In my last post, I argued that, on its own, social innovation would never deliver systems change. For years, we’ve bet on projects, pilots, and clever innovations, hoping they’d somehow add up to transformed systems. Spoiler: they didn’t.

It’s taken years (okay, a lot of years) for the lessons to become clear: if we want different outcomes, we have at least two missing pieces to put in place:

Redesigning communities as integrated ecosystems rather than isolated sectors or silos – and backing communities as the stewards of those systems.
Acknowledging that intermediaries are… More Posted on 02-25-26

Social Innovation Was Never Going to Deliver Systems Change

We Bet On the Wrong Horse

For years, we told ourselves a comforting story: if we focused and funded enough social innovations, eventually the big systems would shift to a more equitable balance between money and quality of life.

It hasn’t.

For me, and many others working at the community level, social innovation has only ever been part of the solution because we have learned firsthand that systems are the real barriers to change and innovation.

Focusing on systems innovation at the community level has been a tough slog and, honestly, an often lonely… More Posted on 02-21-26

Who Speaks for Rural Canada Now?

I’ve been very fortunate to work, in one capacity or another, with many rural and remote communities across Canada. Over the years, I’ve learned a great deal about their resourcefulness, work ethic, and creativity—and also about the growing concerns they are facing, particularly the slow erosion of community life, local control, and resilience.

Almost one in five people in Canada live in rural or small‑town communities—roughly 6.6 million people, depending on the definition you use. Yet even though rural communities generate much of Canada’s food, energy, and natural resource wealth, there is no longer a… More Posted on 02-13-26

When Innovation Lives in Communities—but Funding Doesn’t

When Innovation Lives in Communities—but Funding Doesn’t: How to Resource Community-Rooted Innovators

Last week, I shared this article called When Funders Mistake Big for Better: Why Community Innovators Stay Underfunded.

It was prompted by feedback from many who questioned why, when we say we care about innovation, communities, and localizing the SDGs, so few of the smaller, hardworking, creative, social, and systems entrepreneurs qualify for public, private, or philanthropic funding.

Part 1 unpacked why it was happening. This week is about suggestions for what could be done to fix it—drawing on… More Posted on 02-04-26