Darren Entwistle joined TELUS in 2000 as President and CEO, and is the longest-serving CEO in the global telecommunications industry. Under Darren’s leadership, TELUS has evolved from a regional telephone company serving Western Canada into a national communications and information technology leader. Over the past 20 years, TELUS has generated a total shareholder return of 1,034 per cent. This is number one in the world amongst TELUS’ telecom incumbent peers, outperforming the TSX by 689 percentage points and the MSCI index by 896 percentage points. Moreover, TELUS’ total shareholder return has surpassed the TSX every year over the course of the past five, 10 and 15 years, by an average of 87 per cent. In addition, throughout the past 22 years, TELUS’ enterprise value has quintupled to $75.1 billion and EBITDA has more than doubled to over $6 billion. During this same timeframe, the TELUS brand has increased in value from a few hundred million dollars to $10.1 billion today, ranked as Canada’s most valuable telco brand according to Brand Finance, the most trusted telco brand and one of Canada’s Most Authentic Brands by the Gustavson School of Business, and as 2021 Brand of the Year by Strategy Magazine.
Reflecting Darren’s belief that diversity creates a whole that is far greater than the sum of its parts, TELUS is a signatory of the Catalyst Accord mandating an increase in the overall proportion of Canadian Financial Post 500 board seats held by women. In 2020, TELUS also signed the Pledge, created through the BlackNorth Initiative, committing to help end anti-Black systemic racism. Darren is a founding member of The 30% Club in Canada, a founding member of the Canadian Board Diversity Council, a vocal proponent of their Diversity 50 initiative, as well as a signatory of both the Ontario Securities Commission’s Staff Consultation Paper regarding Women on Boards, and the B.C. Minerva Pledge. Darren’s past directorships include: George Weston Ltd., the Business Council of Canada, TD Bank Financial Group, McGill University Board of Governors and Bell Cablemedia Plc in the United Kingdom.