Jon Dujon | Professional Profile and Blog

When I was a kid, I wanted to be a politician. I did most of my growing up on the small island of Saint Lucia before moving to Barbados for college and grad school at the University of the West Indies, where I studied Political Science and Psychology and International Trade and Trade Policy. After graduation, I completed internships at the UN Conference on Trade and Development in Geneva and the Centre for Trade Policy and Law in Ottawa, and returned to Saint Lucia to join the Ministry of Commerce as a Senior Policy Officer. During that time, I recruited some grad school friends and started the Caribbean's first eThinkTank, the Caribbean Centre for Research on Trade and Development (CCRTD). Our goal was to mainstream the concept of data-driven decision-making by providing non-partisan empirical research to policymakers. I won a prestigious research award and joined the International Development Research Centre in Ottawa. I traveled and worked in a few different places after that, but I kept coming back to Canada (this may or may not have had something to do with an incredible woman I met).

In 2014, my brother and I discovered that we could turn an invasive species of seaweed that was taking over our beaches into a potent biofertilizer. Just like that, I'd been presented with an opportunity to combine my research and analysis skills with my growing interest in business management. I wrote the GMAT and began my MBA, which allowed me to manage our strategic planning, finance, and marketing functions and implement the things I was learning in real time. After the MBA, I moved to Calgary, and then to Vancouver. The incredible woman (her name is Sara), now my wife, got a job as a law professor at the University of British Columbia, so we've (finally!) settled permanently. I'm an HR Consultant by day, and a SME consultant the rest of the time. I enjoy learning new lessons everyday, and passing on these lessons to startups. I'm also teaching myself how to code (this website is an ongoing project!), and traveling every chance I get (29 countries and counting!✈️).