In this rapidly changing world, Canada needs an economic plan that builds on the country’s strengths, addresses its weaknesses, and reduces the risks from future disruptions. In late October the Business Council of Canada created a roadmap to help get there. In our report “Powering a strong recovery: an economic growth plan for Canada”, we outline a plan that builds on three key pillars: people, capital and ideas. Share your thoughts here.
On today’s podcast, Senior Vice President of Policy, Robert Asselin, walks us through the framework, and discusses why it’s needed now more than ever.
Taking pride in Canadian innovation: Deb Pimentel of IBM Canada
Deb Pimentel often tells her colleagues to be “loud and proud.” The President and GM Technology for IBM Canada believes Canadians need to be more passionate and vocal about their accomplishments.
“It’s incredible how many fantastic things we do that we don’t talk about,” she tells Goldy Hyder on the Speaking of Business podcast.
Speaking at IBM Canada’s Software Lab in Markham, Ontario, Pimentel expresses great pride in the innovation that happens there. The Canadian-developed software is being used around the world.
Keeping high-tech jobs in Canada is one of Pimentel’s top priorities. “I’m creating an environment where it’s exciting for this next generation to come in and want to work here in Canada for Canada.”
In the wide-ranging conversation, Pimentel also shares how her immigrant parents, who ran a grocery store in downtown Toronto, instilled in her the values of perseverance, customer service, and a strong work ethic – lessons she has used throughout her 29-year career at IBM.
Get a glimpse inside the Software Lab.
From chemistry to capital – John Graham, CPP Investments
The man who oversees the $650-billion pension portfolio of millions of Canadians started out his career in the relative safety of a chemistry lab.
Back then, John Graham was a research scientist with a PhD in physical chemistry. He spent nine years working in a lab before he jumped from the world of science to the world of finance, joining CPP Investments.
Now, as president and CEO of one of the world’s largest pension funds, he recognizes that investing in financial markets is more art than science.
“One of the few things I definitively know today is I don’t do science anymore,” he tells Goldy Hyder on the Speaking of Business podcast. “Finance is about investing in the real world, in a system that is constantly in flux, constantly changing. At times it can be irrational, requires quantitative, qualitative methods, art … and some science.”
Speaking in front of an audience at the Toronto Global Forum in October, Graham discusses how CPP Investments has adapted and grown in its 25-year history, navigating through changing circumstances.
Taking the long view, he says, means avoiding getting swept up in FOMO (fear of missing out) but instead building a stable, long-term portfolio. “Canadians should be proud that CPP investments is either the number one or two best-performing pension plans in the world.”
Building Canadian champions: reflections on entrepreneurship, growth and resilience
After 100 Speaking of Business interviews with Canada’s leading CEOs, we decided to mark the milestone by putting a few of them together in a room. We brought together a former CEO from one of Canada’s most established companies, an executive from a Canadian success story that started small and became big, and a company founder from a brand-new sector. They had more in common than you’d think.
Host Goldy Hyder wanted to know: how do you maintain a startup mindset, even in organizations that are decades old and employ thousands of people?
“If you want people to be innovative and risk-takers, you can’t punish failure,” said Linda Hasenfratz, executive chair of the board of Linamar.
She joined former CEO of Air Canada Calin Rovinescu and chairman of Aspire Mohammed Ashour to talk about the ingredients companies need to succeed over the long-term.
“Many of the characteristics and drivers for a startup business are absolutely exportable to mature businesses,” said Rovinescu, pointing to the need to communicate widely and to empower frontline workers.
As the co-founder of a new startup, Ashour also discussed the challenges of launching a new business that is unlike any that have come before – Aspire grows insects as a protein source. “You are inventing the plane and flying it at the same time, which is a very thrilling but also terrifying reality.”
Hosted by the Ivey Business School’s Ian O. Ihnatowycz Institute for Leadership at the school’s Toronto campus and recorded in front of a live audience, the three guests discussed their own career journeys, their hopes for Canada, and offered advice for the students in the audience.
Patient Capital: Galen Weston on Canadian prosperity
As the fourth generation leader of a family business, Galen Weston recognizes the responsibility he shoulders – to his employees, his country, and his great-grandfather’s legacy. Weston’s Real Home-made Bread began in Toronto in 1882. Today, George Weston Limited is one of Canada’s largest private sector companies, with more than 200,000 employees.
“It makes you think in decades, not in quarters,” he says. “You think about what is this company going to be not just a year from now, but 10 years from now, 20 years from now, 30 years from now.”
In a frank and revealing conversation with Goldy Hyder on the Speaking of Business podcast, Weston discusses what he calls “patient capital” – his long-view approach to ensuring the company remains strong and vibrant for generations to come.
It’s a mindset he says Canada needs to adopt as a country, calling on public policymakers to think about how to create long-term prosperity. And he urges business leaders to be part of the discourse. “That unguarded dialogue about what’s in the national interest could pay some meaningful dividends,” he says.
Listen to the full interview, including his reflections on inflation, food prices and the challenges of leadership in the face of public scrutiny, on the Speaking of Business podcast.