Shopify president Harley Finkelstein has roused intense debate among the country’s tech leaders after he called out the “600-lb. beaver in the room”—that is, he said, Canada’s lack of ambition is holding companies back. 

Many innovation leaders didn’t take kindly to the remarks, made at the Elevate tech conference in Toronto, for implying that Canada’s low economic productivity could be solved if only they hustled more.

The inciting incident: Finkelstein said Canada’s lack of ambition means companies here tend to sell out early, often to their U.S. neighbours. That’s left the country with a branch-plant economy with few large Canada-founded firms headquartered here. 

Champagne co-signs: Innovation Minister François-Philippe Champagne endorsed Finkelstein’s stance at a government committee meeting Thursday morning, and later onstage at Elevate. “I could not agree more,” he said, when moderator Amber Mac raised the topic. “I just wish we could all be bragger-in-chief. There’s something in our DNA that we need to change.” 

A ‘tired’ narrative: Finkelstein isn’t the only Shopify executive who thinks this way. CEO and founder Tobi Lütke bemoaned the country’s “go-for-bronze” mentality—a lack of courage and ambition, he said—at a Toronto event hosted by BetaKit in May. 

“I’m tired of this narrative placing the blame of sluggish productivity squarely on the shoulders of founders and management teams working as hard as they ever have,” Laura Lenz, a partner at the venture capital arm of OMERS pension fund, said on X. 

A lack of ‘everything else’: Lenz and others in the tech community said structural barriers are to blame. “High costs of living, transportation, infrastructure, taxation—these things are making it next to impossible for entrepreneurs to succeed here,” said Abdullah Snobar, executive director of the DMZ startup accelerator in Toronto. 

Lack of ambition doesn’t explain why Canada’s top talent is “fleeing in droves,” said Logan Ullyott, whose company Compass Visas helps entrepreneurs work and start businesses abroad. 

Uvaro CEO Joseph Fung told The Logic the lack-of-ambition take is “lazy and hackneyed.” Rather, he blamed a lack of appropriate incentives to spur risk capital and other funding for modern tech companies.

Council of Canadian Innovators president Benjamin Bergen said it was “troubling” that Champagne shared Finkelstein’s views. “It’s like a hockey coach blaming the players for not skating fast enough when there’s no ice on the rink,” he said during a Finance committee meeting Thursday afternoon. “The problem isn’t Canadian ambition; it’s our policies, strategies and institutions that aren’t harnessing and supporting innovators.”