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Students walk around York University Keele campus, Toronto in this file photo.Fernando Morales/The Globe and Mail

Students in York University's engineering program might be forgiven for thinking they've walked into a brash young startup or a Silicon Valley technology company rather than a stodgy school campus when they begin classes this month.

Wood floors, primary colours, whiteboards everywhere and not a single lecture hall – the new Bergeron Centre for Engineering Excellence packs all the hallmarks of a Google or Facebook operation, and purposely so.

The oblong, 16,000-square-metre building, constructed at a cost of $69-million, is a key pillar of the Toronto university's attempt to align higher education more closely with the business world, or at least with what engineering students can expect to encounter once they graduate. Full story.

New Brunswick bets nascent marijuana sector will bring jobs

On Aug. 23, the government invested $4-million in Zenabis, a company Kevin Coft launched to build a proposed medical marijuana facility in Atholville, N.B. The money comes in the form of a repayable loan, and Mr. Coft says it signals that Premier Brian Gallant's Liberal government is serious about supporting the sector. Full story.

Leave Canada to succeed? Startup feels the pressure

Armen Bakirtzian and his team are looking at funding sources beyond the country's borders. There are a lot of U.S. and international investors interested in Intellijoint, he says, but they're all pushing for the company to move to where the money is."They request that the business assets be in their home country and that we hire in their home country," says Mr. Bakirtzian. "But we want to keep our operations in Canada – we're a Canadian company, our families are in Canada, and there's a lot of engineering talent where we are in Waterloo. Full story.

Lower loonie is a double-edged sword for entrepreneurs

The lower loonie is turning out to be a double-edged sword for large swathes of the Canadian economy. While the decline from rough parity with U.S. currency began at the end of 2012, the dollar was stricken by the plunge in energy prices toward the end of 2014. Since its steep drop to below 70 cents, the depressed dollar has recovered but is expected to remain relatively low compared with U.S. currency for the foreseeable future. Full story.

More small business news from around the web

Why it matters that Donald Trump and his ilk are encouraging bad manners at work

In Canadian companies today, someone like Trump, would, in all likelihood, be terminated (with cause), not promoted to the top job. However, such impolite, coarse and outright disrespectful discourse across the political realm and beyond, is finding its way into the workplace — even  in Canada. Full story.

Slack announces plans to open Toronto office and hire 145 people

The company says that it's chosen Toronto as its next location to take advantage of the diverse labour pool, which it said is especially beneficial for customer service. Slack plans to hire 145 people in the city over the next two years, with the office officially opening in mid-December 2016 at 171 John Street, just south of Grange Park off Queen. Full story.

Facebook launches new tool allowing small businesses to target global customers

Facebook's new offerings include a feature called Lookalike Audiences, which helps advertisers target customers in new countries that are similar to their existing customer base. Banks noted there are 445 million people outside of Canada connecting to a Canadian business on Facebook. Full story.

What employers need to know about office romances

While workplace relationships can flourish without incident, they can also pose major challenges for employers on a number of levels. In fact, anti-sexual harassment and workplace violence legislation introduced in many provinces was borne of workplace relationships gone awry. In Ontario, Bill 132, the Sexual Violence and Harassment Action Plan Act, 2016—which just came into effect—was inspired by a series of incidents where workplace relations morphed into violent encounters that, in at least one case, resulted in a fatality. Full story.

A publisher joins an industry it covers, blurring lines

When Judy Balint, the chief marketing officer at SmartBiz Loans, read a freelance article that her company's president contributed to Entrepreneur.com last month, she was startled to see that a promotion for a rival lender had been added to the beginning — a lender with a partnership with Entrepreneur. Full story.

SMALL BIZ COACH

Question: I need cash to grow my business but my bank won't lend me more money. What can I do?

Answer: You need to establish a positive working relationship with the bank. Beyond e-mail correspondence, you have to be in personal contact with your account manager.

Keep them informed of current events in your company, how you are tracking vs. plan and other details. They do not like surprises.

Your account manager will likely go to bat for you if your situation warrants it. For them to plead your case to the risk managers you need to have a strong and credible relationship with them.

A wise banking executive once told me that regardless of your situation, it is impressive if you have a plan of how you will spend money from loans and how soon you will pay them back. She said, "It is hard to argue with a good plan and it is easy to defend to my bosses…" If you want money, say what you are going to do with it and do what you say you will. Credibility is everything. Full story.

Compiled by Sarah Efron

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