Hi friend,
In preparation for the ExperienceTO: New Toronto Historical Tour taking place on Saturday, August 8, I’ve been reflecting on how easy it is to pass by a problem every day and miss the practical opportunity hiding right inside it.
If you walk through Humber Polytechnic’s Lakeshore Campus today, you see a busy, well-integrated educational site set among restored 19th-century brick cottages. But for over a decade after the Lakeshore Psychiatric Hospital closed in 1979, the property was mostly seen as an awkward local problem: an abandoned complex with a heavy history that sat empty and deteriorating.
For most people, it was easier to ignore the site or assume it should just be torn down.
Dr. Robert A. "Squee" Gordon, President of Humber College, took a much simpler approach.
During his 25 years as Humber’s second president (1982–2007), Gordon focused on practical growth. He decided to consolidate Humber's operations into two main locations: the North and Lakeshore campuses. Instead of looking for a clean piece of land to build from scratch, he saw that the abandoned hospital site had strong bones, solid architecture, and plenty of space for students. Under his leadership, Humber signed a 99 years lease with the province in 1991 to fix up the existing buildings. When the renovated campus opened in 1995, it gave the property a useful new role in Toronto's New Toronto community.
Gordon’s practical focus turned a long-standing property issue into a reliable hub for South Etobicoke. As former Ontario Premier William G. Davis noted when Gordon retired in 2007, "Squee [Dr. Robert A. "Squee" Gordon] obviously understood the intent of the College system, he nurtured it, and he is one of those leaders in the system who made it what it is today."
For anyone in Toronto thinking through a business idea or a project at work, Gordon’s approach offers a straightforward rule: You don't need a fresh start to build something useful.
When we want to start something new, we often assume we have to come up with an original idea from a clean slate. But in day-to-day work, some of the most practical business ideas come from a simpler question:
- What is an existing process, location, or resource that people in my community or industry are currently ignoring?
- How can I fix it up or adapt it so it actually serves a purpose today?
Building something worthwhile is often less about inventing something new, and more about making better use of what is already right in front of us.
Here are three action items to put this into practice this week:
- Attend the ExperienceTO: New Toronto Historical Tour on Saturday, August 8. Join us as we walk the site, share stories from the neighbourhood's history, and look at how these historic grounds were adapted for everyday use.
- Identify one overlooked asset in your work. Take 10 minutes this week to write down one process, product, or resource in your field that people find frustrating or ignore. Ask yourself: how could this be simplified or repurposed into something helpful?
- Take a walk through Humber Polytechnic's Lakeshore Campus. If you can't make the tour on August 8, visit the grounds on your own time this week. Let the restored buildings remind you that with a practical perspective, overlooked spaces can be turned into useful resources for the community.
Thank you for taking the time to read and reflect.
Until next time,
Alex Rășcanu
P.S. If you'd like to read the past life lessons-focused e-newsletters, you can find them here.
P.P.S. See you at one of the upcoming monthly #ExperienceTO historical tours, such as the New Toronto one on Saturday, August 8th.
