Anyone who considered LinkedIn’s physical expansion into Canada an odd or ill-thought-out move may want to think again.  LinkedIn has been able to secure Jonathan Lister, the former country manager of Google Canada, as its own country manager in Canada.

Lister will be responsible for establishing LinkedIn’s first Canadian office, which will be located in Toronto.  Then he’ll focus on finding more users, more partners, and more advertisers, among other things.

This should all be fairly routine for the man.  Lister’s duties while heading up Google Canada for a year and a half were similar, and his previous stints as AOL Europe’s SVP of operations and AOL Canada’s general manager mean that he’s spent quite a lot of time dealing with large-scale undertakings.

Arvind Rajan, LinkedIn’s vice president of international, stated as a result, "Appointing someone of Jonathan’s caliber to lead LinkedIn’s Canadian operations marks another significant milestone in our international growth.  Canada is one of LinkedIn’s fastest growing countries . . . .  We look forward to being closer to our members in Canada and understanding their needs."

Lister has already started at LinkedIn, and – naturally enough – has a detailed LinkedIn profile if you’re interested in learning any more about him.