Shane Malcolm turned the page on 2020 with a brand new focus.
The former president of Niagara College’s Student Administrative Council who has spent the past four years inspiring Niagara’s next generation of leaders at the helm of Leadership Niagara, now finds himself at the cusp of a new chapter in his career.
In January 2021, he took on a new challenge as the director of career success for the Onyx Initiative. The start-up organization is devoted to boosting professional opportunities for Black postsecondary students and recent graduates from across Canada, into the corporate world.
Malcolm supports and works directly with scholars who have been accepted into the program from coast to coast. For the 170 individuals who were selected to be a part of Onyx’s first cohort in early 2021, he helps build their support network, provides career advice, or professional or personal development support, and helps them grow into roles and opportunities presented in corporate Canada.
“Our participants, we call them scholars, are already exemplary, dynamic, well-rounded individuals. We’re just the funnel to amplify and show corporate Canada that they are people that current system biases would typically miss,” says Malcolm. “I see a lot of myself in pretty much everybody that’s a part of the program.”
When the opportunity was presented to him late last year, after weathering the personal and professional storm of 2020, Malcolm knew it was perfect time for him to take a leap.
“It felt serendipitous,” he says.
The NC years
Malcolm first arrived in Canada in 2009 to attend Niagara College as an international student from Montego Bay, Jamaica.
Drawn to his passion for cooking, he had researched culinary schools to attend after high school, with his heart set on the U.S. After attending an international college fair with his Grade 12 class and checking out all the American schools in attendance, he spotted the NC banner with a big #1 written on it piqued his interest enough to approach the booth and strike up a conversation. Out of all of the schools he looked into, he chose to apply only to Niagara College’s Culinary Management program.
He experienced a shift in focus academically during his College years, and graduated from the Culinary Management (Co-op) in 2011 and Bachelor of Business Administration – Hospitality (BBAH) program in 2014.
At NC, he also emerged as a strong student leader, with a passion for student government and advocacy. After his initial involvements with the NC Student Administrative Council as director of clubs and volunteers, and as the executive vice president of the Niagara-on-the-Lake Campus, Malcolm ran for NCSAC president and was elected two years in a row from 2014 to 2016. He made NC history, becoming the first international student at the College to hold the position.
As NCSAC president, Malcolm strove to build credibility for the organization and strengthen its voice in order to earn a seat at the table when making decisions that affected the student body. His work on the Ride With Me Transit campaign created awareness for the importance of intermunicipal transit for students as well as local residents. He also advocated for students at the provincial level, and was elected director of the College Student Alliance Board of Directors for 2015-2016 where he represented 110,000 students across Ontario.
Malcolm has always believed in giving back to the communities he is part of, and was involved with the Niagara Regional Transit Steering Committee and the Niagara Poverty Reduction Network.
His approach to leadership is to have the right mindset. “As a young leader, you must work twice as hard to prove yourself,” he says.
He is always twice as prepared so that there is no reason for anyone to dismiss his opinion just because of his age. One piece of advice that he has for future leaders: be aware of how you present yourself.
“The light is always on, you never know who may be watching you,” he joked. “Credibility and opportunity come from the moments when you think no one is watching. Dress for the job that you want to have, not the one you have.”
He credits his exposure to community activism and the network he built during his time as a NC student as the reasons he stayed in Niagara, in addition to being a member of the NC Board of Governors.
Malcolm maintains a strong connection to NC and the people there, including NCSAC presidents that served after him.
“Even after I started at Leadership Niagara, I was often on-campus for meetings, so I would make sure to say ‘hi’ to friends and former colleagues while I was there and everyone would joke that it was like I never left,” says Malcolm. “Everyone there knows they can always reach out to me for anything. I’ll help where I can and continue giving back. I’m glad I never shut the door after my time there.”
Leadership Niagara
In May 2016, just before the end of his second term as NCSAC president, Malcolm was offered the role of acting executive director at Leadership Niagara, and was selected as the new executive director in October 2016.
It was quite a transition for Malcolm, going from a big staff at NCSAC to a team of one at Leadership Niagara – which aims to build bridges between business and community, and inspiring the next generation to give back to the community.
As executive director, he wore many hats. During more than four years there, he focused on modifying and strengthening the core leadership program from a brand and content perspective, and cementing the organization as an incorporated business, rather than a community initiative.
Malcolm takes pride in how he has helped Leadership Niagara evolve from an organizational perspective during his time there. He finds that his most rewarding moments were listening to the learning experiences of each cohort at the end of their program, and how they became involved in the community after their Leadership Niagara experience.
“Changing a mindset takes time, and the application of that doesn’t happen overnight,” he says. “It’s great to see individuals who graduated back in 2007 now more involved in the community and leading boards.”
A life-changing year
Malcolm looks back on the challenges of 2020 as having a major impact on shifting his career focus for 2021.
He had dedicated most of the year pivoting operations at Leadership Niagara due to the COVID-19 pandemic, at a time when community organizations were more focused on surviving than professional development.
He also faced an emotional battlefield in his personal life due to the social justice movement.
“It was not news to any person of colour,” he says. “Everyone else woke up to it … everyone’s focus was on it but, for me, it had to be a conscious choice to manage and watch carefully how I engage because it’s not something that can get ‘shut off.’”
Malcolm noted that he didn’t get involved in a major way due to the heavy emotional toll that came with the discussion.
“When you’re engrossed in the conversation from a news perspective and community level, and even in your own house or kitchen conversations, you feel like you’re constantly ‘on’ explaining what’s going on. It’s like being the lone female in the room always having to explain the female experience to a man,” he says. “It was a challenge because you’re the one constantly reliving that. As much as you are trying to provide an opportunity for education and expansion, it’s your burden to bear.”
Having his personal and professional life intersect during COVID-19, removing any physical separation between life and work, along with the emotional weight of the social justice movement, he reached the conclusion that it was time for a change.
Onyx Initiative
Founded by entrpreneurs and philanthropists in the wake of the global social justice movement and subsequent call to action in the fall of 2020, the Onyx Initiative was established on the premise that all young people seeking meaningful employment and advancement should have an equal opportunity to do so. It aims at expanding the Black talent pipeline through cohesive, mutually beneficial partnerships to close the systemic gap in the recruiting and selection of Black postsecondary students and recent graduates for roles in corporate Canada.
According to Statistics Canada, Black Canadians with postsecondary degrees are under-represented in higher-paying occupational groups, compared to their white peers, with some industries showing greater disparities than others. The new support program addresses this data and acknowledgement by corporations that identifying candidates is a key challenge. It aims at breaking down the barriers between ambitious young Black people entering the job market, unable to secure positions in their chosen fields or equal opportunities for advancement within companies, due to hiring practices that adversely and disproportionately affect Black students. Mentorship and coaching and online training are pillars of the Onyx program to ensure scholars are equipped to thrive in their workplaces.
Malcolm knows how the traditional system can present barriers for Black job candidates. He speaks about how a person’s name or how they look can prevent them from getting call-backs from employers.
He reflects on his own experience as a NC Hospitality student, seeking employment with a luxury brand, when he was told that he would need to cut his dreadlocks before he would be considered for employment.
“At the time, people I told about the interview were more upset about it than I was. I didn’t tie it to systemic racism. I just thought, ‘your policy is your policy,’” he says. “Years after, I look back at it and it’s another example of something that’s wrong, legitimized by a policy.”
Because he didn’t wish to conform, Malcolm decided to re-adjust his career aspirations and shift away from hospitality entirely. Now, he recalls the experience was part of his motivation for wanting to join the Onyx Initiative.
“My experience as a Black professional in Niagara, and as an immigrant, it really spoke to me wanting to be a part of Onyx –not only as a Black-specific organization but looking to make the space better for future corporate leaders and professionals going through corporate Canada,” he says. “Everything about it just felt like the next step.”
Joining this initiative at the ground level is exciting for Malcolm, who has an opportunity to help build the foundation for years to come.
“Hopefully the system self-corrects to the point where everybody is working towards equity, inclusivity and diversity until an organization like Onyx doesn’t need to exist,” he says. “Until then, there’s a considerable amount of work that can be done.”
Special honours
Malcolm was honoured with NC’s Distinguished Alumni Award in October 2019 when he returned to the Welland Campus as a special guest speaker for Fall Convocation.
Addressing the Class of 2019, he urged the graduates to embrace their own unexpected journeys toward success.
“What success looks like is never as linear as we think it needs to be,” he says. “Success is not a destination; it’s a journey.
“There is no greater force than the success you’re feeling right now.”
Written with files from Patricia Bernardo
