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Consultant | Speaker | Author | Facilitator & Trainer
darren swanson
Through Novel Futures Corporation, I fuse my compassion for sustainable, resilient and peaceful societies with my passion for respecting history, understanding the present and exploring the future.
darren's credentials
MPA-ID
P.Eng., P.E., IRP
M.Sc., B.Eng.
Masters in Public Administration and International Development, Harvard University, Kennedy School of Government.
M.Sc., B.Eng.
P.Eng., P.E., IRP
M.Sc., B.Eng.
Master of Science in Geotechnical and Environmental Engineering
Bachelors of Civil Engineering
P.Eng., P.E., IRP
P.Eng., P.E., IRP
P.Eng., P.E., IRP
Professional Engineer
(P.Eng. -Manitoba, P.E. - Colorado)
Infrastructure Resilience Professional (IRP)
darren's Journey and bio
engineering (1986-2000)
Strategy & Policy work at Harvard and IISD (2000-2013)
Strategy & Policy work at Harvard and IISD (2000-2013)
Following a fruitful and busy year in the College of Commerce in 1986-87 with an eye on the accounting profession, and while playing volleyball for the University of Saskatchewan Huskies, the provincial Canada Games Team and the Canadian Junior National Team, I plotted my early career shift into engineering.
I completed my Bachelors and Masters in Civil and Geo-environmental Engineering by 1995, punctuated by a year backpacking around the world - a year that would prove formative for my later focus on sustainable development (more on this later). I would spend the next five years as a soil-atmosphere and hydrologic computer modeller, doing research with the Unsaturated Soils Group in Saskatoon and then working with multi-disciplinary consulting firms in Colorado, USA. Then in 1999, I had my first experience with the United Nations system, taking part in a mine reclamation tour and knowledge exchange in Portugal.
This chapter would not be complete without mentioning two persons who provided timely and sage guidance to me as a young professional. Maurice Strong and Jim MacNeill, each in their own way, helped me shift the trajectory of my professional career towards sustainable development. This is a very interesting story in and of itself, and so I encourage you to read my blog below, "A Tribute to the Prairie Fathers of Sustainable Development".
Strategy & Policy work at Harvard and IISD (2000-2013)
Strategy & Policy work at Harvard and IISD (2000-2013)
Strategy & Policy work at Harvard and IISD (2000-2013)
After more than a decade learning and working as a civil engineer in Canada and the U.S., the intellectual tug toward systems thinking and sustainable development took hold. I was accepted into the Harvard Kennedy School and completed its new master's degree program in public administration and international development in 2002, during which time I learned alongside 60 other students from around the world.
They say you can take the boy out of the Prairie, but you can't take the Prairie out of the boy. So, in 2002, I joined the Winnipeg-based International Institute for Sustainable Development on a temporary three-month contract, with thanks to a fortuitous meeting with Dr. Laszlo Pinter, IISD's then Director of Measurement & Assessment, who just happened to be completing a post-Doc at Harvard.
Three months turned into an amazing decade of learning and doing all things sustainable development in Manitoba, across Canada, and around the world. I had the pleasure of working on a diverse array of projects with IISD's Climate Change, Resilience, Water, and Tracking Progress programs, as well as providing innovation, ESG, and corporate reporting support to IISD's then Chief Operating Office, Dr. William Glanville.
Founding of Novel futures corporation (2013-PRESENT)
Strategy & Policy work at Harvard and IISD (2000-2013)
Founding of Novel futures corporation (2013-PRESENT)
In 2013, I launched this website and founded Novel Futures Corporation, an international consultancy based in Winnipeg, Canada. This awarded me flexibility to help raise my amazing daughter, pen a novel, and consult for a diversity of like-minded organizations in Canada and around the world, including the United Nations, IISD, First Nations communities and municipalities, and federal and provincial governments.
For business, I've had the pleasure of supporting international development banks and economic cooperation organizations, provincial and national Chartered Professional Accountants associations, insurance associations and companies, Chambers of Commerce, and media corporations.
Through Novel Futures, I fuse my compassion for sustainable, resilient and peaceful societies with my passion for respecting history, understanding the present and exploring the future...to bring sustainable development to the heart of decision-making in the 21st century, be it in the government office, the corporate boardroom or the household kitchen.
At Novel Futures, I facilitate strategic foresight exercises and international forums, provide consulting services and public speaking for sustainable development and disaster risk reduction, help communities assess climate risk, and publish social fictional narratives and non-fiction technical guides.
As well, I volunteer as a member of the Rotary Club of Winnipeg, the club that made Rotary International, having served as past Chairperson of the club's Honouring Indigenous Peoples (HIP) Committee and the Model United Nations Assembly (MUNA) organizing committee.