A legacy of leading with love
Get to know Mike
Throughout my childhood, I struggled to connect on a meaningful level with almost everyone. I went through awkward phases of teenage growth, externalizing the internal feeling that I didn’t belong.
But one day, my father brought me to work at his small electrical contracting business. Riding in his truck, visiting the office, listening to his conversations with customers, I learned two crucial lessons:
You connect better with the world if you share who you really are at your core.
Emotional transparency, empathy, and an open heart bring success to business.
These realizations improved my self-confidence and connections with others. By [year], I purchased my father’s two-employee enterprise from him. The path to growing the company was winding, involving bankruptcy multiple times.
And in 2003, tragedy struck. Paul Schoenberger passed away from a massive heart attack at age 58.
I’ll never forget the pain of my father’s passing. I coped by immersing myself in work, scaling the business but disappearing from my family in the process.
Then, 19 years later, a series of experiences enabled me to feel my father’s presence in an extraordinarily visceral way. By opening myself up to the world again, I let his legacy fill my heart. This reconnected me to who I am. In mind, body, and spirit, it also showed me the kind of leader I want to be.
Today I’m a board member and leader of the Entrepreneurs’ Organization (EO) Edmonton Chapter, a member of the advisory council of the Northern Alberta Institute of Technology, and a board member of Nanostics. I’ve also been honoured to receive the Business in Edmonton Magazine Leaders Award.
As the CEO of Sunco, I see how emotional transparency, empathy, and openness to ourselves and each other aren’t just characteristics of our culture. Leading with radical love has become the jet fuel for accelerated business growth.
What is radical love leadership?
I lead with my heart in all I do and say.
I see vulnerability as my strength, enabling authentic connection with others.
I honour my mind, body, and spirit and those of others.
These are Mike’s values
I embrace the unknown, letting curiosity spark constant growth and learning.
Mike during his first year of telecommunications studies holding a school project: the telephone privacy switch, invented to prevent family members from listening in on calls!
With Paul Schoenberger in the early days of working side by side
With wife, Jackie, and son, Pearse
The Sunco team at the annual Christmas party
With cousin and Sunco president Sean Schoenberger visiting company partner Telus at their Calgary headquarters
Mike as proud recipient of the Business in Edmonton Magazine 2022 Leaders Award
Wearing his heart on his sleeve, so to speak
Soaring to new heights on a hike along Wasootch Ridge Trail, near Banff, Alberta
Volunteer work and mentorship
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