Dr. Linda Maxwell’s prescription for innovation

The joy of learning and a passion for trying to make the Canadian health care system even better are what drive Dr. Linda Maxwell, the founder and executive director of the Biomedical Zone. The zone, which is a partnership between Ryerson University and St. Michael’s Hospital (now, Unity Health Toronto), is the first hospital-embedded health technology incubator in Canada.

Maxwell, who is also a practicing head and neck/facial plastic surgeon, received the Linda Grayson Administrative Leadership Award at the Ryerson Awards on April 1. This award was the latest in a string of accolades for Maxwell, who has been named one of Canada’s Top 100 Most Powerful Women by the Women’s Executive Network, and one of Top 30 Women Making a Difference in Tech.

In advance of the Ryerson Awards, Maxwell – who holds an honours bachelor’s degree from Harvard University, an MD from Yale University and an MBA from the University of Oxford – spoke with Ryerson Today about her leadership style, exciting developments at the Biomedical Zone and how her late father, Dr. Samuel Maxwell, also a physician, influenced her life.

The citation for your award mentions your mentorship and leadership in "building an inclusive structure and collaborative culture at the Biomedical Zone" – why is this important to you?
I think a lot of the time it’s easy to get tripped up on equality versus equity versus inclusion, and inclusion is what really matters.

Inclusion is an environment that adapts to fit everyone whereas equality is giving everyone the same opportunity regardless of where they start. But people have such disparate starting points – whether it’s physical, religious, racial, economic, gender – that equality doesn’t work in real life, that’s where equity comes in; where people are given opportunities to adjust for the socioeconomic and other disparities that create disadvantage.

But giving a person the opportunity is not enough, it’s about inclusion, how the environment adapts to play to everyone’s strength, regardless of where they start.

I really think inclusion starts at the top. The “tone at the top” is a term we talk about in business (I sit on a number of boards), and “the tone at the top” helps ensure a company operates ethically, and so on.

It starts with the tone that the leader sets. In this little environment [at the Biomedical Zone], I’m the leader and it helps that I look different. I don’t look like your traditional tech leader. I’m a Black woman surgeon from rural northern New Brunswick.

That automatically signals to a lot of people who are traditionally underrepresented or excluded completely from health care, from health tech, from health tech entrepreneurship, that it could be a place for everyone. But beyond that, at certain points in my life, I’ve been excluded because of some of those systemic barriers, so I feel it is important that the environment not only welcomes people but adapts to fit people.

Can you think of an example of how this plays out with your team?
Sure. We get a lot of Ryerson students coming in to do placements with our team and with the companies, to get experiential, work-integrated learning, and that can be very different for different people. For example, we will get students who come in who are very interested in being here but don’t have a background in tech, business, even health care.

I come from a place where I presume people have aptitude and ability, it might be in different areas, but everyone has something to offer. That’s the beauty of innovation, it comes from everywhere, and good ideas come from all over the place.

So I take great effort and pride in creating roles for people who really want to be here, roles that didn’t exist before, roles that allow them to come in and learn and work to their strengths, while also challenging them to learn new things. Therein lies the inclusion.

Have you had significant mentors who’ve made a difference in your life and career?
I can count the mentors I’ve had on less than one hand. It’s been very tough and that’s probably why I’m the person I am. I now have a couple of mentors/sponsors but for the vast majority of my career, it was me navigating in the dark.

I was the first Black woman to matriculate and finish my surgical speciality program, in the history of the program. And when you go through that kind of environment – one that’s closed, barriered, hierarchical, there’s a club you’re not part of – it’s tough to find mentors. It’s even harder to find sponsors – people who will actually “open the door” for you.

I think that’s changing now for people coming up, which is great. It’s only in the most recent years where I’ve had real mentorship.

My original mentors were of course my parents. I model much of how I view things on my mother and father both professionally and personally.

Things like resilience, doing the right thing, making good decisions when you have ambiguous information. Those kinds of principles and real life actions from my parents have carried me through life.

What are some of the Biomedical Zone’s current projects that you’re most excited about?
We are excited about all of our companies, otherwise, they wouldn’t be here. But one example is a company I took into the Biomedical Zone three years ago called HelpWear (external link) .

They came out of Ryerson’s Basecamp program, which is run by the Brookfield Institute for Innovation and Entrepreneurship. This one is notable because they were one of the first companies I took in.

The two founders [Frank Nguyen and André Bertram] were in high school in the East End, and had an idea to build a portable ECG monitor (electro cardio gram monitor). We got special permission from the university and the hospital to take in these high school kids after Basecamp and they have just gone way off the charts in terms of how great they’ve done.

They’re on their ninth iteration of their wearable device, called the HeartWatch. And they are just 20 and 21 years old.

The whole point of them embedding in the hospital is that it allows them to build up connections with cardiologists, understand the clinical problems that this device would need to solve, engage ethically with patients and data, set up studies. They wouldn’t have had the access to do that if they were just random 17 year olds knocking on a hospital door.

That in a nutshell is what Biomedical Zone does. It gives people access and resources and helps clarify the pathway they should take. It’s one of our great success stories, and we’ve had many.

What do you find most rewarding about your work?
I enjoy learning, that’s what drives me in life. I’m one of five sisters, and my father, who passed away in 1996, wanted all five of us to enjoy the process of learning. It wasn’t just about getting great grades, although we did, it was always about learning and scholarship and being curious and that has stayed with me to this day.

Also, I still get to be a doctor, and I also get to work with these really creative people on things that are way out there, things you only dream about. But then I get to bring it back to the one-on-one and the personal level as a clinician – that’s extremely rewarding.

In addition to that, coming to work and seeing people who are risking everything on a startup, a high-risk venture – this is their job. And knowing people are coming and showing up and putting everything on the line to make things better, is exceptionally inspiring.

I understand your father was a physician, how did he influence your career path and life?
My father was born in Ghana in West Africa and came to Canada in the 1950s, when it wasn’t a great time to be a well educated, smart Black immigrant. He was faced with racism and discrimination his entire life, even out in rural New Brunswick.

This is a person who persevered and persisted and never gave up in spite of anything thrown at him. He was always dignified and he cared about his family and he cared about his patients. Those were his two guiding lights, being totally committed to his family and his patients – that stays with me.

Most importantly I learned about not giving up, about persisting, and about being strong in your convictions. If you set your mind to do something, even if it’s super hard, you can do it.

What would you like people to know about the Biomedical Zone?
This hospital embedment is extremely unique – integrating clinical and business development, putting clinicians and patients together with startups so they can test and get their products to doctors and nurses and patients that much faster. Also the economic development whereby these companies can grow and hire more people.

It’s exceptionally unique and it’s a combination effort. It’s a culmination of everyone’s effort because of inclusion – everyone who’s come through these doors whether they are startups or students or people who work on my team. That is what makes it so special, that’s why it succeeds.

And there’s room for so much more – room to expand to help more startups and help more hospitals and work with more clinicians. We are just getting started.

Ryerson Awards Night – part of the larger Ryerson recognition program co-ordinated by Human Resources – celebrates the achievements of faculty and staff in teaching, research, administration, service and leadership, honouring 68 individual recipients and six teams. To learn more about all the award winners, visit Recognition and Awards.