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Housing is one of Canada’s most complex challenges, shaped by policy, infrastructure, community, and the deeply personal meaning of home. That complexity was at the centre of Innovation North’s 2026 Systems Innovation Challenge, presented in partnership with ATCO Ventures, which brought together 245 students from 25 universities across all 10 provinces to rethink the future of housing through a systems lens.
For MSc ’26 candidates Evie Xiong and Susu Li, the Challenge was an opportunity to move beyond quick fixes and explore how different parts of the housing system connect. In this Q&A, they reflect on what drew them to the experience, how systems thinking changed their approach, and why it reshaped not only what they think about complex problems, but how they think.
Q&A with Evie Xiong and Susu Li
What motivated you to get involved in the Innovation North Systems Innovation Challenge?
It started with Mazi Raz’s Systems Thinking course – it actually changed the way we think. Before that, most of our training was very solution-oriented. You define a problem, you break it down, and you come up with an answer quickly. But his approach to systems thinking really shattered that. He challenged us to step back and ask a different question: What is this system producing, and why? We felt that shift was very new and, honestly, a little uncomfortable at first, but also exciting.
So when this Challenge came up, it felt immediately relevant. It wasn’t asking for a polished answer, but inviting us to stay with complexity and explore a system in a more open-ended way. It felt like a valuable opportunity to apply what we had just been exposed to in class.
At the same time, the topic of “home” is something that we both relate to personally, as international students. It’s not just a physical space; it’s tied to belonging, access, and how supported you feel in your day-to-day life. The question was asked, and the Challenge was pitched in such a way that we were very keen to get involved.
The Challenge asks, “What is home becoming?” – how did your team interpret that question, and how would you now describe the future of “home” in Canada in one sentence?
Actually, our starting point was really simple, just something we noticed in real life. One of our teammates lived in Toronto and mentioned that a lot of the new condo developments didn't even have parking anymore. Then one night, when he was dropping us off, we realized something else. Beyond parking, the area itself didn’t really support daily life. Things like where a car can stop, services nearby, or how easy it is to get around were not always well thought out.
That moment has stayed with us. It made us realize that what is delivered is not always in line with how people actually live.
From there, our thinking evolved through the workshops, our conversations, and the two months we spent working on this. We moved from seeing the gaps to trying to understand why they keep happening, and what the system is optimizing for.
In one sentence, home in Canada is becoming a place that is efficiently delivered, but not always designed for how life actually happens.
Can you tell us about how your team approached working together on such a complex issue?
Early on, much of our thinking was still very solution-focused. People would jump to, “What can we fix?” or “What should be improved?” But pretty soon we realized that the approach was too narrow for this kind of problem.
Instead of jumping to answers, we started mapping it all out. We brought different ideas, observations, and perspectives, even if they didn’t necessarily connect at first. And then we tried to look at them together and ask: How are these actually connected?
Over time, that process became much more of a team effort. Rather than debating who was “right,” we sought to connect the dots across the different pieces – marrying lived experience, stakeholder perspectives, and system constraints into something more coherent.
We also did a lot of additional research to back that thinking up, particularly around different stakeholders and how their incentives and timelines interact. That helped us transition from a series of observations to a more structured understanding of the system.
This Challenge emphasizes systems thinking over common managerial problem-solving approaches – how did that influence your approach?
We grappled with how to frame the problem at different levels. For example, what is an individual-level issue versus a community- or system-level issue? And how are those layers linked? That was what was confusing for us in the early stages.
What really helped was going through the sessions, workshops, and conversations with our mentor. We began to have a better sense of how to structure our thinking over time – not because we forced a solution, but because we made the relationships between the different layers and perspectives clear.
That shift became the basis for a lot of our later decisions. It affected even the smallest things, like how we framed an insight or connected two ideas.
What’s one assumption about housing or “home” that your team had to challenge or rethink?
One assumption we had to rethink was what a home is. In the beginning, it was very easy to think about housing in a simplified or even idealized way, as something that should provide on its own complete comfort, convenience, and stability. But our view started changing along the way.
One idea that really resonated with us, and was also echoed by one of the guest speakers, is that home is not a finished product, but a platform. It creates the conditions for people to live, to connect, and to reach their potential, but it doesn’t do that by itself.
That shift led us to realize that “home” cannot depend on one system, department, or institution. Many parts intersect: housing development, infrastructure, services, and community design, and it only works when those pieces are aligned.
At the same time, we also saw how difficult that alignment really is. The frictions between different actors, timelines, and priorities often mean the “platform” doesn’t quite work as planned.
What did you find most difficult or different about the experience, and how did your team navigate it?
One of the most difficult parts was the transition in how we were expected to think. After listening to the mentors and guest speakers – people who are actually working in this space – we realized that our initial way of framing the problem wasn’t quite right. Their perspectives were much more layered and grounded in real-world constraints, which pushed us to rethink how we were approaching everything.
But making that shift in real time was not easy. We were working in a fairly intense, fast-paced environment, and at the same time, trying to connect multiple ideas, perspectives, and system layers into something more coherent. That transition – from scattered observations to a deeper, more structured understanding – was probably the hardest part for us.
What helped was continuing to talk things through as a team, even when we didn’t have all the clear answers. Instead of rushing to finalize ideas, we focused on gradually connecting pieces and refining our thinking step by step.
With students participating from across Canada, how did that national perspective shape your thinking in any way?
Definitely, the diversity of perspectives was a huge influence on us. The students came from different cities and parts of the country, and each location seemed to show a different aspect of housing. Some stressed affordability, others focused on infrastructure, mobility, or community design. That diversity made it obvious that there isn’t a single “housing problem,” but a lot of overlapping ones, depending on context.
People’s cultural backgrounds also affected their understanding of the idea of “home.” What appears to be a must-have or a gap can vary greatly, and it really opened up our thinking on the issue.
What we noticed was that the more diverse the team’s perspective, the more likely it was to see the problem at a system level. Even if teams began with a small or specific observation, they were usually able to connect it to larger patterns and priorities.
We also talked with several teams, and those conversations gave us insight into how others were integrating their own major issues into a larger system. That really required us to think beyond our initial focus and consider a broader set of connections.
What did you take away from working with the podcasts and virtual sessions?
They helped us to move from an abstract understanding of systems thinking to something we could actually apply. Before this Challenge, we had some exposure to systems thinking in class, but it often felt quite conceptual and hard to put into practice.
The podcasts and virtual sessions made systems thinking more concrete. Hearing practitioners talk through real housing issues gave us a clearer sense of how to approach complexity – how to organize ideas, connect different parts of a system, and frame problems more effectively.
They also broadened the scope of information we were working with, bringing in perspectives from people actively working in the field rather than relying only on our own observations.
Looking ahead, how has this experience shaped the way you think about your future – whether in your career or in how you approach complex problems?
We certainly think differently now. Before this experience, we were more detail-oriented, trying to fix particular issues or improve specific parts. We didn’t always take a step back and look at the big picture or how everything fits together.
This experience started to change that perspective, particularly as we learned to apply systems thinking. We think less about discrete problems and more about how different parts of a system relate to each other, and how those relationships affect the outcome.
We also see how this way of thinking can be applied beyond this Challenge. In business and most real-life situations, problems are rarely isolated. Being able to step back and see the broader structure and how different systems relate to each other is going to be useful going forward.
All in all, it not only changed what we think about, but also how we think.
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