James Cairns was appointed Vice-President, Petroleum and Chemicals in February 2010, based in Calgary. He oversees sales and Marketing for CN's Petroleum and Chemicals business unit.

Mr. Cairns joined CN in 1988 as a train order operator, before being promoted to rail traffic controller and then to team leader with CN's Customer Service Centre in Winnipeg, Manitoba. He entered the Sales and Marketing world in 1997 as an Intermodal account manager in Toronto, and was promoted to director, Intermodal Sales in 1999. Mr. Cairns then successively held senior positions in Intermodal Wholesale, Petroleum & Plastics Marketing, and IMX operations. Until his promotion to Vice-President, he had been assistant Vice-President of CN's domestic intermodal since 2007.

Mr. Cairns holds a Bachelor degree in Business Administration from the University of Winnipeg and an MBA from Queen's University in Kingston, Ontario.