Claim OwnershipPeggy Van de Plassche
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© 2026 Peggy Van de Plassche
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Peggy Van de Plassche is a seasoned advisor with over 20 years of experience in financial services, healthcare, and technology. She specializes in guiding boards and C-suite executives through transformational change, leveraging technology and capital allocation to drive growth and innovation. A founding board member of Invest in Canada, Peggy also brings unique expertise in navigating complex issues and fostering public-private partnerships—key elements in shaping the Future of Business. Her skill set includes strategic leadership, capital allocation, transaction advisory, technology integration, and governance. Notable clients include BMO, CI Financial, HOOPP, OMERS, GreenShield Canada, Nicola Wealth, and Power Financial. For more information, visit peggyvandeplassche.com.
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Uncomfortable thought? Good. For years, I thought my biggest professional obstacle was incompetence around me. Slower thinkers. Insecure gatekeepers. Political operators. You know the type. What I eventually realized — painfully — is that the real issue wasn’t just them. It was the emotional wound I was bringing into the room. When someone: • Interrupted me • Slowed momentum • Questioned my framing My nervous system didn’t think “complex organization.” It thought...
👗🤖 How ChatGPT Improved My Fashion Style. Or Did It? My sense of style took a very real downturn during the pandemic. Not because I suddenly stopped owning nice things (multiple closets, still standing). Not because I ran out of skincare (I could open a small apothecary). But because I felt… uninspired. A bit at a loss. Then a friend told my husband and I how he used ChatGPT to upgrade his closet: 📸 he photographed everything (including suits in deep retirement) 🧠 aske...
Everyone is debating AI fluency. Or DEI. Or generational friction. But the real productivity drains I see inside organizations are far less fashionable — and far more costly. 1️⃣ Lack of empowerment Rooms full of smart people waiting for permission. Circular meetings. Silence until things blow up. 2️⃣ Not connecting the dots Process over purpose. Templates over thinking. “I’m just doing my job.” 3️⃣ People completely tapped out Burned-out ...
Integrity is not sexy. It doesn’t trend. It doesn’t sparkle on a résumé or a dating profile. And yet… it’s the one thing you really can’t afford to ignore. In my latest newsletter, I argue that integrity is the most boring value with the highest ROI — whether you’re hiring, dating, choosing friends, clients, or even employers. Because here’s the uncomfortable truth: You can hire brilliant. You can date charming. You can work with “impressive.” But if you skip the...
What car would the people in your life be? 🚗 Over the past few years, friendship has quietly moved to the top of my personal agenda. Pandemic effect? Age? Life doing what life does? Probably all of the above. We all have circles. First circle: the people who truly have your back. Second, third… and some who shouldn’t even be on the map. After a recent party, I realized a friend had moved from my first circle to my third. And suddenly, a very clear image came to mind: a...
💡 What if innovation started with people — not technology? This week, Dubai quietly did something North America still struggles to do. A Dhs12.8bn expansion of Dubai Silicon Oasis isn’t just another tech park story. It’s a lesson in how to build an innovation ecosystem that actually works — where housing, healthcare, education, transit, and advanced tech are designed together, from day one. In my latest newsletter, I explore: • Why Dubai is putting people first and technology second (on...
Yes. Five. Minutes. No leggings. No 45-minute commitments. No heavy weights. No “no pain, no gain” theatrics. Just short bursts scattered through the day that actually… happen. I don’t like working out. I like moving. Big difference. This newsletter is about how I stopped fighting my personality, ignored fitness trends, and built a system that: – strengthens my body – doesn’t disgust me – and survives real life, winter, ugly sneakers, and motivation g...
Last week I attended the 2026 Macroeconomic Outlook organized by 100 Women In Finance at Scotiabank—and walked away with one conviction: The conversation was anchored by Rebekah Young, Laura Lau and Nan Chen, CFA, FRM Global growth is holding (~3.2% in 2025), markets are still up, AI momentum is real—and yet: Job and wage cooling is unmistakable The disconnect between markets and the real economy is widening AI is shifting from hype to maintenance capital Canada sits at a ...
We all know the data by now: Screens are rewiring our brains, shrinking attention spans, and quietly eroding social skills and relationships. Yet family dinners look like a row of people sitting next to each other… scrolling. Parents model presence—or absence. Playgrounds are louder, attention is shorter, and boredom (which kids actually need) has disappeared. And Silicon Valley’s solution? 👉 More apps to help us be on social media less. I love the irony. Here’s the thing: I love my phone...
Dinner party. Assigned seating. Luxury objects being passed around. Inventories compared. Photos shown. Colleagues' behaviors discussed—at length If this had been women with handbags, the verdict would have been immediate: vain, shallow, boring 🙄 But it wasn’t. It was men. With watches ⌚ So suddenly: – it’s not vanity, it’s craftsmanship 🛠️ – not gossip, but “knowing the ecosystem” 🌐 – not posturing, but passion Same behavior. Entirely different intellectual upgrade. No...
🎯 If you set only one career resolution for 2026, make it this. Stop treating LinkedIn like a photo album And start treating it like your own HBR 📖 Thought leadership isn’t about posting more. It’s about thinking better — and making that thinking visible 🧠 Writing regularly has: sharpened how I listen 👂 clarified how I think ✍️ elevated the conversations I have 💬 and, yes, quietly unlocked career opportunities 🚪 Not because I post pictures of where I go — but because I share what I se...
🚧 Career stalled? Before you panic — listen to this. Career slumps don’t mean you made bad choices. More often, they mean the environment shifted, the market moved, expectations drifted, or something quietly stopped fitting. I’ve been through several versions of the career slump — sometimes forced, sometimes chosen, sometimes just confusing — and I’ve tested more remedies than I care to admit. In my latest newsletter, I share what actually helped me regain momentum, without platitudes o...
Ever feel like you’re managing an overconfident junior analyst — only this one costs $20/month and never sleeps? That’s been my relationship with ChatGPT-5 lately. Brilliant at first glance, charming in tone, but when deadlines hit… it cheerfully tells you everything is “✅ On track” while the deliverables are nowhere to be found. I’ve done the homework — deep-dive courses, optimized prompts, feedback loops tighter than a McKinsey Gantt chart — yet the “deep research” experience remains ...
What makes something valuable? Its beauty, its rarity… or the story it tells? A few years ago, I met artist Abraham Reyes — heir to the world’s largest natural pearl, the Giga Pearl, appraised at $135 million. But instead of locking it away, he turned his inheritance into art. He uses real gems and wild pearls to create sculptures that question what value really means — in art, in markets, in culture. It reminded me of Marcel Duchamp, who once placed a urinal in a museum and called it ...
For years, I was a model student of personal development — from the most structured to the most woo-woo. Therapy. Energy work. Coaching. Yoga. Breathwork. You name it — I did it. And it worked. I’m calmer, more confident, and more grounded because of all that work, not despite it. But here’s the catch: at some point, all that “growth” starts getting in the way of life itself. You go from living to self-improving. From “being” to “fixing.” You start chasing the next workshop instead of ...
💬 What’s the Best Career Advice You’ve Ever Given? Last week, I was speaking at the Club Canadien de Toronto during the Francophone Summit on Finance and Investment 2025. The panel was about Power, Leadership, and Investment: Who Shapes the Finance of Tomorrow? But the moment that stayed with me came from the Q&A. A young woman in the audience asked: “What advice would you give to someone like me starting out in finance?”My co-panelists gave wonderful, practical answers — build a n...
The most underrated form of personal development? Reading someone else’s life. Not the polished business bios that read like PR exercises. But the real ones — messy, contradictory, deeply human stories of artists, writers, and athletes who fail, doubt, reinvent, and rise again. Reading David Bowie makes you question how far you’d go to reinvent yourself. Jane Birkin teaches you what it takes to reclaim your own narrative. Didion and Babitz expose the eternal tension between disc...
When I say invest in yourself, I don’t mean another AI course, eMBA, or leadership retreat in the Rockies. I mean literally: invest in your appearance, fitness, and energy. Why? Because ageism is alive and well — for both women and men. Pretending it doesn’t exist won’t make it go away. As a (very honest) friend working at a large bank told me: “I’m doing everything I can to look young. In my group, no one is overweight and no one is above 40.”Scary? Maybe. Realistic? Absolutely. In to...
I’ve seen it too many times. New tech emerges — blockchain, crypto, digital transformation — and companies rush headfirst into POCs, MVPs, and pilots… …forgetting to ask the most important question: 👉 Why? AI is no different. During my month in the Emirates, I attended several AI events and heard it all: ✨ AI for Good. AI for the People. AI as an Enabler. Refreshing, compared to the ego-driven “move fast and break things” we so love in North America. But I also met the Evangeli...
I spent a month in the UAE. And I came back thinking — they’re doing what we in the West keep talking about… but with coherence and conviction. In the Emirates, economic development isn’t an afterthought — it’s a strategy. If you want to access sovereign wealth funds, the rule is simple: 💼 No local office, no money. Capital comes with purpose. You invest in the country, not just from it. The same logic applies to government contracts and SOEs. Public funds are tied to publi...
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