O' Canada

I spent part of last week at the Sustainable Enterprise Academy, which is a consortium for executive training for sustainable development based out of York University in Toronto, UNC, and several other universities. Each time I go to work in Canada, I get the distinct feeling that they are different from Americans in a very tangible way. After several in depth discussions, I think that it has to do with the pace of life and fear.

In America, we are now ruled by fear. Fear of losing our jobs, our economic success, our health insurance, our way of life. We are convinced that if we work harder, increase the pace of our activities, that we can overcome (or at least repress) our fears. We are sure that our capitalism and individualism, will allow us to lead.

The Canadians on the other hand seem to believe in the strength of the collective with a bit more socialism built in. I think that the basis for this is their national health insurance plan. With this safety net, there is a decline in pace that allows for deeper discussions and collaboration that may produce longer lasting solutions to problems. It is not the endless discussions that take place in Europe (I'll never forget the Dutchman who told me the national product of the Netherlands are meetings), but a purposeful pace that is inclusive of dialogue without a rush to make a decision, good or bad. There is an emphasis on good dialogue that produces good decisions. I have been to the center for dialogue in Vancouver, BC and seen the new Business School at York University. All of these facilities are like the Canadian people...Built to sustain a dialog based process of decision making.

I think that it would be interesting to see how tension levels would drop in the US if we had national health insurance. For our company, other than sales, insurance costs are the most inflationary, uncontrollable cost we have. How do you put a price on health and when we do, we get the frenetic pace that we Americans enjoy today. We should learn from our good neighbors from the North.