Have you ever noticed how sometimes you head off to meet someone or to accomplish a goal, but the highlight turns out to be something else entirely? There turns out to be a deeper connection you could easily miss if you were focused only on the agenda of the moment.

Recently, I went to Ottawa on an informal trade mission organized by Nova Scotia Business Inc. (NSBI). The agency chartered a 737 and invited a group of influential Nova Scotians to pay their own airfare and represent their province at a downtown restaurant.

Standing at the front of the plane, NSBI president and CEO Stephen Lund explained the purpose of the trip: “We learned from bringing RIM to the province that the Team Nova Scotia approach is what sets us apart. All we want the people in Ottawa to do is listen to our story, and then come up and take a look.”

On the bus ride to Ottawa’s down-town I sat with Ava Czapalay, the president and CEO of EduNova, which is marketing the province’s educational resources abroad. There is huge potential in the Middle East, she told me, although it can be hard for a woman to find a co-ed gym. Note to self: Understanding both cultures is part of the deal if you want to play in foreign markets.

At the restaurant we were greeted by Ian Thompson, Nova Scotia’s representative in Ottawa. Lund described Nova Scotia’s business advantages, including ready market access: a short flight to the northeastern U.S., a time zone halfway between Silicon Valley and Europe, and globally linked transportation systems. There was a video on Nova Scotia as a gateway to North America by sea, air, and fibre optics.

David Carrigan of Xwave elaborated on the “data pipe” used by Aliant Inc. and on Hibernia Atlantic’s transatlantic cable, part of the infrastructure that makes the province attractive to the technology sector. David Gossen of I.M.P. Aerospace described the potential of the province’s billion-dollar aerospace sector.

The star speaker was not so buttoned down. Manny Calandrino of Consolidated Fastfrate said that his company is setting up a “transload” container centre in Halifax. They have one in Vancouver, but that port is congested, as are all the West Coast ports, he said. The new opportunities are on the East Coast, at underutilized ports like in Halifax that can capture the post-Panamax trade coming through the Suez from Asia. “Sorry, I got so excited,” he said. “At least I didn’t lapse into Italian.”

The highlight of the night, in my mind, was unexpected: cellist Denise Djokic, a Nova Scotian who was clearly delighted to represent her home province. I spoke to her between performances of Bach on her $6-million Strad. In her mid-20s, she has been on the road for several years, filling concert halls around the world. We spoke of how the true innovators in all fields look backwards and reinterpret the genius of the past. This is certainly true in classical music, where living traditions trace back hundreds of years, she said. Suddenly it struck me that of all the accomplished people in the room, Djokic had advanced the farthest in her chosen career. Her talent, discipline, and the joy in what she does make her an inspiration.

A few weeks later I attended the Progress Face to Face conference at the Fairmont Algonquin in St. Andrews, N.B. Speakers included Lyn Heward, of Cirque du Soleil’s content division, a brilliant example of “blue ocean” strategy. In an emotional session, Gerry McConnell of mining company Etruscan Resources Inc. described his company’s policy of building clinics and schools in its sphere of operations in West Africa.

A point of interest for me was something that wasn’t on the official content agenda: a fleet of Mercedes-Benz brought in by TriStar Fine Cars of Saint John and available for test drives. I selected the biggest SUV and cruised around with Marc Diettner from the dealership. Originally from Germany, he married a woman from Halifax. They lived in Germany for a while and then moved to Saint John, which has the most growth potential of any city in Atlantic Canada, in his opinion. “I used to work for Eddie Bauer, which is all about service,” he told me. “In Germany they build quality products, but they don’t have the same focus on customer service.” However, he noted with obvious pride that the first Mercedes-Benz, built more than 100 years ago, still runs today.

I wasn’t expecting to be tooling around in this masterpiece of German engineering, talking global business with a guy who could compare Atlantic Canada with Europe, who understood manufacturing and service at the highest levels. There is something about quality; it just shows up. Whether it’s a German car, a brave initiative to make a difference in West Africa, a reinvented circus, or a multimillion-dollar cello, quality sends a signal to the world. There are many messages there.