About

My name is Jane Porter and I’m a Canadian currently studying and working in Finland. I came here to start my Masters in Corporate Environmental Management in 2007 and now work at the University of Jyväskylä with Global Venture Lab. To give a bit of a background, I did my Undergrad at Carleton University getting my Bachelor of International Business degree (with 1 beautiful year in Lyon France). Before that, I was born and raised in the isolated but beautiful Northern Ontario.

My interests are many but most of all I’m interested in how business (and people!) can play a role in pushing forward the sustainability era.

Here in Finland, the opportunities have been amazing. Not only have I thoroughly enjoyed learning about the ‘other’ side of business, I’ve managed to sneak myself into a group here that promotes growth venturing for problems worth solving. My cup of tea.

My job can be hard to explain but essentially I’m working with GVL along with our partners in India (IIT Kharagpur) and the U.S. (U.C. Berkeley). Our goal is to turn university research and education from local “closed door class room action” into a globally connected “open door problem solving action”.

In doing this, I completed my thesis on “Growth venturing for sustainability”  working with our first live case startup – a Finnish wind power company.

So, exciting stuff on two fronts.

I could likely go further but suffice it to say that I think that I’ve wandered into that directed path towards finding my own passion of how I want to make a stamp on this wonderful world we call home.

Other than that, I’m always up for a good talk with good friends and good beer.

This blog is a little bit of everything but mostly it’s just me trying to make sense of this non-sensical world. Agree with me? Disagree? I don’t care, I love connecting with people. If you want to reach me, me(at)janeporter.ca is where you can get me.

Cheers.