Sue Paish 00:00

If I ever got a C+ on my report card, I was sent to my room. I never did get a C plus, but we were told we would get sent to our room.I think we spend a lot of time in industry, maybe in other sectors, trying to get from C to C+. I would like us to focus on getting from B+ to A and A to A+. And that means if a company or an organization is not making it, give them all the opportunity to make it. But if they're going to be a C- player, I move on to a C+ player and make them a B and make the B to A. And that's what we do with our projects. 

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Mo Dhaliwal 00:44

Welcome to High Agency, igniting conversations with inspiring people, leading transformative change. Canada has a very curious innovation problem. Brilliant research, world-class universities, abundant talent. Yet somehow, the country has consistently struggled to turn ideas into global companies.The playbook says compete harder, move faster, outspend your rivals. But what if that playbook isn't right for us? In March 2020, when COVID-19 hit, one organization received over 400 qualified proposals worth $1.4 billion in just three weeks. They then deployed working solutions in 100 days. That same organization grew from 31 partners to over 950 in six years, generating over $4 billion in anticipated GDP from Canadian companies. One of its platforms was even adopted by the World Health Organization as the global standard for fighting antimicrobial resistance, a crisis which is actually killing about 5 million people annually. So how did this happen? What was the specialized know-how that unlocked the speed and capacity? The breakthrough technology was trust. Not competition, but coordination. And that kind of mobilization doesn't happen by accident. It requires high-integrity, trust-based networks to exist long before the crisis arrives. And today's guest has spent her career proving that collaboration beats isolation as the first female managing partner of a major law firm, the first female CEO of Canada's largest pharmacy chain, and CEO of Canada's medical diagnostics provider, and now as the architect of a new model for innovation itself. Sue Paich is the CEO of Digital, Canada's global innovation cluster. And she's here to explain why the future of technology might look less like Silicon Valley and more like a bazaar. In her role, Sue leads collaborative innovation initiatives with over 1700 Canadian organizations. Under her leadership, Digital has facilitated the IP development of over 750 assets, over 190 commercialized products, and $1.4 billion in follow-on investment across natural resources, life sciences, and talent development sectors. Sue brings together industry leaders, innovators, and public sector organizations to tackle these global challenges while creating economic opportunities for Canada.Beyond her professional achievements, she's the proud mother of three daughters and grandmother to five granddaughters. And I've heard the latest is a grandson. 

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Sue Paish 03:30

Landed on Friday. 

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Mo Dhaliwal 03:32

Welcome Sue,  before we get to the digital ecosystem, I mean, you've got a bit of an ecosystem of your own going on with the kids and the grandkids and, and, uh, a lot happening in the household. 

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Sue Paish 03:45

How lucky are we? When we were in our 20s, Brad and I, and you think of where you're going to be, and now all of a sudden you wake up and you have six grandchildren. The kids all live within walking distance of our house. At one point, one of them lived in Halifax, one lived in Denmark, and one lived in Dubai. They've all come back.In some ways, when you juxtapose that against a pretty busy career, it all makes sense. I've always said, I do what I do and I've done what I've done to build a better Canada for my kids and all of their friends, which may be your children or people in your family. I think that's why I'm here, is to build a better Canada. I'm trying to anyway. 

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Mo Dhaliwal 04:41

I mean, I have jokingly said ecosystem, but with everybody in walking distance, I mean, you got a little village started there. That's incredible. 

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Sue Paish 04:49

Yeah, we're moving to Sechelt though. They know that. 

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Mo Dhaliwal 04:53

You need a little bit of space, okay, fair enough. So before we get into your role at DIGITAL, you've held a lot of leadership positions in some pretty massive organizations.And I'd be interested to learn what kind of set you down this path. Like when Sue Paish was a little girl in the playground, were you dreaming of being a CEO? Did you want to lead companies? Like, how'd you head into this path? 

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Sue Paish 05:21

I didn't head down a path. A path came to me, I'd say. So as a little girl, me and my two sisters and brothers were raised in, I'd say, a pretty unusual environment. We're first generation Canadian.Our parents were immigrants from England. And one of the things my mom was really committed to was making sure that we knew our relatives in England, our grandparents and cousins, et cetera. We had no relatives in Canada. And my elder sister went and had a stint in England with the grandparents. And then in April, in January of 1968, my grandfather died suddenly. And my parents thought it would be a good idea to send a nine-year-old over to England to take care of the recently widowed grandma. And so I can still remember, as clear as day, sitting down at the table and my mom and dad saying, right then, you're going to finish your school by March. And at Easter, you're going to go live with grandma. And it sounded like an adventure, which of course it was. I didn't realize until many years later that it was rather bizarre. So April 1968, I got on a plane by myself. There was no unaccompanied minor programs or anything like that. I had a photograph of my uncle with strict instructions from my mother. Find Uncle Tim. He will be standing under that sign. Do not talk to anyone in Heathrow Airport at all. Do not get lost. If you get lost, this is what a British policeman looks like. Only talk to someone with that uniform on. So I got off the plane. I found Uncle Tim. 

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Mo Dhaliwal 07:06

And I think most of those instructions for Heathrow still stand. 

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Sue Paish 07:11

and didn't see anybody in my immediate family, sister's brother, parents for nearly two years. And when you're put in that kind of environment and you kind of feel like you're responsible for your grandmother, you grow up pretty fast.And then I ended up traversing between the two sets of grandparents who were in England in different parts of the country, so that meant what school uniform do I wear today as compared to next week? So you just become independent and pretty decision-oriented and... 

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Mo Dhaliwal 07:47

At nine. 

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Sue Paish 07:48

Pardon? 

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Mo Dhaliwal 07:49

At nine. 

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Sue Paish 07:50

I turned 10 while I was there. 

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Mo Dhaliwal 07:52

Okay, fair enough. 

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Sue Paish 07:53

And not afraid of the unusual. See it as an opportunity, not as something to be afraid of. 

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Mo Dhaliwal 08:01

I mean, what an incredible story. Is there something about old world cultures that just seemed way more comfortable with kind of thrusting the kids into the world? 

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Sue Paish 08:13

Well, you know, it's interesting that you asked that question because I do find today, and as I look at my children's generation, there's an awful lot of structure and an awful lot of shoulds, you should do this, you should do that, you should not do this in our society these days. And one word I try to never use is the word should, and so allowing our children the freedom to chart their own course has really been fundamental for Brodini in terms of helping them grow into happy, productive members of society and great parents, rather than creating a super structured environment.And then the other thing is doing things as parents that maybe weren't in the playbook. So very early on, we became a single income family and Brad stayed home with the kids. And I can remember being asked by some business leaders, doesn't that make you feel really awful as a mother? And I thought, well, no, not until you raised it. And, you know, I think our daughters really benefited from having that kind of model that says, you know, mom can go and work outside the home. 

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Mo Dhaliwal 09:38

There's other ways of doing things. 

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Sue Paish 09:39

Yeah, dad couldn't cook dinner, crappy housekeeper, but really good at getting the kids outdoors, getting them skiing, getting them in the playgrounds after school, playing soccer, and just exposing the kids to things that might not be in the handbook of how to be a parent. 

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Mo Dhaliwal 09:56

Mm-hmm. Yeah, I mean, I resonate with that quite a bit. There does seem to be a lot of norms in life and in society that are meant to kind of de-risk your existence, but that little bit of risk, you know, that's also where some of that agency is created, right? Like, you know, I'm like, no pun intended, but I do feel like there's some loss of agency these days with people, you know, needing to de-risk things, have so much structure, have a framework and a plan for everything.Like, not exactly the same story, but like, you know, thinking about that time period of, you know, being so young, my grandfather on my dad's side, like, the whole reason why he was later in life able to create a livelihood and actually have, you know, a family was because at 14, he ran away from home and joined the army. And not in any, like, dramatic fashion, really. It was more so that, you know, recruiters were coming through their village in Northern India in Punjab. And there was like a recruitment truck and he kind of ran after one. And they're like, you look too young. And he made up some excuse or said something. And they're like, you know, they just kind of laughed it off and said, ah, look at this young buck, threw him on the truck and just drove away with them. And his parents at the time, like, my great grandparents, like, didn't know where the boy had gone, were like confused. And somebody said we saw him running after the army truck. And he came back like a year later. And later on, had a career and, you know, was, I think, retired as a captain in the army. And that was, again, you know, what I think at least set up the family to have enough of a livelihood to be able to, you know, survive in some meaningful way. 

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Sue Paish 11:35

It's those stories that break out of the rule book of how you're supposed to be as a parent or how you're supposed to be as a child and actually allow us as individuals to explore what makes us happy and what are we good at and how can we best contribute to our families, our society, whatever. And that's the kind of thing that I was really lucky. Our whole family was really lucky to have parents that allowed us to do that.In the early 70s, my dad owned a property up in the Spatsizi Plateau up in Northern BC and was a guiding outfitter back when big game hunting was something that we did. And every summer we were, as young teenagers, I was riding a pack train horse and camp cook in the middle of the Spatsizi Plateau with warnings from Dad, be careful, the grizzlies are around so make sure you got the food up in the tree high enough. And I look back on that now as a teenager, how lucky was I to see the province be thrown into that environment, learn how to navigate pack trains and hunters and game coming in and there's no cell phones or anything like that. Once in a while a float plane would come in, you'd have to ride out to go meet it and get your supplies. But it builds character and it builds a sense of independence and maybe lowers the fear factor of where's right and where's wrong. 

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Mo Dhaliwal 13:13

Yeah, I mean, there's a lot of life in that, right? Of being, you know, first dressed into those situations, but then be in any environment where the warning is, look out for grizzlies, like, what a way to be alive. That's incredible.No, I mean, but I think it's true. I think there has to be some, you know, there has to be some existential threat or risk to even feel alive, right? Because otherwise, it's, you know, existence is the little numb. So I think if you're in those situations early enough, it's obviously impacted you. It's obviously, you know, tested your metal to some extent, because it sounds like you were running things from a young age and grew into a career of continuing to run things. And so, you know, when, when did you actually come back from England? Was it just after a couple of years and then you carried on your education here? 

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Sue Paish 13:59

Yeah, 1970, so a couple of years. And yeah, I came back from England. It was a bit tricky because I came back and was supposed to go into grade seven. But the principal at the time apparently said to my mom, you should be born in grade seven, put her into grade eight. And so I was really young. And so through the entire high school, I was a year and a half, two years behind everybody, which doesn't mean much when you're in your 30s or 40s, but when you're in your early teens, it's 13 to 11.That's a big gap. And so again, I was kind of, in some ways, charting my own path through high school, trying to figure out who I could be friends with that wouldn't beat me up or take fun of me and luckily found some good folks. And then headed off to university. And it was actually the assistant dean of the business school who really, I think, set me on the path that led to being in business. And he called me into his office one time and I thought I was going to get kicked out of the business school. And he said, I want you to apply for the scholarship. General Motors has a scholarship, summer postings in General Motors facilities in Eastern Canada. And I read the first paragraph and it said, in order to apply, you have to be in the ultimate or penultimate year of your program. I didn't know what those words meant. And I said to Dean Tan, I said, what does this mean? He says, oh, you have to be in year three or four. I said, well, I'm in year one. He goes, that's okay. Some rules you don't break, but some rules you can kind of navigate. I can still remember him saying that. And so we put the application in and off I headed to General Motors.And I wanted to do labor relations. That's what I wanted to do in business school. And so when I got to General Motors, they put me in the personnel department because women didn't work in labor relations in General Motors in the 70s. And so I did a year, a summer year in the personnel department, enjoyed it, learned a lot. And then when I was re-invited to come back the next year, I said, I want to go labor relations. And they said, no, you can't. Women don't work in labor. Don't you understand? Women don't work in labor relations. I said, well, let me try. And so they said, okay. And so I was posted in labor relations in the fabrication plant in Oshawa. And I showed up my first day of work with a little white dress with black polka dots on and a little red belt and matching red shoes. And I showed up in the entry of the fab plant. And my boss who was 10 feet tall was there with a hard hat and a safety jacket on. He looks at me, he goes, lose the shoes, never bring them back. Here's coveralls. Here's a safety jacket. Don't wear the dress again. And gave me a clipboard and said, go down the floor, take attendance. We have to make sure we have enough staff in each part of the plant. And they'd never seen a woman in a fab plant before, other than on the line, not in a quote unquote semi-management position. And again, I grew up pretty fast and learned a ton and ended up when we had a walkout. One day I was called in to help navigate getting the guys back into the plant. Because I somehow managed to be able to, I don't know whether I called build a dress, but build a relationship with the guys on the lines such that when they're all sitting outside on the sidewalk, let's just, you know, we're going to cool it down in there and let's go back in and put the batteries together.And so it's things like that that I think sort of put me on the path to say to myself, just because it hasn't been done before, doesn't mean it's not a good thing to do. 

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Mo Dhaliwal 17:57

It seems like you have some appetite, though, for pretty high-friction environments. Or maybe you just don't encounter it as friction, I don't know, but I would imagine. 

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Sue Paish 18:04

Yeah, I don't see it as a friction, I see it as an opportunity, like it's never been done before. And when I walked in the fat plant, I'll never forget it because I was a kid, you know, just a teenager, right?And these are all guys that have, you know, been at GM for a long time. 

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Mo Dhaliwal 18:15

There's the polka dot dress and the red shoes. I mean, that just like painted a picture and I was like, wow. 

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Sue Paish 18:20

Wrong outfit. Really wrong outfit.It didn't get the playbook. But we're all human beings, right? We're all trying to do our best. We're all trying to get our job done. We're all trying to end the day on a good note. And that's how I saw it. So when I was taking attendance or talking to the guys on the floor, it was really to try and help make things better, not to be management versus non-management. And I think, I don't know, I've just always found that people will draw in if we respect them, if we understand that everybody's trying to do their best. Nobody wakes up in the morning wanting to have a crappy day. And that's the way I treated everybody every day. We're just trying to do our best. And my job is to help you do your best. 

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Mo Dhaliwal 19:08

I mean, it's interesting you say that, and having recognized that then, because I see a bit of a through line from there to being able to sort of create systems and organizations that rely so much on collaboration and coordination, because I'd say it's pretty easy, especially in that era, if I can say it, to walk into a situation and understand that, okay, they're labor, we're management, and there's these sort of bifurcations, right? And so, you know, what did you, what did you experience or what did you learn at that time about how to bring, like, so many different sort of stakeholders together and get them moving in one direction? 

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Sue Paish 19:45

Well, it was two things, I think, external to myself. One was having a super good manager myself. As I say, I was a kid. I was in second year university. And having a supervisor who had the confidence or the guts or the courage to put this young woman out on the floor. Just crazy enough. I better make sure he doesn't look bad for doing this. But calling me aside and saying, this is how you do this and this is how you do that. I noticed you did that. Try it this way that next time. Not saying you did it wrong, but I can remember a couple of times he said, I noticed that you did this when you filed the attendance report. Try doing it this way the next time then it's easier for us to... That's a really different way from saying, don't do that again or you shouldn't do that. And so he was really influential.And then some of the profs that I had in university were really influential. And I've lucked out in being able to work with people who are committed to helping, I felt committed to helping me be productive and useful rather than just another billable unit, if you will. When I went to the law firm, and that was a really unusual environment as well, because I went into a small law firm that it didn't work out at all. And I was in a very, very difficult and almost dangerous situation of... It was just a very bad scene. And I called a friend from law school and said, hey, I think I have to leave. And she was a good friend from law school. And she said, well, she was in one of the big firms. And she said, oh, well, I'm gonna go and talk to some people here. And the next thing I knew I had an interview there and they were gonna transfer my articles. And it was just, wow, there's great people.There are great people out there. And then I was lucky enough to work in the labour department at Ben Russell in Dumoulin, which was a little bit, was consistent with having worked at GM. And then my commerce degree was focused on labor relations and working with a really forward thinking group of lawyers there who basically said, well, if that's the direction you wanna go, then let's explore it. And the direction was looking at human rights, not so much labor employment, although we did a lot of labor employment or traditional labor relations. But there was this whole new avenue that I sort of saw on human rights and one of the other partners there said, you know, why don't you like explore that, go for it. And that led to me being a human rights lawyer and an investigator and writing a book on harassment in the workplace.And while I was on my third maternity leave, do not do that. It's hard to do. And then out of the blue, the managing partner said, I'd like you to think about law firm management. Really? Why? I'm a labour lawyer. And so having the good luck to have a managing partner who said, you know, why don't you think about going more into management of law firm? Well, number one, I'm not a corporate commercial lawyer. That's their expertise. Number two, I'm a mother. And number three, I don't think I can do it.And he's like, yeah, I don't agree with you there. Give it a go. And he kind of pushed and pulled and gave me, I remember he came into my office one day after I'd given a like opening talk at a, I can't remember if it was a partners meeting or associates meeting closer. He goes, never do that again. Never ever talk like that again. I was like. 

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Mo Dhaliwal 23:52

Do you remember what you said? 

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Sue Paish 23:54

Too much. That was really the message.They'll stop listening if you drone on like that. That was basically, and that's the way he was. He was a man of few words and I was not. Because you talk like that, he'll just stop listening too. So I'm very aware of that, even right now. I'm talking too much. But yeah, super lucky, right? 

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Mo Dhaliwal 24:16

Mm hmm. Yeah, I mean, definitely a recurring theme in your life of having people around you that are going to thrust you into situations, assuming you can handle it, and then you just handled it. 

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Sue Paish 24:28

Yeah, maybe. I haven't thought of it that way, but I've been really lucky.I've got a life partner and my husband who has allowed me to do really crazy things that were completely outside the line of what mothers and wives do, and then forced him to do things that were completely outside the lines of what dads and fathers and guys do, and facing tough things like he, our youngest, would not allow him to walk her into kindergarten. And when we chatted with her about this, she was five, as clear as day I can remember, she was because mummies take kids to school, not daddies. And I was like, okay, that is a very good reason why daddy's going to walk you into kindergarten. And just not necessarily opening the playbook and saying this is what mummies do, this is what daddies do, this is what lawyers do, this is what whoever fill in the blanks do. And actually figuring out, I say this a lot to young people, what makes you happy? Because if you're not happy, what are you? 

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Mo Dhaliwal 25:42

Mm-hmm. My mind's racing right now. It's like 10 things I want to jump on. But I'm just trying to think of where the word playbooks come up a few times or not necessarily worrying about what the established patterns are, how to do things.And you've also at the same time mentioned luck a few times, right? And some would argue that you have to show up with a lot of competence and have some idea to take advantage of anything that shows up. But what's your definition of luck? You mentioned that I'm very lucky. So it's not all happenstance. What's your definition of luck? 

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Sue Paish 26:17

Just having things happen, drop in my lap that are not the product of anything that I've done. Being sent to England, I didn't have that in the playbook, right? But even when Michael, our managing partner at the time, took me aside and suggested that I could be the managing partner of then Russell and Dumoulin, where did he get that idea? That wasn't my idea. That was not my plan. And nothing could have been further from my plan.And when he brought that to the table and said, look, let's think about this. And then when he phoned me, I still remember it was after Christmas, we knew he was retiring and he phoned me at home. Brad was out with the girls. I can't remember where they were. And he phoned me at home and he said, I've decided I am going to retire at the end of the year and I want you to be my successor. I was like, where does that come from? To me, that's luck. I mean, maybe other people would look at it and say, well, no, you can do that. But I've never gone into a situation like that thinking, well, that's what I want to be. And even when it came to pharmacy, I was on the board and our CEO was retiring. We knew that. And we were in a recruitment mode at the board. And we were at a board meeting and we were lining up to get breakfast at the little buffet that they have for boards in these events, these situations. And the board chair was behind me getting his granola. And he said, what do you think about the meeting coming up? And I said, like, I'm really excited about the path that we're going to go down to find the successor for Terry. And he said, well, I think you'd be a good successor. And I looked at him and I said, yeah, right. He goes, no, I'm serious. And I said, jeez, come on, Bill. And I remember putting on my fingers and saying, I'm not a pharmacist. I don't know retail. I don't have any medical background. I don't know how to run a company. I don't know how to do marketing. And he put his granola down. He goes, we have pharmacists. We have people that know how to retail. And he went through all the, he basically shot down every one of my reasons why I couldn't do it. And he says, what we don't have. And then he put some things on his fingers that he thought I could do, which I didn't think were even relevant. And he goes, will you give a shot? I said, well, you have to go through a full process. I can't do that without there being a full, proper process. And we did. And I ended up getting the job and was not a likely candidate. But it was super fun. It was a great opportunity and a whole new world. A labour lawyer becomes a CEO of a pharmacy chain. That's not your usual path. 

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Mo Dhaliwal 29:20

I'm sure some of the front line staff are rejoicing. 

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Sue Paish 29:24

I don't know. I mean, there was a lot of, a lot of, is this a girl's job, right? There was a lot of that. And, and luckily, phenomenal team at life, at pharmacy, that I walked into who were experts in the field. And, and basically, we work together to say, okay, this is, here's your, here's your net, the most value. These are our runways. Let's do our job. And, and, and that was when I kind of honed in on the idea that as a leader, my job is to help you do your job.My job is not to tell you what to do, or to do your job for you. My job is to help you be in a position to fulfill your job. And, and I've kind of carried that with me. And yeah, we had a lot of fun at Pharmasave. And we, and we did things that hadn't been done before. Our head of pharmacy at the time had done a bit of a, an assessment of where do the pharmacists in the store spend a lot of most of their time. And most of the time was answering questions from customers slash patients on what does this medicine do? You know, I've got the prescription and I can see I'm supposed to take three pills twice a day or whatever it is, but what does it actually do? And so Mark said, why don't we put all of that online? Why don't we put summaries of everything from amoxicillin to zopiclone online so people can read up on what this medication does and maybe reduce the time that pharmacists spend doing that and having pharmacists help people live healthier lives. I thought it was a great idea. And so we put that together and then I phoned the Ministry of Health and said, just, you know, heads up, you know, we're going to put this out. Oh my gosh. No, you're not. Absolutely hard no. You can't put that kind of information out in the public domain. People will not know what to do with it. And that, yeah, so my first interaction with government where I was like, Oh, well, you know, I thought it was a good idea. Yeah, it was a great idea. Anyhow, learning how to navigate a situation where somebody says absolutely not and we actually want to, how do you get to yes? You know, that was the, my first experience of somebody saying, not just let's talk about it, but hard no. And then eventually getting it to, actually it's a good thing.And we had the same thing at, same thing at Life Lapse, ran into a really hard no in Life Lapse and got very creative about getting around that one. I can tell you about that later. 

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Mo Dhaliwal 32:06

Um, so this, um, gentlemen on the board of PharmaSave, uh, Bill, it was his name. Yeah. So one thing that kind of dawned on me when you were sharing that story was, you know, when you were kind of picking up the reasons why it wouldn't work. Um, and he was telling you the reasons that it would, but you kind of brushed it off. I was like, you thought it was irrelevant.Um, you know, I've been spending a lot of time lately and thinking about strengths and where they come from and reading about this stuff. And it is quite often the things that to you are just so obvious that you don't even think about that you kind of brush off as like, Oh, that's just obvious, but that's actually your new, your unique skill that for somebody else might be the difficult or impossible thing that they can't even fathom doing. But for us, it tends to be the thing that we don't even pay attention to in a conversation. You probably wouldn't mention it because it just comes obvious. And so I'm imagining that maybe some of those things he mentioned back then that you just brushed them off as irrelevant because to you there was just come with the territory. It's just what you do. 

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Sue Paish 33:04

Yeah, I think you're right. And one step further, everybody does that.Everybody does that. And I remember saying that to Bill in this conversation and he was like, no, no, no, not everybody does that. And that was the first revelation where I thought maybe I'm a little weird and I'm a little odd. I definitely do not fit the CEO job description if you look it up in a book.At that time, that's what we did, looked things up in books. And I think that's actually been the situation in every CEO role that I've had. I am not the usual suspect at all. 

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Mo Dhaliwal 33:46

yet you've been getting tapped repeatedly to lead some pretty major organizations. So digital, who came and tapped you on the shoulder and how did that role come about? 

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Sue Paish 34:02

Yeah. So I'd left Life Labs. My life at the time when I was at Life Labs, I loved the work there. We did fantastic things. We launched non-invasive prenatal testing. It's a whole other story about colouring outside the lines and really put a lot of technology into diagnostics. But my life, I described it during that period as two houses, two cars, two wardrobes, one husband. Because I was commuting between Toronto and Vancouver, had a condo in Toronto, and three young children at home and getting into their teenage years. And I just felt, this is not actually how I pictured myself as a mother or as a wife. And I loved the work, but it just got to a point where I thought, what's more important, being a CEO or being a good mom.And so I left Life Labs and I didn't know what I was going to do. And I had no idea. And I actually was enjoying the freedom. And I was walking downtown actually on Georgia Street and bumped into a couple of friends. And one of them said, hey, have you heard about the superclusters? No. What the heck is that? And they were putting together this proposal for this supercluster. They didn't have anything else to do. So I thought it was Edo DeMarta and Josh Blair and Bill Tandall's Greg Cause. And so I thought, oh, and Jennifer Cudlup from Life Labs was also involved. And I thought, well, those are great people. And so I thought, well, I'll sit around the table. They had things 90% done for the submission. And I was just sort of playing on the edges. And then Digital won one of the spots. And a couple of those guys came and said, why would you be the CEO? And I did what I've done in every time. This is why I'm not a technology person. I'm not a this. I'm not a that. Remember Greg going, well, we got technology. We got this. And so I thought, what could go wrong? It doesn't work out. And I go do something else. But what really drew me to the job was the public policy. That when I dug into the cluster notion that had been created by the Government of Canada following a report from the Growth Council that had been created, it was actually turning the approach to innovation that that Canada had followed completely upside down. And I thought, if this works, this can change the culture of how we do innovation in Canada.And that can change the trajectory of the growth of the economy. Not overnight, it'll take decades, but we've got to start there. Because historically, Canada had looked at innovation through the lens of research and really, really focused on growing our research and academic sectors. And we've done very well at that. And we have fantastic universities and researchers. I mean, when you look at AI, it's Yasuo Bengio and Jeff Hinton, right? Canadians that really created the foundation for AI, but it was commercialized in the United States. And so when I looked at the cluster program, I thought maybe that can bridge that big divide between research, which we celebrated, and commercialization, which was called quite openly going to the dark side. Really? Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. And I was told that. I was told that when I was going to digital. You're going to the dark side. 

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Mo Dhaliwal 37:59

What a strange hostility towards that. 

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Sue Paish 38:02

And so I thought, what's the worst that can happen? It doesn't work.And we'll try something else to drive GDP out of innovation and research. But if it works, man, this could really be something. So I thought, why not? Give it a try. So I did. 

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Mo Dhaliwal 38:21

How's it going? 

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Sue Paish 38:22

love it. Absolutely love it. Not every single day, not every single moment, but working in a space that doesn't have a hundred-year history of how you should do things, and 

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Mo Dhaliwal 38:41

Was it pretty well a blank slate? 

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Sue Paish 38:43

Oh, yeah. I mean, there was proposals that went in. Well, you know, maybe when I say blank slate, I should define a blank slate. There were proposals that went in and then the way federal programs work, which was brand new to me is, is there's a contribution agreement, which is very complex and very detailed and very, very focused on risk avoidance and, and risk management. And, which I found very interesting for an organization that's focused on innovation. And so, you know, we got, we got up and running and, and we were, we were compliant with all of the requirements of the contribution agreement. And in, in some areas we applied our own interpretations and, and, and made commitments to the government of Canada that we will deliver for you on your outcomes. We might not fill in every box on page 43, sub paragraph G of section 720, but we will not let you down. And, and I had a good relationship with the deputy at the time, Simon Kennedy. We, we'd known each other through the health space and, and, and the importance of human relationships in business or other endeavors, I don't think can ever be overstated. So we trusted each other. And, and so we got a little bit of leeway to get things done and, and it worked.And, and it really took off when COVID hit. And, and we got a call that basically said, we've got $60 million here. Get it deployed. Just get it deployed and get those companies up and running and make sure that they are working on technologies that are meaningful and especially in health, health and food security. We didn't know what COVID was going to bring, but we knew health and food were going to be a big problem. And some of those technologies that came out of that early period are still world leading technologies. And yeah, it's, it's a lot of fun. And, and, and I work with a group of super dedicated people, really small, you know, under 30 people in the team. And there's one other person, maybe two that are in their fifties. I'm not in my fifties anymore. And everybody else is in their thirties. And, and it's just phenomenal. Every day we say, okay, what if, what if we try that? Let's try it. 

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Mo Dhaliwal 41:25

That's a pretty massive impact from a small team. 

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Sue Paish 41:29

It's proof of, I think, when you put the right people together with an outcome focus rather than a process focus. That's a challenge for when you work with government because government's all about process.We have really good processes, but we're obsessed with delivering outcomes and a willingness to fail fast and an excitement about doing things that haven't been done before. Canadian ingenuity and energy and our culture around working together to do great things. We talk about it in the hockey environment and I sit on the podium board, so I love those conversations about what can we do on the field of play and I translate that into what can we do on the field of play in business and that's what we do at Digital. 

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Mo Dhaliwal 42:18

So what's wrong with Canada? 

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Sue Paish 42:21

Nothing's wrong with Canada. Nothing is wrong with Canada. There are just opportunities for us to be bolder, more confident, more willing to fail fast in industry in the same way that we are on the field of sport. And it's ironic that we're having this conversation on the first day of the Olympic games.And that's what we bring into the environment in digital is we say, okay, we have a program that we are going to launch in housing and here are the requirements for the proposals. Here's the framework through which the proposals will be evaluated. And here's the timeline. No, you don't get an extension. No, because there are 55 or 155 other people that have made the deadline. And here's the reviews and sorry, I didn't make the grade. You want to go complain, go complain, but you didn't make the grade. And now you got selected. So deliver. You got to perform. You got to perform. And then our team is responsible for making sure that those results are delivered on time, on budget, in the right environment, i.e. a good environment, a productive environment for all concerned and fail fast. We spend, I think we spend a lot of time in industry, maybe in other sectors, trying to get from C to C plus. If I ever got a C plus on my report card, I was sent to my room and never to get a C plus, but we were told we would get sent to our room. I would like us to focus on getting from B plus to A and A to A plus. And that means if a company or an organization is not making it, give them all the opportunity to make it. But if they're going to be a C minus player, I move on to a C plus player and make them a B and make the B to A. And that that's what we do with our projects. 

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Mo Dhaliwal 44:41

What do you think it is about the culture of Canada though? Um, because I think the scenario you're describing, um, like for digital, it's incredible, right? I wish the entire Canadian economy worked this way. Um, but what is it about the culture of Canada that has us maybe, you know, resting on our laurels a little bit? Like maybe, I don't know, life's too good here. It's a little bit too easy, maybe a little bit too comfortable because sometimes you need, you do need some stimulus, some sort of driver to really, you know, force change and force the situation.Um, I mean, one example of that is like our relationship with the US right now, right? We're doing such interesting things suddenly, right? With international diplomacy and trade deals and diversification and things that we wouldn't have imagined before. And that's really being prompted by this sort of threat, right? This sort of now, you know, um, impulse, uh, that's coming from our relationship, essentially being in tatters for the most part, right? Um, with, with America. And so there was this sort of like negative force being applied. That's now driving growth and driving a bunch of new ways of thinking.And so what is it about the culture of this country? I think up until this moment, like, yeah, was it just too comfortable? Was it just that innovation is going to stay a research project because those are sort of, you know, comfortable, encapsulated, safe spaces. Um, and that's why we also have the comfort of almost like, you know, kind of poo pooing, uh, commercialization and calling it the dark side and these sorts of things, but what, what is it about our culture? Do you think that gave rise to this? 

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Sue Paish 46:10

Well, it's a good question if I had an answer to that. I'd write a book, right? I'll be the next one. I do think when it comes to industry, we see that culture in a very positive way, the culture of caring. So Canadians are known as being a very caring society and whether that's helping our neighbours or whether it's helping a community in distress, it's something that we celebrate and it's something we nurture.And I think we have brought that into the industrial context where we don't want anybody to feel left out and that means that if a company is a C minus company, we're going to get them to a C. Whereas in other cultures, if you're a C minus company, you should really go and try and do something else because we're going to focus on getting the Bs to the A's. And so there are really good parts of the Canadian culture around being a caring, a respectful, a supportive environment. We don't want to be a slash and burn society. When we take it to the extent of sacrificing the economic growth of our country, that's where I think we have to maybe look in the mirror and say, rather than 300 C or C plus companies, how about we have 45 A plus companies and really celebrate those? And there's something, I think in private sector, we try and do that. I think perhaps in the public sector, there's less enthusiasm for saying no and a real fear of making a mistake. What if it doesn't work? Like what if it doesn't work? I quite often say, sometimes in, I'd say in the public sector, we'll sacrifice a $1 billion opportunity so that we don't risk making a $10 million mistake. And I think the new government in Ottawa is really moving away from that and really picking winners and having us in industry set up in our chairs and perform. I think it's a phenomenally positive transformation in a fairly short period of time, and I think industry is going to rise up to that and get over this historical sort of decades long, let's have everybody in industry be C plus. Because I think that's where we've been for quite a while. 

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Mo Dhaliwal 48:58

So, you know, there's this, um, cause I think what you're describing us is top grading actually, right? Of, um, taking the good players and making them great.And anybody that's average and doesn't have hope of being more than above average of saying, okay, we need to actually, you know, maybe compost, you know, those ventures, those departments, those organizations so that we can, you know, uh, reallocate those resources. Um, what was the first thing that you did when you got into the role of that digital? Um, or frankly, actually even at life labs or, or pharma, say, like when you, when you come into this role, uh, what's the first thing that you do to kind of take ahold of the situation and then figure out what to do next. 

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Sue Paish 49:43

It was different in each of those because they were all very different environments. But, um, let's just go with digital.Um, why do we exist? Like, what are we trying to do here? Um, because if you're trying to run a process and if outcomes emerge, great. But if you're trying to run a process, that's an entirely different mindset and culture than if you're actually trying to build Canadian companies that'll lead the world. Those are, those are two very different environments and I'm not sure when the cluster program was launched that there was real clarity in some of the administration side of the program, which one of those you wanted to have happen. And so the small group that we had around the table, Greg Cause, Bill Tam, uh, Suzanne Gill, those folks, Edo Demarte, um, we were focused on results and, um, we are going to drive results and results mean commercial products, companies that grow, increases in GDP. So we had some metrics that we were, you know, throwing off in the air of, how do you know if you're doing this? And, and that's what we embraced and, and that's what we built into our, the organizational, organizational culture of the five people that were there, but, but that's the spirit that, that we grew the company around. And, you know, we had a few collisions in Ottawa. When, when, you know, we told Ottawa, we were going to, we've done a call and we're going to select this many projects and we're going to decline this many. It was like, what, what do you mean? 

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Mo Dhaliwal 51:32

and spread it around. 

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Sue Paish 51:33

you mean you're going to decline? Well, they didn't make the grade. No, no, you don't understand, Sue. We can't do that.No, no, you don't understand. Here's the objectives that you approved our board approved. We can't do that if we're accepting these kinds of proposals. And there were some tough early days where I kind of think that when some of the people saw my phone number come up, when they were in Ottawa, oh, no, no. But we ended up producing really good results. And that gave us the leeway then to say, being results focused, being fair, it's not a slash and burn environment, but it's here's the results we're trying to deliver. Here are the metrics or the measurements that we will be using to see if you're on the path to deliver those results. And if you're not, we will help you get there, but we are not a babysitting service. And if you cannot make the grade, your project will be discontinued. And we've stayed true to that. We have. And it's working. And I think it's also, I'd like to think that we're having an influence on the culture in the public space. I mean, that's sort of the government space in terms of what we are celebrating now when it comes to industry success and innovation, rather than, you know, we're celebrating the outcomes, the products, the GDP, the revenue for companies, the international agreements, rather than how much money have we spent on a program. 

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Mo Dhaliwal 53:16

Yeah, and that's quite often. I mean, there's every cliched photo op from government, right? It's the announcement of the program, the announcement of the funding, and then we forget about it. And years later, we don't know if that ever led to anything or if anything actually happened.But it's interesting the way you describe that push and pull, right, of are you here to run a process or do you want to get results? This comes up in like nonprofit and social impact spaces sometimes where there's a push and pull between bureaucracy and purpose. And every sort of nonprofit or social impact organization in early days is like, it's all purpose, right? And there's like maybe like a thin membrane around it that you could call it the bureaucracy, that's just enough to kind of hold it together. But what happens over time is, you know, there might be some stressors, there might be some funding cuts, there's some issue that comes up that kind of threatens, you know, the purpose existentially. So the bureaucracy is increased to kind of create safety, right? And then it's increased and increased. And eventually you get to a point where there's some foundation that's supposed to be, you know, saving the environment or something else. And you look at them, it's like most of the operations actually set up to just hold the operation together. And they're spending some minority of the time and resources and attention, frankly, on what the purpose is, right?So, you know, for something like digital, early days, especially, you know, I think it's easier in many ways to be purpose driven. And you kind of joked when you said, you know, our organizational culture of five, but that's what it is, right? Because, you know, the five of you got together and you really like sewed together the DNA of this thing. But how do you consider, you know, continues for transmitting the culture as this thing becomes more successful and, you know, digital itself will grow as it's enabling other businesses to grow. But how do you sort of ensure that it remains results oriented, purpose-based and not a bureaucracy that is tomorrow doing funding announcements, but there's not really a lot of talk about the impact. 

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Sue Paish 55:14

Yeah, great question. So a couple of things there. One, in all of the conversations that we have with our colleagues and our overseers in Ottawa, we talk about results. And we are now hearing the people in Ottawa who oversee the clusters now talking about results, which is fairly recent. It was always about inputs. And if there was an output, well, that was kind of a, okay. But it was how much money have you spent? How many contracts have you signed with companies? How many proposal calls are you doing? Whereas I was more focused on how many products are these consortia producing? What's the revenue being generated? How many companies have grown? And now we're starting to see some of that come out of Ottawa, which is a little ray of sunshine for me.And I'd say at our organizational level, a few things. One, we've always been obsessed with results. Now it's not results at all costs. Don't break the rules. Don't be a nasty person. But we are driven to deliver results. And we've got a group of really young people who are thirsty and energized to build the country. And so they push back on us sometimes in terms of, oh, why are we doing it this way or not that way? But the energy that they have to try and deliver on the results that we've all agreed on, it's phenomenal.And so it's going to be, I think, a continual exercise to help the public sector administrators of this program be as excited about results as they are about process. But I actually think the new feeling coming out of Ottawa is supporting that. We don't just have to sign a deal. We actually have to deliver on what the deal says we're going to do. And that's basically what we do every day is it's not what's in the contribution agreement. It's what are the results that we promised in return for the investment from the taxpayers of Canada.What are these results, guys? How are canals work backwards? How are we going to deliver these results? Don't start at the beginning with your process. Start with your result and then work backwards. How are you going to deliver that? What kinds of calls do you need to do? What kinds of companies do you need engaged? What kinds of communications do you need to have? What kind of team do you have to have around you so that they are also obsessed with results? What kinds of interim engagements do you have? What's your response to failure? If a project is failing, how much do you invest in getting it back on track as compared to saying you're gone? And those are tough conversations, but the more we've embedded that in our culture, the more we have a team that celebrates success and does everything we can reasonably to help those projects be successful.But when we hit a line that we can all say, oh, oh, oh, we've got a problem. Can you fix the problem? Good. Get back on track. If you can't fix the problem, goodbye. And if you call Ottawa, fine. I'll take the call when they call me. 

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Mo Dhaliwal 59:05

What are you excited about next? 

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Sue Paish 59:06

Oh my gosh. The Olympics? I love the Olympics. And I say that only because it is the first day of the Olympics right now as we're talking. But I think one thing we need in society generally is opportunities to celebrate. The world's tough right now, right? There's a lot of craziness out there. There's a lot of conflict. There's a lot of how many more times do you have to turn on the television or open your phone and see another tweet from someone or horrific situation in a geopolitical clash. And so to have an opportunity to celebrate the good things in humanity is a good thing.I mean, I think we all need a little bit of a pressure valve release and hopefully that the Olympics will provide us that in the short term. In the medium term, I'm really excited about the 40-somethings. The people that I see on our team and that I see in the broader organizations that I work with because I sit on some boards and things like that. And I look at the 40-somethings that are going to be responsible for the country fairly soon if they aren't already. And I see a really good balance between being good human beings and being accountable for building the country. A better balance than I think my generation had. My generation got into work, work, work, work, work, work, work, work, work, just pounded out and sacrificed perhaps a little bit on the personal family community side. And I find that the 30 and 40-somethings are balancing that better. I'm optimistic about Canada's future. I'm really optimistic about Canada's future. I think we've got good leaders that have the resume that match the job description. And we don't tend to do that in elected officials. When you apply for a job, there's a job description and you're... Well, maybe not for the company that you run, but most of us, our job description needs to have some correlation to the skills that we have. We've never held our public officials to that standard, elected officials. And I think now we've got elected officials who are really matched to the job description. 

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Mo Dhaliwal 01:01:44

Um, I mean, it's, it's interesting what you're saying about, um, you know, the, the elected official matching the job description. Um, because I've actually been on the side of the fence, it's a very lonely place where I sit, um, where I think that our elected officials should actually be paid more.And I think that's across the board because I think if the hyper competent saw it as a lucrative, you know, path to go down in life, uh, in addition to being able to, you know, be of service and have a constituency and then serve the people. But I think if we were to bring these two things into one place, I think it could be quite powerful. And I know in my own circles, there's plenty of people that would just never even consider running for politics or affecting government in that way, because they don't see it as necessarily a lucrative path. Right. Again, it's not something to get rich off of, but if it was enough that, you know, if, if somebody is doing CEO type stuff for a massive organization, if I came with a CEO type salary for a massive organization, perhaps we would be getting people with, you know, a certain type of experience and a certain type of competence actually, uh, arriving in those roles. Um, so they're a different take maybe, uh, because I know in my circles, especially, uh, there's plenty of business people that, um, freak out every time, you know, there's a annual, um, cost of living increase for MP salaries and I'm sort of looking at it and saying, well, I get that, you know, um, you know, and where that tension comes from, because they're all allergic to government waste of any, of any kind. But I do feel like there has been a mismatch between, you know, the what's required of the role and the type of people that land there. And in my mind, it's like maybe the incentives aren't lined up. So I don't know, maybe we pay these people more. What do you think? 

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Sue Paish 01:03:29

Well, if you're the premier of the province or you're the prime minister of the country, you're the CEO. And there is no correlation, in my view, between the expectations that we should have, and I think many of us do have, of those roles and the remuneration that they receive. And also it's a 24-7 draw. And so what you attract are people who are deeply committed, deeply committed, and can afford it. And I'm with you. I think there's an interesting conversation for society to have about, do the job requirements match the compensation or the remuneration that's offered? And then it's, how do you evaluate the skills and ability? In a democracy, that's kind of hard, right? It's kind of hard. There's no application for the job other than being on the hustings, right? But maybe once you're elected, if you're going into a cabinet portfolio, maybe that's when you could have a bit more of an evaluation. But I think Canadian society is a long way from now.I think we're really lucky in many contexts now to have the quality of people that we have in some of the elected positions, but do I think we could inspire young people who are in their 40s to look seriously at politics if it was more practical for them to do so and still put food on the table and pay their mortgage? I think that's a yes. The other thing that I think we have to address is, as a society, is respecting that the people that are in those jobs are doing the best they think they can. And I cannot bear to read the constant criticism of, you got this wrong, you got that wrong, how can you be so foolish? What an idiot. Really awful comments about people who are getting up every day trying to build the country in the best way they see fit. And if you've got a better idea, then put your name on the ballot and go do it. And so I think we tolerate a level of disrespect for elected officials that I think is intolerable. And I'm not saying I agree with all the public policies that are out there. I'm is doing a great job, but I don't think they deserve the kind of, not just harsh criticism, but sometimes really malevolent attacks on character. And as citizens, we should not stand for that. And I'll just tell you a little anecdote. Our son-in-law is from Dubai. And years ago, 10, 15 years ago, we went to meet the family in Dubai. And the brothers picked us up in their vehicle. And there was a little photograph hanging from the mirror in the front seat with a picture of a guy on it. And I said, hey, Basam, who's in the picture? I said, oh, well, that's our equivalent of prime minister or minister or something. And I was like, you had a picture of the leader hanging from your mirror and you're like 25 years old. And then I got this dissertation from him about how grateful they are that these people are in the role. Now, I know a lot of people might say, oh, well, that's a totally different environment. But I haven't seen too many pictures of the prime minister or a premier hanging from anybody's bear in their car. 

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Sue Paish 01:07:50

And yet, these people are putting their lives, their families, their careers on the line to build a better Canada and to build a better British Columbia or fill in the blanks province. And I think we need to support them more. 

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Mo Dhaliwal 01:08:07

No, I agree with you completely. So if somebody wants to follow everything you're up to and what's going on with digital, where should they go? 

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Sue Paish 01:08:20

We've got LinkedIn, we've got our website, which we keep current, or reach out to me. I'll take a call.I'll take a call. And I'm a real believer in the human conversation, this kind of conversation, I think is really important for society, way more than email. I'll text to find out, you know, what do you need picked up at the grocery store? But I've had this conversation with a lot of young people when they're on their phones, and I'll say, what are you doing? Oh, I'm talking to so and so. No, you're not. Yes, I am. No, no, you're sending a text. Conversation is different. So pick up the phone. 

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Mo Dhaliwal 01:09:04

I appreciate that. That's actually one of the reasons why we're doing this in person in this format.Um, like I, I work in digital media, everything, our whole lives are online. Um, and when we started this, it was like, well, actually everything's technology, everything's mediated through a screen. And I actually think that, you know, this or pressing the flesh in person is like the new disruptive technology again. Right. Yeah. What's the oldest new again? 

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Sue Paish 01:09:28

Yeah, and it's great to have this conversation, and I really appreciate it, and I'm a little bit embarrassed that I'm here, and there's so many more people that you get a call on. 

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Mo Dhaliwal 01:09:43

Are you kidding? Oh my god.Sue with you and your role you can't be having imposter syndrome because that makes people like me feel bad. But no, we really appreciate your time. Thank you so much for joining us. It's been great. 

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Sue Paish 01:09:55

Thank you. Thank you. It's a real honor. Thanks a lot. 

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Mo Dhaliwal 01:09:59

Hopefully we've given you a lot to think about that was High Agency like and subscribe and we will see you next time

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