Asper Alumni on a call from his office in the Cayman Islands, where he works as Partner, Audit & Assurance for Deloitte.

During his time at the University of Manitoba, Jabs took a year of computer science. Upon not loving it (too much typing), he then switched to the Asper School the next year, with the idea that, sure, he could just combine business and IT, right?

“I was going to transfer all the credits, and focus on Information Systems Management, but then I met this really pretty girl in my intro to accounting class, and she told me she wanted to be an accountant.’”

“I was like, ‘oh, me too. We should study together.’” Jabs says with a laugh. 

“I always tell people I’m really just doing this to impress a girl, but I’ve been with Deloitte for 22 years, and I’ve been married to her for 23,” he says. “So now I’m in too deep.”
 

"It's like Winnipeg...just nicer weather"

The first few times Jabs and his wife, fellow Asper alum Gabrielle Jabs [BComm(hons.)/05] went to the Cayman Islands, it was on vacation. While there, they jokingly remarked—as everyone does on vacation while sipping a cocktail—"boy, sure would be great to live here.”

But then it actually came true. 

Jabs, who was always a traveler at heart, went down to Cayman for a few business trips there while he was working for Deloitte’s Winnipeg office. 

He got to know one of the partners, who, in a classic Manitoba moment, was also from Winnipeg. “Turns out her husband bagged groceries with my brother back in the day,” he says. “So, small world.”

Around 2020, laws changed in the Cayman Islands, and Deloitte suddenly needed more audit staff for investment funds. He reached out to his connection asking if he could help. Never doubt the power of networking. 

Cut to: the beach. Double rainbows. Some of the most beautiful scuba diving in the world. Obviously, he worked too.

But don’t get him wrong. This isn’t a story about leaving Winnipeg, so much as it is about keeping things fresh and new. In fact—Jabs loves Cayman because it reminds him of the community feel of Winnipeg. 

“Everyone knows everyone, and it’s a friendly community,” he says. “I don’t know if I know how to make friends as an adult anymore, but in Cayman, it’s super easy. You just look over and be like, ‘hey, you wanna be friends?’ Done.”

His advice to students: if you want to try something new, and get comfortable with being uncomfortable, it’s easy. just say “yes.”

“Early on in my career, I was probably nervous that I had to pick the right path because it was going to be my path forever,” Jabs says. 
 

Using the Asper Framework on a daily basis

“Is Howard Harmatz still a professor there?” Jabs asks me. 

The reason he asks (and the answer is yes, by the way) is that he still thinks of what Harmatz taught him in Business Government Relations at the Asper School “on an almost daily basis.”

“His whole view of, ‘evaluate what the motivations are, evaluate why people are doing the things they’re doing’,” he says. “Every time I listen to any kind of news I can hear Harmatz in the back of my head going ‘hey, pay attention to the underlying story here.’”

“Asper is very deliberate about showing you different ideas,” Jabs says. 

It’s these kinds of critical-thinking skills that gave him a leg up in his career, but as he points to a big number-filled whiteboard next to him, he says that the simple lessons mattered just as much.