Buy a Business, Don't Start One? Steven Wang on Canada's Entrepreneurship Revolution

Steven Wang is the CEO of Venture for Canada, a national charity that equips young Canadians with the entrepreneurial skills, mindset, and opportunities they need to thrive in a rapidly changing economy.

He's also a Rhodes Scholar, a Harvard Law graduate, a former corporate M&A lawyer at Paul Weiss in New York, and a Gates Foundation-backed social entrepreneur. And he grew up as an immigrant kid in Cambridge, Ontario, which is where this whole conversation really begins.

Qasim Virjee sat down with Steven at StartWell in downtown Toronto to talk about:

→ What Canada gets wrong about its own talent → The experience gap holding young Canadians back (and what VFC is doing about it) → Why entrepreneurship through acquisition might be the smartest career move most people aren't considering → The small business succession crisis and who steps in when 75% of family-owned businesses plan to exit this decade → How AI is reshaping what skills actually matter → What the "Paul Weiss moment" was that pushed Steven to leave corporate law → Why Canada needs to be bolder and what that looks like in practice🔗 Learn more about Venture for Canada: ventureforcanada.ca

🎙️ StartWell Podcast: https://startwell.co/blogs/insights 📍 Filmed at StartWell, Toronto (https://startwell.co/)

Chapters:

0:00 Intro 1:00 Arriving in Canada in 1998: the immigrant story 5:30 From Cambridge to Oxford: choosing curiosity over certainty 10:00 Deferring Harvard Law to build a social enterprise in Asia 15:00 Life at Paul Weiss and the Trump "bend the knee" moment 20:00 Why Venture for Canada, why now 25:00 What VFC actually does: three programs explained 32:00 Entrepreneurship Through Acquisition and the succession crisis opportunity 42:00 Youth unemployment and the three challenges facing young Canadians 52:00 AI, human skills, and what it means to be future-proof 58:00 Canada's moment: elbows up, ambition unlocked