Investing in highly qualified talent to grow Canada’s economy

Canada’s economy is facing a set of unprecedented challenges. New pressures, including global economic disruptions caused by the pandemic and war in Ukraine, the requirement to transition our resource-heavy economy to meet net-zero commitments, and the inevitable need to adapt our workforce to rapid developments in AI are running headlong into one of Canada’s long-standing key economic weaknesses: poor business investment in innovation, research and development. For Canada to meet these demands, we need a far greater supply of highly qualified drivers of innovation in business, government and civil society. We require more individuals who can respond to change, deal with uncertainty, and integrate technical knowledge within a broad range of social and cultural competencies to tackle challenges in key areas, like quantum technologies, artificial intelligence, agri-tech, health care and clean energy. Universities play a critical role in the development of this highly qualified group. Through basic research, universities are a talent pipeline for the science and deep-tech innovation ecosystem. Trainees at the graduate and post-doctoral levels are, in effect, apprenticed to research professors—whether in science, medicine, or the arts and humanities—to understand the breadth of existing knowledge and then lead at the frontier of innovation. Think of Chris Burns who studied at Dalhousie with lithium-ion battery pioneer Dr. Jeff Dahn, and then started Novonix Battery Technology Solutions, which currently employs almost 150 people and has just under half-a-billion-dollar market cap. According to the 2021 INSEAD Global Talent Competitiveness Index, Canada ranked third for the quality of our universities, and eighth in the relevance of our education system to the economy. We benefit greatly from Canada’s world-class research universities, which provide the talent at the heart of our innovative communities. Most of Canada’s PhD-holders are employed in business, non-profits and the public sector; less than half remain in academia. These highly skilled knowledge workers carry into their careers the ability to absorb and apply leading-edge ideas, techniques and technologies. They are the agents by which innovation spreads out from the knowledge frontier and is adapted to the requirements of Canada’s business and public sectors. Canada, however, ranks just 28th in the OECD in graduate-level attainment. In short, we are not producing enough people with the education and training required to fuel an innovative society. We need to do more to help people attain graduate-level degrees and to support the university research enterprise as the backbone of talent development. Without financial support for investigator-led research, this essential process of developing human capital breaks down. The most talented people leave for better prospects while the economy falls farther behind. In addition to financial support for investigator-led research, complementary investment in innovation, entrepreneurship and intellectual property training for graduate students is essential. Successive federal governments have tried to stimulate business investment in R&D with initiatives such as the Scientific Research and Experimental Development tax incentives, the Global Innovation Clusters, and the new Canada Growth Fund. These initiatives are critically important, but they are not enough. They need to be paired with strategic investments in the development of highly qualified personnel with the entrepreneurial skills needed to capitalize on these federal programs. Dr. Rafaela Andrade, a biochemist, credits university innovation programming with equipping her with the business skills she needed to co-found Myomar Molecular, a health diagnostic tool that will be going to market next year. As a postdoctoral researcher, she participated in Lab2Market, co-founded by Dalhousie University and now a national network. Lab2Market increases the innovative and entrepreneurial capacity of trainees, and provides them with the skills and tools needed to take their research to market. Such programs support a culture of innovation in universities, enable students to build entrepreneurial skills while they pursue their studies, and produce a pipeline of highly skilled graduates ready to engage with an increasingly innovative and knowledge-based economy. Maintaining a competitive level of investment in university research through the granting councils, increasing funding for masters and doctoral scholarships, and investing in innovation skills training, will increase the supply of graduates equipped with high-level research and innovation skills as well as the entrepreneurial mindset vital to catalyzing the growth of Canada’s economy. Dr. Alice Aiken is the vice-president of research and innovation at Dalhousie University in Halifax, N.S., and former dean of the faculty of health at Dalhousie. She is a full professor with her research focusing on health systems transformation and evidence-informed policy-making with a concentration on military and Veteran health. The Hill Times