Ryan Kelly was running his startup Ascend Application, a social enterprise focused on making websites more accessible to people with disabilities, when the COVID-19 outbreak started. 

He quickly realized the crisis would make simple tasks like grocery shopping or running errands inaccessible to people who were vulnerable to the virus. Given his technical background, he felt compelled to create something that could help. He developed the Atrium app to help people at high risk of contracting COVID-19 get groceries and other supplies through a volunteer matching app. 

The pandemic will leave no organization or individual untouched. When it comes to youth, we know that new realities of education, career options, and opportunities will not be distributed equally. And while energy from community and for government support to date remains on large scale business, shifts in post-secondary education and sweeping government policy, the role of young people in shaping the future cannot be ignored. After all, this generation of youth is the largest that has ever walked the earth. Let’s not keep them on the sidelines — they will be a critical force for post-pandemic innovation and rebuilding an economy we want to live in. 

We need to take advantage of young people’s experimental nature, innovative approaches, and deeply-held desire to create holistic value. As the pandemic exposes the many fissures and gaps in our economic systems, which leave some members of our communities vulnerable, many speculate that the future economy will have to yield to human values, the needs of many in our society, and the planet. There is no one better to take on this challenge than youth who embody those values.

Youth will be a critical force for post-pandemic innovation and rebuilding an economy we want to live in. 

How can we create the environments for youth innovation to flourish? We need more government financial support for students, providing youth opportunities beyond internships, such as project grants and funded innovation challenges, so that youth can rise to major social challenges like COVID-19 and create solutions. Government support can enable organizations to provide these opportunities across socioeconomic and regional divides, spurring innovation at scale. This would enable more youth to participate in the economy in new ways, while at the same time fostering young people’s creativity and innovation to help build solutions for a post-pandemic recovery. . 

If recent history suggests anything, it’s that in times of great disruption and constraints, innovation has the opportunity to thrive and young people have often been at the forefront.  Look back at 1975, when the US was trying to climb out of a 16-month recession: it was during that time that a young Bill Gates and Paul Allen built the model for ‘easy-to-use computing.’ Or to 2009, when Brian Chesky and Joe Gebbia finally — two years after launching the platform — saw explosive growth for their short term rental model, Airbnb.

In times of crisis there is always an opportunity to do better, to lead, to innovate for a more prosperous future, for better business, for higher values. A time of crisis inherently creates the unique circumstances that allow for, if not require, transformation to happen at the individual, corporate, and systems levels. During COVID-19, we have seen on-the-spot innovation: from healthcare delivery to altered customer experiences to reinventing small business models, all to deliver the value to those that need and desire it. With a rallied purpose, bias towards action, and a desire to reinvent economic systems, a post-pandemic time will pave the runway for many innovators to lean in. This will be amplified for our youth, who were born and grew up in a technology-infused world that has seen its fair share of recessions (the dot com bubble, ‘08, and now the looming Coronavirus recession) and major factors like 9/11, polarizing politics, and the climate crisis.

“The crisis has created a disruption in how we work, learn, and connect, and out of this disruption, there will be many opportunities for innovation. Young entrepreneurs going through this now will be at the forefront of tapping into this disruption,” Ryan Holmes, the board Chair of League of Innovators and CEO of Hootsuite, told me. 

As we start transitioning and rebuilding our economy, our future will depend on how we effectively engage youth — the largest subset of the population.

At the League of Innovators, we meet and work with a diverse group of young people from across Canada who are building solutions to the challenges and issues that they hold dear to their hearts — continuously dedicated to creating change on their own terms. And even in these uncertain times, which for many have devastated their startup opportunities, they have found ways to pivot, to learn, to drive forward, and again create change. For example, Michelle Kwok and Ravina Anand who founded FLIK, a female apprenticeship platform, have redirected part of the platform to connect female-founded businesses affected by the Coronavirus with female STEM students, bridging the gap between the need for talent and students’ desire for valuable work experience at this critical time. Sophie Wyne pivoted her HR harassment and misconduct reporting platform Spotlight to encompass solutions for mental health and burnout for employees now dealing with entirely new work environments. 

These and many other young people around the world are creating solutions at lightning speed to problems that are growing and evolving as a result of the pandemic. For young people business is not just about profitability, but also providing value to a future that they are part of and deeply invested in. We know young people are capable of developing new ideas, tangible solutions to personal, economic and social issues — if given the agency to do so.  

As we start transitioning and rebuilding our economy, our future will depend on how we effectively engage youth — the largest subset of the population. Let’s ensure we are providing the space and support for all of these youth all across Canada to gain the life experience, tangible skills, and the tools to contribute positively to building innovative solutions to the challenges and issues we all face. As a community, we need to provide them with the opportunities to forge the future they want to be part of.  

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