Dan Meeking

Great opinion piece. "...it is increasingly clear that you can’t have a thriving innovation economy without industrial policy." (FYI - Industrial policy is government policy to encourage the development and growth of part of the economy in pursuit of some public goal.) For the future of Canada: AI, the environment, food security, housing, military, education, and healthcare all need industrial policy that is focused on the public goal of protecting the natural world. A larger discussion, but this public goal definitely includes the military, space exploration, education and healthcare.

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Toronto's government software waste highlights a broader problem in public sector tech adoption: misaligned incentives and outdated systems lead to millions in waste. The City of Toronto's Auditor General just released a scathing report showing the city wasted $11M on unused software licenses. Let's break down the numbers: 💸 Total software budget (2019-2023): $235M 💸 Total waste identified: $10.9M 💸 Unused Microsoft M365 licenses: $6.9M 💸 Inactive employee licenses: $1.4M The most striking example? In 2021, Toronto bought 10,000 Microsoft M365 licenses at $5.1M annually despite Microsoft explicitly warning their network could only handle 6,000 users. The results were predictable: 1⃣ Year 1: 90% of licenses went unused 2⃣ Year 2: Over 50% still unused 3⃣ Expected $27M in productivity gains never materialized 4⃣ Security risks from keeping active licenses for departed employees This isn't about blaming individual civil servants—they're working within a system that often prioritizes bulk purchasing to save money without considering implementation challenges. The problem is structural: 1️⃣ Incentives reward immediate cost savings over long-term efficiency 2️⃣ Procurement systems designed for physical goods struggle with digital services 3️⃣ Limited flexibility to adjust plans when circumstances change 4️⃣ Complex approval processes that slow down essential infrastructure upgrades The most concerning part? This isn't new. The Auditor noted that 12 recommendations from previous software audits remain unimplemented, most over 5 years old. This persistence suggests the issue isn't with people, but with the system itself. The real questions we should be asking: ❓ How can we redesign procurement systems for the digital age? ❓ What incentives would better align public spending with public value? ❓ How many other cities face similar structural challenges? At Publicus, we believe modernizing government operations isn't about pointing fingers—it's about building better systems that enable public servants to serve effectively. We need to reimagine how government operates in the digital age. #govtech #publicsector #toronto #digitaltransformation

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Good data is important.

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This is a measured response with an equity lens focus for all users of our public transportation system. Also helps that Metrolinx has already been field-testing this policy since April 2024. "A ban on e-bikes and e-scooters on the Toronto Transit Commission (TTC) would disproportionately affect low-income individuals and marginalized groups with limited transportation options, according to an equity report published by the transit agency's chief people and culture officer. "For low-income individuals in particular, e-bikes are a readily available and affordable form of commuting," Shakira Naraine wrote in her report, which will be discussed at the TTC board meeting on Tuesday. "Alternatives such as public transit, manual bicycles or scooters are viewed as less economically viable, and in some cases, less convenient, potentially increasing travel costs and negatively affecting their budgets. "The TTC board voted to put the proposed ban on hold until staff determined how such a move would impact gig workers, as well as racialized and lower income riders. In her report, Naraine suggests rather than a complete ban, the TTC impose "specific restrictions"— similar to Metrolinx's, which ban e-bikes with uncertified batteries but allow those with batteries displaying a UL or CE safety certification. Such a policy could offer "many benefits" to the TTC, including promoting accessibility, enhancing safety measures, supporting economic vitality and promoting community engagement, Naraine wrote in her report. TTC board member Coun. Dianne Saxe, Ph.D, GCB.D said she would be moving a motion at Tuesday's meeting to adopt Naraine's recommendation to be consistent with Metrolinx.  - Mahdis Habibinia https://lnkd.in/gyguSb7Z h/t Lara Muldoon Cc: Cycle Toronto TCAT - The Centre for Active Transportation The Biking Lawyer LLP The Bike Brigade Supplemental Report: Equity Analysis for Seasonal Prohibition on Lithium-Ion Battery Powered E-Bikes and EScooters Date: December 3, 2024 To: TTC Board From: Chief People and Culture Officer :  https://lnkd.in/gKh9zDuz

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🇨🇦 Usually, I'd source and plot the data, but when it declines over 18 consecutive quarters, I don't think there's much point. This is why I made a pitch in April to the Sr. Deputy Governor of the Bank of Canada to look to what made Japan great for ideas on how to turn our productivity around. Alas, to no avail. I guess we'll muddle through with the same-old/same-old hoping for the best but expecting the worst. From the article: "The latest decline has lasted 18 quarters, making it the second longest in the past 40 years. Only the decline of 1989 to 1994, which lasted 21 quarters, was longer... Not only does Canada lag most developed economies, Canadian provinces also fall far behind almost all U.S. states... Ontario last year had a per-person level of economic output similar to Alabama, said Tombe. The Maritimes were below Mississippi, and Quebec and Manitoba lag West Virginia. Canada’s strongest economy, Alberta beat the U.S. average, but ranked 14th overall." https://lnkd.in/dsc67Uyx #systemsthinking #leadership #deming #productivity #gdp

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IT'S KIND OF HARD TO PROCESS: A WELLBORE MORE THAN NINE KILOMETRES LONG... Think of it this way: stack 47 Calgary Towers on top of each other and watch them stretch thousands of metres into the sky. Think of it this way, too: somehow a bunch of smart people figured out how to poke a hole in the earth, push a rotating piece of metal down thousands of metres and gradually turn it to be roughly parallel to the earth's surface for another nearly six kilometres. There, it reached a destination at which another group of smart people figured out there was petroleum previously inaccessible. Crescent Point Energy (now Veren) recently landed that new onshore Canadian drilling record in the Kaybob-Duvernay on a multi-well pad, in partnership with contractors Pacesetter Directional Drilling and Ensign Energy Services. Trican Well Service Ltd. did the cement work. The well is pretty much a technology triumph...a triumph of geo-and-engineering-knowhow, on-rig skills, high-tech equipment, safety and regulatory knowledge and a whole lot of grit. The team that achieved it should be justifiably proud. It made industry headlines for a day or so and then fell out of the news cycle. Thus, it's a lost opportunity. It's a missed "brass ring" grab to talk up our sector's technology chops in ways that might entice young women and men to consider a career in oil and gas. This one well alone makes a critical symbolic point: "oil and gas" is actually a technology sector that produces hydrocarbon products. Just like Tesla is a mining company that makes electric vehicles. We need as a sector to step up the way we use more than a century's worth of technology competency to create a different and creative "recruiting narrative" to attract the diverse workforce required to meet growing energy demand. Right now, there's a big and growing delta between workforce needs and the trickle of human capital entering the sector. At Energy Safety Canada's Careers in Energy group, we've just released some important research on the topic. Check them out here: https://lnkd.in/g9PXZXMP Better technology dialogue will help turn that trickle into a steadier flow. EDIT: It would be great to see all the various players in this achievement build a collaborative presentation to be shared with broader industry -- particularly students who would be inspired by the opportunities such "tech-collab" creates and lessons learned. Shauna Louie, CPHR Mark Salkeld Gurpreet Lail Murray Elliott Mark A. Scholz Craig Watt Lisa Stephenson-MBA, CRSP Dale Hansen Deidra Garyk Brad Fedora David Hood Bemal Mehta Kerry Jothen Collin Maier Gene Huber Dale Hansen

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So back in 2017, quite literally on a dare, a team of 6 people decided to run FWD50 in Ottawa. I did NOT have "be a free library of hundreds of public sector innovation talks" on my Bingo card. But here we are. Since 2020, we've also been recording, captioning, and publishing our talks. In 2023, our best-attended workshop happened online—with over 850 participants. If you're wondering how AI might impact your job in the public sector, you should watch it. It's called "How to use AI tools for your work in government," from our amazing partners at Apolitical. https://lnkd.in/eeZ5gspA AI is transforming the public service, and this just one of many talks full of practical knowledge about service design thinking, AI, team culture, data privacy, and more. Did I mention this was free? In 7 years, FWD50 has become not just an event where the people building tomorrow’s government go to learn, connect, and recharge; it's also become a great community (I got to see some of them on recent trips to DC, San Francisco, and London!) Anyway, new drop. #ai #machinelearning #publicservice #FWD50 #digitalgovernment

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I rarely share #Ontario news, but this is one that I think is interesting. A group of developers are asking for various levels of government to reduce or eliminate development charges. In return, the developers have pledged to reduce the prices of their new homes, dollar for dollar. I spoke to Matthew Young of Republic Developments about how the coalition was formed, the development costs, and the pledge itself. #realestate #housing #affordablehousing #development #construction

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Canada do you know what cities are your c40 cities? THIS IS A MUNCIPAL DEEP STATE ORGANIZATION oNCE your city is a c40 city can it unwind? Do you know what it means to be a c40 city. IT IS ABSOLUTELY CRAZY how controlled all the commitments are right down to divesting from fossil fuels. Look for instance at Vancouvers c40 commitments. What I want you to consider is that this organization completely invalidates the ENTIRE BASIS FOR DEMOCRACY. it has decided the entire control of this and other C40 CITIies. LOOK THEM. Make understanding the Municipal Deep state an every person conversation. https://lnkd.in/ew44sc5x HERE IS THE LINK TO VANCOUVER https://lnkd.in/eAd9R7YP Vancouver for instance has made the following commitments to c40! including DIVESTING OF FOSSIL FUELS ACCELERATOR. Renewable Energy Accelerator View Towards Zero Waste Accelerator View Green & Healthy Streets Accelerator View Net Zero Carbon Buildings Accelerator View Divesting from Fossil Fuels, Investing in a Sustainable Future Accelerator View Networks Clean Energy Network View Private Building Decarbonisation Network View Public Transport Network View Zero Emission Vehicles (ZEV) Network View Waste to Resources Network View Walking and Cycling Network View Land Use Planning Network View Food Systems Network View Connecting Delta Cities Network View Air Quality Network View Urban Flooding Network View City-Business Climate Alliance View Inclusive Climate Action Forum View Case Studies ICA Fund | Supporting the city’s most heat-vulnerable residents View Cities100: Vancouver – Zero Emissions From New Buildings View City Adviser Case Study Series: Vancouver- Industry Association Partnership to Deliver Rental Apartment Energy Retrofit Program View Cities100: Vancouver – North America’s First Renewably Powered City View C40 Good Practice Guides: Vancouver – South East False Creek Neighbourhood View C40 Good Practice Guides: Vancouver – Neighbourhood Energy Strategy View C40 Good Practice Guides: Vancouver – Olympic Village View Cities100: Vancouver – Low Carbon District Heating Cuts Emissions View Cities100: Vancouver – Building Strategically for Sea Level Rise View Cities100: Vancouver – Plan Creates Green Jobs and Green Thumbs View

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🇨🇦🌱Achieving Canada’s Net Zero by 2050 requires managing a complex web of relationships across government, industry, and the public. In my research at MIT, we’ve applied the Stakeholder Value Network (SVN) approach to a Heating Decarbonization Program, designed to navigate these intricate interactions and drive effective collaboration. Why the SVN Approach is Critical? The SVN captures the complex, multi-directional dependencies between stakeholders—highlighting how government regulations, OEM innovation, user feedback, financial flows, and public influence are all interconnected. Unlike simple, top-down models, the SVN allows us to visualize and manage the real-time feedback loops that shape decarbonization efforts. This level of insight is crucial for large-scale initiatives like Canada's heating transition, where every stakeholder’s action triggers consequences throughout the network, requiring continuous adaptation and coordination. Why This Matters for Canada? In Canada, decarbonizing heating systems involves navigating a web of technological, economic, and social factors. The SVN approach ensures these complexities are not just managed but optimized, aligning incentives and actions across all levels. This model enables the agility needed to leverage programs like the Net Zero Accelerator Initiative and billions in funding, ensuring that innovation, policy, and public needs are seamlessly integrated to meet Canada’s long-term climate goals. #Sustainability #NetZero #Canada #CleanTech #StakeholderManagement #HeatingDecarbonization #MIT #EnergyTransition Innovation, Science and Economic Development Canada | Innovation, Sciences et Développement économique Canada

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If you live in BC then you're probably about to vote in our upcoming provincial election. What if I told you that regardless of who you choose to vote for, the way you are about to vote is undoubtedly stupid? As someone who designs and evaluates systems every day, there is literally nothing more frustrating about Canada's democracy to me than the "First Past the Post" voting system... and yet every couple of years I'm forced to engage with this *objectively* stupid system (and so are you). So if you even remotely like democracy you kind of owe it yourself and fellow citizens to understand just how dumb this is. But thankfully you don't have take my word for it because a beautiful internet person created a fun and interactive website that explains it way better than I ever could. Step by step: Click link. Learn something. Get indiginant at every election. Share understanding with your friends. Eventually shame government into adopting better system. https://ncase.me/ballot/ (No I don't have any affiliation with this site. I kinda wish I did.)

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Is AI to blame for the Air Canada lawsuit? It's a hot topic in AI discussions I've had with folks over the past few weeks (AC was found responsible for a promise that it's AI-powered chatbot made to a customer, and had to reimburse them ~$2500.) People are quick to blame AI, and worry about the risks if a business uses AI in customer-facing solutions. But there's an important detail in the ruling, namely that the judge found that "Air Canada did not take reasonable care to ensure its chatbot was accurate." Air Canada was found at fault, and not AI itself, because AI is a tool that Air Canada used improperly. They did not give it properly bounding laws under which to operate, and did not ensure accuracy of its responses. This is the important principle about using AI in your personal and business life: It's a tool, and it must be used responsibly, given proper boundaries, knowing its limitations. Just like there are laws and principles that Air Canada uses for how to fly a plane, they should have implemented laws and principles along with governance for how their AI was to behave, and they failed in this regard. I personally found that modern LLMs like ChatGPT4 can be highly predictable with careful prompt design, along with robust testing and output monitoring. For example, we created a lead-capture chat AI widget for small business websites, and given it the goal of answer questions about the business, understanding a person’s needs, and then capturing their contact information for the business to follow up. It’s like having an employee on call, 24/7 for your business. One of our users (a law firm) was skeptical. Before they agreed to put our chatAI product on their website, they believed they could get it to make a false promise. But their entire firm was unable to break it. Why? Because we've set clear boundaries on the AI behaviour in the product, only allow it to answer questions that it confidently finds in the businesses knowledge database. Here’s the learning, for anyone using AI in business: You must not unleash a LLM chat solution in your products without giving it a strict set of rules to operate by, giving it an accurate knowledge database, and testing it thoroughly. Human oversight is also extremely important, make sure you have a team that monitors and manages your AI’s actions. Don’t shy away from using AI in your business, it’s a very powerful tool that can help your business in a growing list of incredible ways.

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Reposting as I am a lover of great graphic design.

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Thank You Colin Deacon for leading this discussion paper ... Here is a quote from the work - "Despite the billions in funding dedicated to promoting business innovation, Canada received a ‘C’ grade on the Conference Board of Canada’s 2024 Innovation Report Card, ranking us 15th out of 20 countries. This Government has consistently emphasized innovation as a priority, yet results remain underwhelming considering our collective potential." Canada needs innovation to keep the number of jobs up (63% of Canada's workforce comes from small businesses with less than 100 employees, 21% in the 100-499 category and only 16% from the 500+ club - StatsCan March 2023) .. innovation is one way to help create jobs. ISED needs to hire entrepreneurs to help get the program right ... the civil servants need to have metrics that really measure what counts, all the civil servants in the program need to understand how payroll and cashflow might impact the small and medium businesses they work with and KPIs to show they are on track. Here is the discussion paper ... Senator Deacon is looking for comments... please read and comment.

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The animation illustrates a race of net incomes across Canada. As gross income rises, the share that earners take home shrinks — but the impact varies significantly across provinces. Watch to see which provinces favour low, middle, or high earners in relative terms. See the interactive visualization here: https://lnkd.in/ejgc_GJ3 Made with Flourish #Canada #TaxReform #NovaScotia #Income #PersonalFinance #DataVisualization

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Great to see my 2022 report "Canada's Moonshot: Solving Grand Challenges Through Transformational Innovation" cited in this blog by Tim Draimin for Social Innovation Canada. As Tim argues "Our innovation policy will ultimately determine how well our country navigates a very complex global and national future buffeted by a polycrisis rippling with environmental, social, economic and geo-strategic challenges". I couldn't agree more. In the report, I argued for a shift towards a more intentional approach to our innovation policy toolkit - understanding that not all innovation is equal in its outcomes, and some of the challenges we face will never be profitable areas to focus on unless the government plays a more hands-on market-shaping role. The case for this shift is as strong as ever. You can read the blog here: https://lnkd.in/gBdPskvh And can read my original report for the Brookfield Institute for Innovation + Entrepreneurship (now The Dais at Toronto Metropolitan University) here: https://lnkd.in/gQwxtY_C

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It’s easy to point at one thing or another like CafeTO or construction or bike lanes as a cause of congestion in Toronto. Bike lanes have become a hot topic and it’s important that we step back and look at the actual research that’s been done extensively in North America and around the world, studying the impact of bike lanes on congestion. The GPS data shows that bicycle lanes not only have no overall negative impact on vehicle traffic flow, in many cases they reduce travel times for cars. In New York, for instance on the streets that implemented bike lanes, car travel times were reduced by up to 33% because it organized traffic flow better. So before we all get hot and bothered, let’s do our diligence and read the research. Then a healthy debate can happen. #turnthetide https://lnkd.in/grktavMc

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