Students pitch ways to eliminate homelessness in Ontario at annual SHIFT Public Sector Case Competition

Ryan MacDonald (MPP ’18) has always had an interest in creative problem-solving and public service. His time at the Munk School’s Master of Public Policy (MPP) program offered him ample opportunities to explore this passion.

“I value case-based approaches to learning through complex problems with no clear path to resolution. You quickly learn, instead of becoming an expert in a particular area, to become an expert in problem-solving, which translates perfectly into consulting,” recalls MacDonald.

With that in mind, MacDonald founded the Consulting Careers Initiative (CCI) as a Munk School student leadership initiative while he was a student in the MPP program. “I’ve always been more interested in solving problems that have a clear social impact, and finding ways to help government work better, and to help public sector entities with their thorniest, most difficult problems.” CCI helps students prepare for and connect with the public sector consulting industry. The group organizes training workshops, and networking events to build a bridge between the classroom and public-sector consulting.

One of the major highlights for students in the Consulting Careers Initiative is the annual SHIFT Public Sector Case Competition, hosted by the Munk School in collaboration with KPMG. This event is a career focal point for graduate students across the University of Toronto. Students from the Munk School’s Master of Global Affairs (MGA) and MPP programs are teamed up with students from the Rotman School of Management and iSchool, to tackle relevant and pressing public sector issues. This year’s competition took place  in January, placing the issue of homelessness in Ontario municipalities at the forefront. Ten teams pitched policy solutions for transitioning people out of short-term housing before a panel of judges that included Rosemary Foulds, co-founder of Affordable Housing Action; Jen Arntfield, from Sustainable Affordable Housing at Federation of Canadian Municipalities; and Sharon Campbell, director for the City of Toronto’s Homelessness Initiative. Winning teams received a cash prize and first-round interviews for internships with KPMG.

The SHIFT case competitions was designed to  bring interdisciplinary teams together to propose solutions to complex social issues.

Second-place winner Giancarlo Da-Ré, a first-year student in the MGA program and one of KPMG’s interns this upcoming summer, felt that the case competition acted as an excellent preview of the kind of consulting work that students might do upon graduation. “The process of building a client-oriented solution that tied in such diverse perspectives and considerations made this experience unique from other case competitions I’ve participated in.”

Outside the weeklong preparation and pitch, however, are also broader connections between students and the consultancy world. Last year’s KPMG summer intern, Anton Meier, a second-year MGA student, played a key role in running this year’s SHIFT case competition. He emphasized how case competitions played a big role in his decision to pursue a career in consultancy.

“Case competitions like SHIFT serve as a gateway into the consulting sector. In many ways, these competitions simulate the work we do as consultant,” said Meier. “They also act as a great way for students to find out if they enjoy working in consulting, and for employers to meet bright young minds, especially with SHIFT, which draws students from non-business programs.”

Students are able to flex the core skills they have learned in class in a collaborative environment and come up with solutions to real-world problems. MacDonald emphasized how this case competition showcases the skills of students at the Munk School. “Beyond the technical knowledge of learning about governance and institutions, what we see the most in students KPMG hires out of the Munk School is a high level of strategic thinking and the ability to distill complex problems into their component parts.” What started as a small group to help MacDonald’s peers has grown into a pillar of the Munk School’s student life, and an initiative that has helped develop leaders in the public sector.