Keith Creel: Lessons from Life on the Railroad

**Keith Creel** (0:00)
In your career, you're going to work with a lot of managers that want to do things right, but very few that want to lead, and leaders do the right things, even when they're not the comfortable thing to do. You know, often change threatens people. You've got to be able to articulate why you need to change and how you need to change, and stick with it, even if it's not comfortable.
Those lessons, you know, to me, I think are universal, and I think they're undeniably true, and I think they lead to success in any business, and most specifically in our business.

**Shane Parrish** (0:46)
Welcome to The Knowledge Project. I'm your host, Shane Parrish. This podcast is about mastering the best of what other people have already figured out so you can apply their insights to your life. If you're listening to this, you're missing out. If you'd like access to the podcast before public release, private episodes that only appear in your feed, hand edited transcripts, including my personal highlights, or you just want to support the show that you love, you can join at fs.blogslashmembership. Check out the show notes for a link. My guest today is Keith Creel, the CEO of Canadian Pacific Railway.
For those of you that don't know, Canadian Pacific is one of the large class one rails in North America. It has over 13,000 miles of rail network, 11 ports served on both the West and East Coast, and over 100 transload facilities. Keith has helped Canadian Pacific go from one of the worst operated rails to one of the best in the world. While trains are such an important part of our supply chain, they remain misunderstood and underappreciated. I wanted to talk to Keith to learn more.
We discuss common misunderstandings about rails, the symbiotic relationship between trucks and trains, self-driving technology and how it changes the landscape, high-speed rail, reshoring and the role that rail plays, leadership and some of the lessons he's learned from legendary railroader, Hunter Harrison, and also from investor Bill Ackman. We also discuss the $27 billion acquisition of Kansas City Southern. He walks us through step by step revealing awesome details that I don't know have appeared anywhere else.
I get to talk with and learn from so many amazing people and conversations like this one with Keith remind me of why The Knowledge Project is so important. I love sharing this stuff with you.
It's time to listen and learn.
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Everyone knows about rails, but we misunderstand so much. I think the best place to start is with the question, what do people misunderstand about rails?

**Keith Creel** (5:00)
I think they misunderstand or they lack an understanding that if the rails don't run, the products that we all enjoy consume and that establish or define our quality of life just doesn't happen. I think that's probably came more to bear or maybe more apparent to folks over the last year, year and a half with all the supply chain challenges that we've experienced and the inflation we've experienced, but certainly it's the backbone of the economy in so many ways.