On a strategic level Paglia believes that organizations like hers can become innovators by adopting a strategic mindset, a high level of critical thinking, and a relentless focus on the future. Achieving those results requites diversity of input, too. She believes that as the IIAC adds greater intellectual and demographic diversity it adds new perspectives, the ability to innovate, and accountability brought by those different perspectives. She believes the work the IIAC has done this year speaks to their role as innovative advocates.
That work is a long and exhaustive list. From AI and the push for tech-neutral regulations, to the move from green bonds to blue bonds, to advocacy in the anti-money laundering space ensuring cost controls within new supervisory expectations, the IIAC has been tackling this year’s major trends.
They’ve worked to develop solutions for capital markets improvement, notably a push to increase the number of IPOs on Canadian public markets. While Paglia accepts that the source of an IPO is the inherent competitiveness and innovation in an economy, she believes that capital markets regulators can do more to get ideas and innovations from that start-up stage to IPO within Canada.
Part of achieving that goal of more IPOs, Paglia notes, involves working to make Canada a more attractive place to start and grow a business. Taxation is a key consideration because it incentivizes behaviour, Paglia explains. Recent changes in the tax regime may have worked against the goal of creating a more competitive economy where more businesspeople want to stay.
Paglia drives home the work the IIAC has done for and about advisors. She has pushed for CIRO to lower some of the barriers to starting a career as an advisor. The IIAC has recommended that CIRO remove its mandatory prep courses to allow career changes with relevant experience and knowledge to more easily take their certification exams.
