Company Overview
The Toronto Business Development Centre (TBDC) is Canada's first business incubator, with over 35 years of experience supporting more than 9,000 local and international entrepreneurs, including two that became unicorns. Focused on driving meaningful outcomes, TBDC equips high-potential startups with the resources, clients, and capital they need to grow. Learn more at tbdc.com.
About Horizon
TBDC's flagship is Horizon - a program that helps high-potential international scale-ups land and expand in North America. The goal isn't better events or better programming; it's real commercialization outcomes: founders who understand the market, win customers, raise capital, and plug into the ecosystem.
Horizon runs as one connected funnel of three products:
- Scout - an AI-first, expert-validated market-intelligence tool that produces deep research reports framing each founder's market and the engagement ahead.
- Sprint - an intensive week in the Toronto market, where each cohort meets the stakeholders, customers, and investors who help them understand the market and start selling or raising.
- Surge - the conversion into sustained support: we match founders with vetted advisors and consultants for ongoing, paid advisory and go-to-market work.
The Director of Operations and Commercialization (Horizon) owns the entire program.
Who You Are
Are you an entrepreneur or experienced business operator who understands what it takes to build, commercialize and scale a business? Have you worked directly with founders to validate markets, win customers and overcome growth challenges? You bring practical commercial judgment, strong operational discipline and the ability to turn plans into measurable outcomes. You are comfortable working directly with founders while leading the people, partners and processes needed to deliver an effective program.
Position Summary
We are seeking a Director of Operations and Commercialization to lead Horizon's day-to-day delivery and support participating scaleups as they enter and expand in the North American market. The Director works directly with founders to assess commercial readiness, develop actionable market-entry and customer-acquisition plans, and maintain momentum toward agreed milestones. The role combines hands-on commercialization support with responsibility for program operations, team coordination, partner engagement, budgets and funder outcomes.
Reporting to the Chief Programming Officer, the Director will:
- lead the end-to-end operational delivery of Horizon across Scout, Sprint and Surge, with clear owners, timelines and quality standards.
- work directly with founders to assess commercial barriers and translate market intelligence into practical commercialization plans.
- coordinate staff, advisors and partners to deliver market validation, customer introductions and sustained follow-through.
- identify specialist support needs and work with the Partnerships team to secure appropriate advisors, mentors and commercial connections.
- track company milestones, engagement quality, operational risks and program KPIs, and take corrective action when progress stalls.
The Opportunity
The Director of Operations and Commercialization is responsible for the development, coordination and delivery of assigned TBDC entrepreneurship and business growth programs, with a focus on operational execution, commercialization and measurable business outcomes.
Reporting to the Chief Programming Officer, the Director leads assigned programming staff and works closely with the Operations Manager to ensure effective program delivery. The role involves direct engagement with founders and leadership teams to assess commercial readiness, identify growth opportunities, develop commercialization plans and support market validation, customer acquisition and market entry.
The Director is accountable for day-to-day program execution, staff coordination, stakeholder relationships, approved budgets and achievement of organizational and funding partner KPIs. The role requires demonstrated experience translating commercialization strategies into actionable plans and measurable results for participating companies.
Key Responsibilities
Program Management
- Develop and deliver competitive programming and curriculum for startups, scale-ups and entrepreneurs.
- Align programming objectives with TBDC’s organizational priorities, founder needs and funding commitments.
- Lead and support assigned programming staff to ensure effective performance and resource management.
- Develop program evaluation frameworks to assess effectiveness, identify gaps and drive continuous improvement.
Program Coordination and Delivery
- Oversee the planning and delivery of workshops, mentoring sessions, founder events and program activities.
- Manage subject matter experts, mentors and external vendors within approved program budgets.
- Work closely with the Operations Manager and internal teams to coordinate schedules, resources and delivery requirements.
- Maintain program schedules, delivery plans and documentation to meet established standards and timelines.
Founder Success and Stakeholder Engagement
- Work directly with founders to assess commercialization readiness, develop market-entry plans and support customer discovery, market validation and business growth.
- Develop relationships with mentors, industry experts, investors and ecosystem partners.
- Establish strategic partnerships to strengthen programming and expand resources available to founders.
- Own the tracking of founder engagement, commercialization milestones, advisor follow-up and documented company outcomes.
Monitoring and Reporting
- Monitor program performance against internal KPIs, funding commitments and approved budgets.
- Maintain accurate records and collect participant data to support leadership and funding partner reporting.
- Evaluate program activities and participant outcomes to identify opportunities for improvement.
- Provide regular updates to the Chief Programming Officer on performance, operational risks and decisions required.
Qualifications
- Minimum 7 years of experience in program management, entrepreneurship, business development, commercialization or a related field.
- Demonstrated hands-on experience delivering commercialization initiatives and supporting startups or scaleups through market validation, customer acquisition or market entry.
- Proven ability to lead teams, manage program budgets and coordinate multiple priorities.
- Strong communication, facilitation and stakeholder relationship management skills.
- Experience with government-funded programs, performance reporting and CRM systems is preferred. Firsthand experience founding, co-founding or operating a business is strongly preferred, but equivalent direct commercialization experience will be considered.
Benefits and Perks
- Comprehensive health and dental benefits.
- Paid vacation and flexible float days.
- Convenient on-site parking.
- Access to major transit routes.
