Hone has been working with Engineva since 2016 to edit the technical documentation required for their clients’ SR&ED (Scientific Research and Experimental Development) tax credit applications to the Canada Revenue Agency. As anyone involved with SR&ED applications knows, getting the narrative right is a key component of qualifying for refunds and avoiding audits. Review by the Hone team ensures not only that the text is mistake-free, but that the framing and language used is specifically tailored to meet and exceed the expectations of SR&ED auditors. Hone has helped Engineva achieve an over 96% success rate and earn tens of millions of dollars of tax credits for their clients.
Andrew began working with MY01 during the McGill Clinical Innovation Competition (CLIC) that “aims to inspire members of our Faculty of Medicine community to conceive and develop promising ideas that will have a direct and positive impact on Canadian or global health care.” Andrew’s role is to help prepare all finalists (mostly senior McGill professors) for the 8-minute pitch competition, a web-broadcasted public event used to select the final recipients from an initial pool of over 50 entries. After the competition, MY01 realized they still had work to do identifying the core messaging that would enable them to be successful in communicating with their external stakeholders. They then hired Hone to work with their senior communications, finance, and product development leaders to better articulate their core value propositions. Since this series of meetings, they have successfully exceeded their fund-raising targets and have emerged as a start-up to watch in the Canadian medtech community. The relationship has since come full circle when their senior communications lead came to one of Andrew’s undergrad communications classes where MY01 was featured as a case study to introduce the art of business proposal pitching.
The McGill 3MT has become one of McGill’s SKILLSETS premiere events. With over 100 graduate students competing in multiple rounds of heats for a coveted finalist spot in a 2-hour live streamed feature event at the McGill Faculty Club, the stakes are high. The results have been outstanding as past McGill winners have gone on to compete and then win on the national stage. Andrew’s role is designing and delivering the training program. Because of the scope of the event and the mandate from the client, Andrew designed a program to train a cohort of graduate students to do the initial training. After the first round of competition, he is then involved with working with the finalists for 2 additional rounds of feedback, one in small groups (3-4 students) so that they can benefit from learning from each other, and another individually just before the competition where final wrinkles can be ironed out.
Check out the video link here to see the results: https://www.mcgill.ca/skillsets
Andrew was involved with the Lister Family Engaged Science Initiative at the MacDonald campus of McGill University since its inception. The program initially started with a small summer student research grant. Working with the original program administrator, Andrew then helped envision creating the program it is today: a year-round science presentation training program that runs multiple events and offers nearly 100 hours of presentation time in a variety of formats. Starting with helping write the program vision and initial grant request all the way through to running the training programs and hosting events, Andrew has been involved with every aspect of this program, including the shift to going completely online during the COVID pandemic.