Darin Diehl didn’t introduce himself so much as jump headlong into my life. There was never a question of us being mere colleagues, although that was how we met. He had an irresistible gregariousness that turned every relationship into a friendship.
Diehl was with the Toronto-based mutual fund shop Global Strategy in the late 1990s when we first connected, part of a team that built a practice management and news service for Canadian financial advisors. He and Dwayne Desaulniers hosted a 4 p.m. market wrap that we used to dial into on our landline telephones.
Both were recruited by Rogers Media in 2001 to launch Advisor.ca — an early web property that complemented Advisor’s Edge, which I’d helped launch in 1998. That cinched it. He and I would be teammates, in one form or another, for good.
We lost him a little more than three years ago. As if it wasn’t cruel enough to see such a joyful life cut short, it was lung cancer that took our friend, a lifelong non-smoker.
A ‘big impact’
This week’s edition of the Canadian Advisor.cast features Preet Banerjee, a consultant to the wealth management industry, keynote speaker and financial educator. He was a friend to both Diehl and his wife Jeanette, who coincidentally was a director on Banerjee’s Oprah Winfrey Network show.
“I think about Darin a lot,” Banerjee said. “He had a very big impact on me.”
Diehl’s career included stints in financial services journalism and content marketing. After his time at Advisor.ca, he went on to do pioneering work with Sun Life — building its Brighter Life platform — and at Tangerine. His work reflected a heartfelt desire to help Canadians understand money, and to inform advisors, even when that meant reporting uncomfortable truths.
Even as he was battling cancer, Diehl wrote a remarkable piece for Jonathan Chevreau’s Financial Independence Hub on what he was experiencing.
“None of us know how long we have with the ones we love, to do the things we love to do and to lift up others where we can,” he wrote. “I’m grateful for every day. I’m grateful for the sound financial planning decisions, aided by our advisor of three-plus decades, we committed to years earlier. I’m grateful for the health care system provided by the imperfect country in which we live and for so many magnificent health care professionals. I’m grateful for a lifetime of friendships, new and old. … I’m grateful for three loving adult children and my partner of 32 years who’ve all been forced to deal with all the stress and anxiety right alongside me. Thank you 2020, for putting all that in focus for me.”
He’d grown reflective at that point in his life, understandably. The sincerity in that little chunk of writing was a big part of who Diehl was. It has to be said, though, that he was also one of the funniest people I’ve ever met. He saw humour in everything, and helped all of us do the same.
“He was one of those truly genuine, amazing people that you wish you could clone many times over,” Banerjee said. “If the world was filled with more Darins, the world would be such a better place. I miss him so much.”
Canadian Advisor.cast is available in both video and audio formats, via Advisor.ca, Spotify, Apple Podcasts and YouTube.