Milton Friesen, Director of Operations at Cardus, explores and develops organizational practices that will contribute to more effective institutions. He has invested leadership and research energy in helping organizations understand how to combine knowledge and practice to achieve their goals. Remarkable organizations invest energy in designing and nurturing intelligent processes with room for surprise and novelty, an important factor in designing resilient organizations.

One expression of these ideas can be found in the growing social innovation movement. Canada has many interesting projects that are at various stages of maturity that involve public, private, governmental and nonprofit groups of all kinds. You can see a budding Social Innovation in Canada map here.

Adaptive leadership based on context-driven collaborative strategies is needed today. The theoretical roots of this approach can be found in complex systems theory applied to organizational design. Milton has taught five different undergraduate courses in history, culture, theology, and science as well as seminars on writing, social media and the history of computing. His graduate work includes a philosophy of language master’s thesis on the theory of words and objects, paper presentations at the University of Toronto and the University of Sherbrooke, and publication of a peer reviewed paper on religious influence in 5th-7th c. Ireland.

Milton's has experience in corporate communications projects encompassing development of marketing collateral, presentations, magazine editing, writing, interviewing, political campaign development, web strategies and content development, creative team leadership and other capacity-building projects. He has also served a three-year term as an elected municipal official and run in two other campaigns (including a mayoral race) that did not lead to election.

Milton and Michelle have four children ages 7, 11, 13 and 15. They live in a heritage house in an old Hamilton neighbourhood.

Leadership Interests

Complex Systems Theory
Contemporary Culture
Social Innovation