Our work

Understanding change. Connecting people. Applying ideas.

The Forum's work connects broader workforce change with practical questions inside workplaces.

Why this matters

Workforce change is already shaping workplace decisions.

Demographic shifts, labour shortages, new technologies and changing skills needs are influencing how organizations design work, support people and invest in new approaches. The Forum focuses on what those broader shifts mean in practice.

495,700

job vacancies

Source: Statistics Canada, May 2026

24.4%

of businesses identified recruiting skilled employees as an obstacle

Source: Statistics Canada, Q2 2026

19.2%

of Canadian businesses used AI

Source: Statistics Canada, Q2 2026

What we do

Three connected areas of work

The Forum moves between evidence, practitioner exchange and practical testing depending on the question at hand. These are connected areas of work, not a fixed sequence.

Understand

Research & Insights

We bring together public data, research and practical perspectives to help make sense of the forces changing work and workplaces.

Reports, Forum Insights and practical briefs turn broader signals into usable context.

Explore Insights

Evidence to interpretation

What is changing in the workforce — and what does it mean inside workplaces?

SignalsInterpretationPractical insight

Public data, research and workplace evidence are brought together around a defined question.

Convene

Communities & Collaboration

We bring practitioners and organizations together around shared workforce and workplace challenges to compare evidence, experience and possible responses.

Focused exchange surfaces practical experience, implementation gaps and questions worth exploring further.

Explore Communities

Shared question

What are organizations seeing in practice — and where are the gaps between evidence and implementation?

Employers

Public sector

Shared workplace question

Practitioners

Researchers

The value comes from comparing evidence with experience, not from networking for its own sake.

Apply

Applied Innovation

We explore promising technologies, interventions and new approaches in real-world settings to understand where they may be useful and what can be learned from application.

Pilot design, workplace review and documented learning help turn a promising idea into a better-informed decision.

Explore Applied Innovation

Applied learning

Workplace challenge

Define the practical question clearly enough to test something useful.

Real-world test

Apply a tool, intervention or approach in context and review what happens.

Decision-ready learning

Capture what worked, what did not and what is worth carrying forward.

Focus

Connecting what is changing outside the workplace with what happens inside it.

Broader workforce context

Workforce & labour-market change

Demographic change, labour shortages, skills pressures and changing occupations.

Technology & the future of work

How emerging technologies are reshaping jobs, skills and workplace decisions.

Inside the workplace

Productivity & work design

How jobs, processes and tools can be designed to improve performance.

Workplace safety & human performance

How physical demands, human factors and workplace practices affect people doing the work.

Questions we examine

The work starts with a practical question.

Where are workforce pressures beginning to change the way work is designed?

Which technologies are useful enough to test in a real workplace?

What should organizations measure before a problem becomes an injury, cost or performance issue?

What can be learned in one workplace that may be useful to others?

Work with the Forum

Start with a shared challenge.

Engagement does not need to begin with a formal project. A conversation can start with an emerging issue, a question that would benefit from stronger evidence, or a workplace challenge where practical testing could be useful.

Start a Conversation Explore Communities