Tuesday, November 15, 2011
Toronto, Ontario

Four Seasons Hotel
21 Avenue Road

Price: $75.00

Join us as at the 10th annual report by Ontario’s Task Force on Competitiveness, Productivity, and Economic Progress. In addition to a 10-year retrospective on Ontario’s economic progress, the report will set out an agenda for closing the innovation and prosperity gaps as the Ontario government begins its new mandate.

Register online.

We need to harness the best and brightest to address the challenges that lie ahead in the GTA. Only by accessing and mobilizing the full range of talents and experiences can the Toronto region propel itself forward.

The DiverseCity Fellows program helps to surface this rising, untapped pool of talent, connect it across racial and ethnic lines, and spur it to act by creating and executing hands-on projects to build a better region. Each year up to 25 city-builders are identified and given access to leadership development opportunities, networks and inspiration.

Want to strengthen yourself as a city-building leader? Apply to Fellows.

The Martin Prosperity Institute is pleased to announce our fourth annual Experience the Creative Economy Conference, being held from Tuesday June 21st to Thursday June 23rd at the University of Toronto.

Experience the Creative Economy is a unique conference which allows scholars new in their careers to experience notions of the creative economy in a small and focused setting. This conference will bring together up to 25 individuals with similar research interests to share their work, receive feedback, foster the development of effective research methods and to establish an ongoing framework of collaborative learning and mutual exchange for years to come.

The MPI’s Kevin Stolarick will be speaking at the upcoming Creative Rural Economy Conference in Kingston and Prince Edward County.

The conference will focus on how the theory of the creative economy can be experienced and practiced in rural Ontario communities.

Click here for more information or to register to attend.

On June 6th, 2011 the MPI’s Research Director, Kevin Stolarick, will be in Midland to address the mayors and councils of the area. The Summit is part of the Mayors Economic Action Initiative (EAI) and a kick off to discussions among the four municipal Councils around this joint economic development program that is still very much in its early days.

The EAI is an effort by the four Mayors of these municipalities in north Simcoe County (Towns of Midland and Penetanguishene & the Townships of Tiny and Tay having a combined population of about 50,000) to develop a joint economic development/economic prosperity effort to address the long term health and vitality of the area.

The MPI’s sister institute, The Institute for Competitiveness & Prosperity is set to release its annual Report on Canada’s innovation imperative on June 1st.

The report will be released by the Institute’s Chairman, Roger Martin, Dean of the Rotman School of Management at the University of Toronto.

It will articulate Canada’s competitiveness challenges as innovation challenges and will discuss the importance of the need for governments, businesses, and individuals to invest in the capabilities and polices to address these challenges.

It will inform the debate and deliberation on Canada’s innovation policies as the new federal government takes shape.

Click here for more information or to register for the event.

The Martin Prosperity Institute invites you to a brown bag lunch presentation (beverages will be provided) on Monday, April 18th from 12:00 Noon to 1:30 p.m. at our offices at the MaRS Centre, 101 College Street, Ste. 420, 4th Floor.

“ÅRE-Project”, How to design a city!
Dag Holmgren
Professor in Industrial Design
Designer MSD
Department of Mechanical Engineering
Technical School of Engineering, Jönköping

The presentation will focus on the reason companies and also organisations need Industrial Design in their product development process.

The Design methodology always starts with the user – the human – and focuses on the reason; the How, What and Why a product or service should be developed. When the answers are clear then we can start with How!

This was what happened in Åre!

They started with the human senses, and they started together with all inhabitants in Åre, the politicians, the business people and of course with the inhabitants, the people who lived in the community.

Dag Holmgren has a Master of Industrial Design at the University College of Arts Crafts and Design, Stockholm. He has worked as an Industrial Design Consultant. In 2003, he was appointed Professor of Industrial Design at the School of Engineering in Jönköping. His own research included studies of Industrial Design and SMEs together with The Swedish Industrial Design Foundation: GTS Evaluating of IDR I Copenhagen; Partner in the DEEDS project; Project about Ergonomics and Teaching. Dag has been the head of the Industrial Design programme at JTH. He takes part in various research projects both in and outside the region. Design research is a fairly new area in Sweden.

Shige Oishi, University of Virginia
Speaks on “Residential mobility, Individualism, and Suburban Uniformity: An American Paradox”

Wednesday April 6th
11:30am to 1pm
Room 151
Rotman School of Management

Salon Camden@MPI Presents:

His Excellency Dr. APJ Abdul Kalam, the Former President of India

Will speak on

The Knowledge Economy: Exploring the Benefits of Indo-Canadian Partnership

Details:
The Martin Prosperity Institute
MaRS Centre, Heritage Building
101 College Street, Suite 420
Toronto, Ontario M5G 1L7
Wed., Sept. 29th, 2010 at 10:00 a.m.

Refreshments will be served
The event will conclude at 11:30 a.m.

Space is limited. Please RSVP to Kim Ryan at [email protected]

The Institute for Competitiveness & Prosperity releases its annual Report on Canada on Tuesday, June 8 from 8:00 a.m. to noon in Toronto.

For more information or to register click here

Kevin Stolarick, research director of The Martin Prosperity Institute, will speak at the Model D Speaker Series May 12 at the Westin Book Cadillac in downtown Detroit. The discussion is on higher education’s role in city building.

The 8th Annual Global Health Conference will be held on Tuesday, May 4 from 8:30-5:00 at the University of Toronto.

The MPI’s Marisol D’Andrea is a participating artist in the exhibition of student and community art. ‘Clear Eyes, Full Hearts: Social Responsibility Today’ is presented as part of the Conference in conjunction with the Stone Lobby Student Curators Exhibition.

Click here for more information on the conference and the exhibition.

“Richard Florida, bestselling author of Who’s Your City? and The Rise of the Creative Class, returns with a much-needed and original vision as we emerge from the economic downturn, illuminating the incredible opportunity our times present for rethinking our future.”

The Great Reset will be released in Canada on April 27th by Random House Canada.

The Canadian Urban Institute and the Cities Centre, University of Toronto, present:

Designing the City of Tomorrow — Are We Thinking Boldly Enough?

Thursday, April 15, 2010
7:45 – 9:45 a.m.
Innis Town Hall (U of T)
2 Sussex Ave.
Toronto, ON

This latest session from the Election Issues Series is presented by The Canadian Urban Institute and the Cities Centre, University of Toronto, in collaboration with the Council for Canadian Urbanism, the Design Industry Advisory Committee and the Martin Prosperity Institute, University of Toronto.

The Martin Prosperity Institute’s sister institute, The Institute for Competitiveness & Prosperity, is pleased to announce two panelists who will be joining Roger Martin at the release of our Working Paper on the strength of retail management in Ontario and Canada:

Dene Rogers, President & CEO of Sears Canada Inc.

David Soberman, Marketing Professor at the University of Toronto’s Rotman School of Management.

The Working Paper features new research on the quality of retail in management in Canada, the United States, and the United Kingdom.

The release of the Working Paper by Roger Martin and the panelists’ discussion will take place at The Rotman School of Management, Fleck Atrium, 105 St. George Street, 8:00 am to 10:00 am on Thursday, April 8, 2010.

There is no charge for this event, but space is limited. Registration is required.

Dan Taylor (Prince Edward County Economic Development)and Dr. Greg Spencer(Munk Centre, University of Toronto) will present ‘The creative economy in Ontario: A Prince Edward County case example’ as the next installment of the Creative Economy Seminar Series at Queen’s University.

The seminar will take place on Tuesday March 23 from 12:00 – 1:00 PM in Room 304, Goodes Hall.

The Martin Prosperity Institute’s sister institute, The Institute for Competitiveness & Prosperity, is pleased to announce the release of Working Paper 13 on management strength in the retail sector on April 8, 2010 from 8:00 a.m. to 10:00 a.m. at The Rotman School of Management.

The Working Paper features recent research done by the Institute on the strength of management in Canada’s and Ontario’s retail sector.The Working Paper follows the Institute’s work on Canada and Ontario’s manufacturing sector, presented in Working Paper 12, Management matters.

There is no charge for this event, but space is limited. Registration is required.

March 2-3, 2010
MaRS Centre, Toronto

Discuss. Learn. Connect.

Join cultural planning practitioners from across Ontario for an informative workshop on cultural planning and mapping. Presentations on Creative City Network of Canada’s cultural planning and mapping toolkits, panel discussions from those in the field and a facilitated discussion on what’s next will give you the knowledge and connections to move the cultural planning agenda forward in your community.

Learn more…

The Martin Prosperity Institute and Salon Camden invite you to a talk and dinner on Wednesday November 25th, 2009 at 7pm.

Uffe Elbaek, the founder and former principal of the KaosPilots – International School of New Business Design & Social Innovation will speak on The Fourth Sector: Beyond Private, Public, NGO.

For more information on the fourth sector, click here.

Register today for ‘Strength in Services: A Summit on Transforming Service Jobs’

Join us for a day of thinking creatively about what we could do to foster a world class service culture and transform service jobs in Toronto, the region and the Province of Ontario.

Monday November 16, 2009 at the Toronto Reference Library’s Bram and Bluma Appel Salon
Moderated by Steve Paikin, host of TVO’s The Agenda

Creative Places + Spaces: The Collaborative City

Dates: October 28-30, 2009
Location: Toronto
Topic: The Collaborative City

MPI Friends and Family Get 15% off

1. Go to http://www.creativeplacesandspaces.ca
2. Click on ‘Register’ in the upper right hand corner and complete the registration form as indicated
3. Under “Special Needs” enter: MPI
4. Under “If you have a registration code, enter it here” enter: cps0809
5. Complete remainder of form and submit

The MPI’s Kevin Stolarick will be participating in a panel discussion on what it takes to create a workable city as part of the City Series at the Toronto Reference Library’s Bram and Bluma Appel Salon.

MPI Affiliate Dr. Betsy Donald to participate as expert panelist at the Canadian Urban Institute’s “The Future of Food: Sustainable Supply Chain Strategies for Growing Urban Regions”.

The GTMA’s International Leaders Breakfast Club series starts up again this fall on Wednesday September 30. The first meeting will focus on how the GTA must deal with the current Talent Crisis we face.

Canadian Business
Artmap is a collaborative art piece by artists from each of Toronto’s 44 wards. The work has been commissioned for Manifesto Festival of Community and Culture and will be unveiled on September 17th at 5:30 in the Rotunda at City Hall. City Councillors and participating artists will be in attendance.

MPI Academic Director Kevin Stolarick will be speaking at two conferences this fall. The Global Creative Economy Convergence Summit runs October 5-6 in Philadelphia, PA. The Create West Virginia conference takes place October 18-20 in Huntington, WV.

Ledger-Inquirer
The theme is “Leadership in Uncertain Times.” Those speakers include retired general and former secretary of state Colin Powell; the man who currently oversees U.S. military activity in Iraq and Afghanistan, Gen. David H. Petraeus; the president of Aflac, Paul S. Amos II; Chick-fil-A president Dan T. Cathy; MSNBC chief Washington correspondent Norah O’Donnell and Jim Blanchard, retired CEO and chairman of Synovus.

CityBuilders Toronto is seeking referrals for individuals or groups to be featured in a new book and photography exhibit. They need your feedback on who these young CityBuilders are. Where are they? What are they doing and why? If you know of any young Toronto people or groups you think exemplify a CityBuilder, please go to www.citybuilders.to and submit your info by August 31st.

On September 24 the Center for Economic Growth in Albany, NY is presenting a speech by Richard Florida entitled “Who’s Your City? How the Creative Economy is Making the Place Where You Live the Most Important Decision of Your Life.”

The Korea Herald
The Asia Pacific Cities Summit to be held from Sept. 15-17 will bring together top-ranking officials of the cities from around the globe to discuss creative urban development strategies. Richard Florida, renowned urban studies theorist and professor at the University of Toronto, will deliver the keynote speech on Sept. 15.

The Human Capital Institute (HCI), a think tank, professional association and educator in talent management strategies, announced today that Dr. Richard Florida, widely regarded as one of the most influential scholars on the shift to the new knowledge economy, will headline HCI’s inaugural National Human Capital Summit, to be held in Chicago April 6-7.

June 23-25, 2009

Experience the Creative Economy 2009 is designed to promote the exchange of ideas and methods, giving feedback to participants on their current research areas through group discussion. Researchers will explore the creative economy at a multi-dimensional level, focusing on theory, empirical methods, and practical applications.

Download the conference announcement

Download the conference programme

Dr. Kevin Stolarick visited Quebec City this week to present findings on how Quebec City ranks in terms of prosperity.

English Presentation
Présentation française

June 9-11 2009
Martin Prosperity Institute

The conference is an extension of the Placing Creativity partnership which investigates the interconnection between ‘Place’ and ‘Creativity’ through a number of different dimensions.

3rd CIBC Scholar-in-Residence Lecture — 21st Century Cities: The Geography of Innovation

The Ontario Centre for Engineering and Public Policy and the Martin Prosperity Institute present “Smart Ways to Spend Infrastructure Dollars”, part of the Policy Engagement Series.

Speakers:
Dr. Chris Kennedy, Dr. Bryan Karney, Dr. Eric Miller and Dr. Marianne Hatzopoulou
Department of Civil Engineering, University of Toronto

Thursday, May 14, 2009
12 – 2pm
Sutton Place Hotel, Stop 33 (33rd floor)
955 Bay Street, Toronto
Lunch will be served.

Pre-registration is required; please reply to info@ocepp.ca or call 416-224-1100, ext. 1204 by May 11

Roger Martin, Dean of the University of Toronto’s Joseph L. Rotman School of Management and Chairman of the Institute for Competitiveness & Prosperity, will be releasing the 2009 Report on Canada’s Competitiveness and Prosperity.

The report is a collaboration of the Martin Prosperity Institute and the Institute for Competitiveness & Prosperity. It will draw on research recently released in Ontario in the Creative Age.

Richard Florida, Director of the Martin Prosperity Institute and co-author of Ontario in the Creative Age, will address the conference.

Event Details:
Date: Wednesday, April 15, 2009
Time: 8:30 to 11:30 am
Location: Sutton Place, Toronto
Click to register

Relevant Links:
How the Crash will Reshape America by Richard Florida, The Atlantic, March 2009
The Great Reset: An interview with Richard Florida by The Atlantic’s Conor Clarke, February 2009
Evan Solomon interviews Richard Florida, CBC News Sunday, March 1, 2009
How the Crisis will Reshape Toronto by Richard Florida, Creative Class Blog, February 18 2009

Research Director Kevin Stolarick and Research Associates Patrick Adler, Scott Pennington and Ronnie Sanders are participating in the Waterloo edition of TVOntario’s The Agenda with Steve Paikin‘s AgendaCamp series. Expert guests and concerned citizens will debate the issues facing Ontario’s innovation economy on Sunday, March 29 from 9:30am to 4:30pm at the Davis Centre, 200 University Avenue West, University of Waterloo.

Director Richard Florida will be a guest on the televised component of AgendaCamp along with Research in Motion co-CEO Jim Balsillie, broadcasting live on Monday, March 30 at 8 pm on TVO.

Learn more about how to attend in person or join in online via the AgendaCamp website and contribute to the TV program’s schedule on the AgendaCamp wiki’s open source TV production page.

Every month our workshop plays host to an evening of lively conversation and debate known as the Salon Camden series. Founded by a group of passionate Torontonians as a way to celebrate the city’s thought leaders and emerging talents across all fields, the salon welcomes the open-minded for a night of discussion, debate, and flavourful food and drink.

Salon Camden and the MPI are proud to celebrate the ideas, experiences, and opinions of Torontonians.

Tuesday, February 10, 2009
7:30 to 10:00pm
Fleck Atrium (ground floor), Rotman School of Management, University of Toronto
105 St. George Street, Toronto

The Martin Prosperity Institute presents the inaugural event of its Program on Innovation and Creative Industries:

“Markets Making Music” – A Lecture and Concert

You and your guests are invited to register for this unique evening of lecture, discussion, and music.

At 7:30pm sharp we will begin the session and introduce lecturer Prof. Ajay Agrawal, Director of the Program on Innovation and Creative Industries at the Martin Prosperity Institute and Peter Munk Professor of Entrepreneurship at Rotman.

Immediately following his presentation, the evening will feature a Q&A session with Sellaband CEO and Co-Founder Johan Vosmeijer as well as an album debut concert performance by Sellaband recording artist Angie Arsenault. The evening will adjourn by 10:00. There will be a cash bar and snacks.

Synopsis: In 1999, an unknown Northeastern University student named Shawn Fanning released – with little fanfare – a program for sharing music over the Internet. Despite its modest dorm room origins, that innovation and subsequent permutations had a devastating effect on the recorded music industry worldwide. In Canada, for example, revenues declined by a stunning 50% between 1999 and 2007, after adjusting for inflation. In fact some industry observers, reflecting on the rise of Internet traffic and the concurrent decline in music sales, referred to the launch of Napster as “The Day the Music Died.”

Almost a decade later, however, in 2008, something surprising happened. In order to finance the recording and production of her debut album, an unknown artist in Montreal named Angie Arsenault turned to another Internet innovation and raised $50,000 from 531 “believers” spread across 34 countries using an online market-making platform that virtually no one had heard of – Sellaband. She was the first Canadian to successfully do so. Sellaband had been launched in the Netherlands – with little fanfare – two years earlier, in 2006.

Although it is too early to speculate on long-term industry trends, Prof. Agrawal will present insights, based on Sellaband data, into what general lessons might be learned from this unique artist market in terms of peer-to-peer lending and microfinance (believers invest in $10 increments), foreign direct investment (artists raise much of their financing from outside their home country), and crowd-financing (believers have collectively financed only a select few from thousands of artists featured on the site).

TO REGISTER FOR THE SESSION: The fee to attend on February 10 is $30 per person plus GST. The fee includes your seat and a signed copy of Angie Arsenault’s debut CD. Please register here before noon on February 10.

The session is sponsored by the Martin Prosperity Institute at the Rotman School of Management, University of Toronto.

Questions can be directed to [email protected] or at (416) 978-4193.

Dress code is business casual. There are three ways to reach the Rotman School:

• by public transit we are a 2.5 minute walk south of the St George TTC station
• by bicycle we have bike racks at our main entrance and to the south
• by car there is underground parking available – the entrance is located just south of the Rotman School

In the 2008 Ontario budget, the Ontario Government asked Roger Martin, Dean of the Joseph L. Rotman School of Management at the University of Toronto and Richard Florida, Director of the Rotman School’s Martin Prosperity Institute to “undertake a study of the changing composition of Ontario’s economy and workforce, examine historical changes and projected future trends affecting Ontario, and provide recommendations to the Province for ensuring that Ontario’s economy and people remain globally competitive and prosperous.”

The report of their findings, to be released on February 5th, is an important element of Ontario’s economic strategy. Following its release, the authors hope to engage Ontarians in an ongoing dialogue about achieving advantage for Ontario in the creative age.

Event details:
Thursday, February 5th
7:30am – 9am
Hilton Toronto
145 Richmond Street West, Toronto

The Economic Club of Toronto event costs $75 per seat, $750 per table of 10. Member rates apply. Please register online at www.ecot.ca or complete and fax the registration form to (416) 306-0898.

Research Associates Ronnie Sanders and Patrick Adler are participating in the Thunder Bay edition of TVOntario’s The Agenda with Steve Paikin‘s AgendaCamp series. Expert guests and concerned citizens will debate the issues facing Ontario’s aboriginal economy on Sunday, February 8 from 9:30am to 4:30pm at the Fort William First Nation Community Centre, 400 Anemki Drive.

Participants use tools like Flickr, Twitter, and YouTube to build an interactive wiki about Ontario’s economy. Learn more about how to attend in person or join in online via the AgendaCamp website, and view their presentation comparing Thunder Bay to its peer cities.

The inaugural event of our Program on Innovation and Creative Industries takes place Tuesday, February 10 from 7:30-10pm in the atrium of the Rotman School of Management. Entitled “Markets Making Music”, the evening consists of a lecture by Prof. Ajay Agrawal, a Q&A with Sellaband GmbH CEO Johan Vosmeijer, and a concert performance by singer-songwriter Angie Arsenault. More details and ticket purchase information are available here.

The MPI and the Centre for the Study of the United States present a free lecture by Andrew Gelman, Professor of Statistics and Political Science, Columbia University. He is the author of several books, including his latest “Red State, Blue State, Rich State, Poor State: Why Americans Vote the Way They Do” (Princeton University Press, August 2008). Bring your copy to the lecture and Prof. Gelman will autograph it.

Date/Time: October 21, 2pm sharp to 4pm
Place: Room 108N, Munk Centre for International Studies, University of Toronto, 1 Devonshire Place

Pre-registration online is mandatory: please register here by noon on October 21.

City as System is a mini-conference for academics from across North America to discuss creative new approaches to the empirical analysis of regional economic systems and innovation networks. It takes place in Toronto from October 9-11, 2008. All scheduled sessions will be held at the MPI offices, Suite 420 in the MaRS Centre, Heritage Building, 101 College Street. Friday will be primarily dedicated to presentations of research, while Saturday will be flexibly scheduled to allow for unstructured working sessions and informal discussions between participants. For further information, see the conference schedule or contact Kim Ryan.

Experience the Creative Economy is the first conference to be held at the Martin Prosperity Institute. It brings together twenty-two leading researchers from around the world to better understand the Creative Economy. The conference is designed to promote the exchange of ideas and methods, giving feedback to participants on their current research areas through group discussion. Researchers will explore the creative economy at a multi-dimensional level, focusing on theory, empirical methods, practical applications and an active evaluation of Toronto’s creative economy. The three days wll be engaging, educational, and fun!

Keynote Speaker: Richard Florida, Director, Martin Prosperity Institute

Topic: “The World is Spiky”

Booksale: signed first-edition copies of Who’s Your City? will be sold at the event

Authors: Richard Florida, Charlotta Mellander and Haifeng Qian.