Financial District : Innovation + Job News

The Ontario Electronic Stewardship announced Phase II of its ambitious and growing recycling program late last week. At 500 locations across Ontario -- including dozens in the GTA -- people can now drop off electronics including mp3 players, radios, computers and televisions.

The OES, based in Toronto's financial district, is an industry organization of retailers and manufacturers formed to divert toxic material from landfill and to comply with the provincial Waste Diversion Act in 2007. Phase one of the program, dealing with household hazardous waste, was launched in April 2009.

"Nearly four in five Ontario households (78 per cent) have at least one electronic product that is not working or not being used. This program makes recycling easier and encourages consumers and businesses to do what they can to help," said Carol Hochu, OES executive director, in announcing the program. "The reason to participate is simple -- it helps keep hazardous electronic equipment out of landfill, which leads to a greener, healthier environment."


Writer: Edward Keenan
Source: Carol Hochu, Executive Director, Ontario Electronic Stewardship

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Pretty much since the social media revolution took off in 2008, people began searching for ways to make money from their Twitter accounts. Waterloo University school friends Saif Ajani, Mike Rhemtulla and Minaz Abdulla joined them when they launched their company, Assetize, in September 2009.

"We looked at the growth that had been happening on Twitter and thought that there must be ways to monetize it," says co-founder and CEO Ajani. "If you look at the history of other media developments ... every time there's a place where people can create content, there's been a way to make money from it."

Originally they looked at ways to have people embed advertising into their message streams, but found the approach too invasive. So they developed an application that would display advertising in the frame of links that people tweet (it looks like this). As Ajani says, in addition to direct revenue, this creates viral revenue as links are re-tweeted across the network. The concept took off and in the first six months of operation, Ajani says revenue has grown approximately 50 per cent each month and the company's clients have served more than 147 million ads.

In addition to private users, the concept has attracted business from large mainstream media organizations, including the Canoe network, publishers of the Sun chain of tabloids, who use the service to brand all their content and photos rather than to drive direct revenue. Ajani says the company is in talks now with a major American television network, and is in the process of launching a service for a professional sports organization.

The three founders have been working together from their Financial District offices since the launch, and are in the process of adding their first additional employee. Ajani says that's just the beginning, as he expects Assetize will "double or triple the size of the team over the next year."

Writer: Edward Keenan
Source: Saif Ajani, Co-Founder and CEO, Assetize

In a first for a Toronto hospital, Mount Sinai has been giving 10 skilled immigrants a boost under The Mentoring Partnership for the past several months. The program partners  working professional mentors with skilled new Canadians. Mentors introduce their partners to members of their personal network and show them the ropes of the Canadian industry and workplace.

The program, run by the Toronto Region Immigrant Employment Council (TRIEC), has over 50 corporate partners, including financial institutions, universities and utilities, but Mount Sinai is the first hospital to participate. According to Joanne Fine-Schwebel who is director of volunteers at the hospital, the first round has been a success (including seeing several of the immigrants finding employment). She says the program is not just a help to immigrants, either. "We decided to participate because we have a very diverse staff and patient population, and that's a real strength for the hospital," she says. "The strength is that we have staff who reflect the patient population and that's how we can better understand and care for our patients."

The program is not for workers in regulated professions such as doctors. Instead it focused on other skilled jobs, in this case including finance and human resources professionals and occupational therapy workers.

Information provided by TRIEC says that this is just the latest step in an exemplary diversity program at Mount Sinai. "A diversity census of the hospital's workforce found, for example, that 57 per cent of their workforce speaks a language other than English and one third of their employees entered Canada in the past 10 years," the organization writes in an email. The hospital has also been partnering with Care for Nurses, a bridging program for nurses trained abroad that helps them obtain their Ontario nursing license.

Writer: Edward Keenan
Sources: TRIEC, Mount Sinai Hospital

When Industry Minister Tony Clement clarified Canadian ownership rules for wireless carriers in December 2009, allowing Globalive's WIND Mobile to enter the market despite a majority owner from Egypt, the company was quick to get to market: within five days the carrier was launched in Toronto. It was the first mobile carrier to join the market alongside Telus, Bell and Rogers in more than 10 years.

WIND had laid the groundwork for its aggressive marketing campaign -- based on customer-friendly initiatives such as contract-free service, no system access fees and "all-in" packages that include voice mail and caller ID -- with a social networking initiative seeking input for potential customers. And of course, it had spent the previous year constructing a next-generation cellular network. Company CEO Ken Campbell says, "we  likely built more cell towers in Canada in a year than had ever been built before."

In that year, the company also hired 700 employees, Campbell says, about half of those in the GTA. Less than two months after its launch, WIND is growing quickly. The company announced last week that it had secured debt financing for its rapid expansion, which followed news of hiring blitzes in Edmonton and Ottawa and network improvements in and around the GTA. The company's action is good news for Toronto's battered employment market, as the company is immediately hiring for at least 45 positions in the GTA alone.

"We're building for the long-term," Campbell says, "not for a year or two years. But only eight weeks after our launch, we're please with how things are going."

Writer: Edward Keenan
Source: Ken Campbell, CEO, WIND Mobile

The annual Wintercity Festival that launched last week with a gala event at Nathan Phillips is by now familiar to most Torontonians. It offers free programming and performances and, perhaps most famously, a chance to eat relatively inexpensive prix fixe meals in some of Toronto's finest restaurants through the Winterlicious program.

But what many may not know is that, according to the City of Toronto, Wintercity is an economic boon during the yearly February business-cycle blahs. Last year, according to city PR representative Giannina Warren, the Winterlicious portion of the festival generated $12 million in direct spending at participating restaurants. And this year's festival will create 265 direct temporary jobs for performers and artists affiliated with the festival -- and on top of that there are jobs for those hired to produce the festival and stage it, she notes in an email.

"The Winterlicious stats in particular are very important -- as the festival was created as a way to boost Toronto's restaurant industry during a typically slow period of business. Many of the participating restaurants rely on the program to keep them viable throughout the winter, and it's become a staple of the City's economy," Warren says.

The festival runs through February 11 and involves the participation of 150 restaurants.

Writer: Edward Keenan
Source: Giannina Warren, City of Toronoto

You wouldn't normally think of an aging workforce and decaying infrastructure as good things, but if you're looking for a stable job right now, Toronto Hydro's challenge could be your opportunity.

The utility, which has a huge number of employees with more than 30 years of experience (and therefore approaching retirement) and a plant that needs rebuilding, is engaging in a massive, ongoing hiring and training program to ensure it is able to maintain its services. The jobs are trades work, including power line apprentices and meter mechanics. "We're hiring for two reasons - to ramp up our staffing to ensure we have a knowledgeable workforce [and] that we can complete the knowledge transfer, as well as to deal with the infrastructure by changing our plant," says Jodi Engel, who manages the company's trade school as well as organizational development. Toronto Hydro has hired more than 120 trades workers in the past six years, and are looking to hire 100 or more in 2010, according to Engel. She says they will continue to hire for for the next four or five years.

I takes about 4.5 years to train an apprentice - though Toronto Hydro is the only Ontario municipal utility accredited to administer its own training. Candidates often have a trades background, but its not entirely necessary. However, a high-school diploma is required, as is some knowledge of electrical theory.

Engel says job opportunities are usually posted on Toronto Hydro's website.


Writer: Edward Keenan
Source: Jodi Engel, Manager of Organizational Development and Performance, Toronto Hydro