In this episode, I’m speaking with Imole Ashogbon, a fractional HR consultant who helps small and mid-sized businesses, executives, and HR teams when they need senior-level HR leadership, without the cost of a full-time executive.

Imole and I explore a nagging question I have about Canada’s much-talked about productivity decline: Are we declining in productivity because we lack talent OR because our broken systems aren’t able to take advantage of all the talent we have seating around in Canada?

Imole thinks we’ve created a strange contradiction. We bring in immigrants through Express Entry (a competitive immigration pathway meant to attract young, educated, upwardly mobile individuals.) Then we act like we’re doing them a favor. Like immigration is charity work. It’s not.

45% of recent immigrants have university degrees but work in jobs that don’t require post-secondary education. Which is an absurd waste of talent in my opinion.

Imole and I chat about:

• Why businesses need to culturally integrate just as much as immigrants

• Why immigration is investment, not aid

• How to build systems that actually deploy immigrant talent

• The misalignment between immigration policy, employment strategy, and economic growth targets