Don has spent more than two decades leading, growing and transforming organizations and businesses. A career innovator, he consistently identifies opportunities and addresses challenges to achieve meaningful and tangible results. Among Canada’s foremost thinkers on innovation, work and learning, and entrepreneurship, he works with multinational companies, tech start-ups, academic/research institutions governments and clients the world over.
Currently, Don defines the strategy and directs operations of NORCAT, a global, multi-faceted enterprise dedicated to advancing the dynamic and evolving needs of the new world of work and the innovation economy. In his role, he has transformed NORCAT to become a global leader for training and development, transformed NORCAT’s underground operating mine into the global one-stop shop for all that is the future of mining technology and innovation, pioneered the “Platform Effect” business model to support sustainable innovation in small to mid-sized cities, and continues to define the future of learning with NORCAT’s integrated experiential and simulation learning technologies. These achievements have generated community engagement and business partnerships, accelerated start-up tech firms and improved the operations of major clients across a myriad of industries.
Previously, Don served as VP of Strategy/Operations for the MaRS Discovery District, the world’s pre-eminent urban innovation hub that supports the growth of tech ventures in Canada. Prior to that, he was Senior Manager, Strategy & Operations Consulting, at Deloitte.
A former tech entrepreneur and engineering adjunct professor, Don is an active angel investor, serves on the board of several organizations and is a member of the Young Presidents’ Organization. He was a Top 40 under 40 recipient, two-time TEDx speaker, and founding member of a non-profit theatre company in Toronto.
He holds an undergraduate degree in Chemistry from Queen’s University and a Master of Applied Science and Engineering from the University of Toronto.
