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Marketplace Leaders Network

Why the Marketplace Leaders Network?

Formed spiritually. Leading redemptively. Multiplying Kingdom impact.

Marketplace Leaders Network exists because many Christian business owners and senior marketplace leaders carry significant responsibility for people, culture, strategy, resources, and outcomes — often without a trusted discipleship pathway for the actual weight of marketplace leadership.

These leaders are not simply managing businesses. They are shaping workplaces, making decisions that affect families, stewarding resources, absorbing risk, building teams, and influencing the culture of our city.

The Vision

Ottawa shaped by Kingdom-minded marketplace leaders.

We long to see Ottawa shaped by a unified community of Christian leaders across the Church, ministries, prayer, and the marketplace. Marketplace Leaders Network serves one focused part of that broader vision: Kingdom-minded business owners and senior marketplace leaders who lead redemptively, disciple through business, and advance God’s Kingdom in the marketplace.

This vision is not about creating another networking event. It is about forming leaders. It is about helping business owners and senior leaders see their work as worship, their businesses as tools in God’s hand, their people as those entrusted to their care, and their influence as a gift to be stewarded for the flourishing of the city.

Who this is for

Established owners and senior leaders.

Marketplace Leaders Network is for professing Christian business owners and senior marketplace leaders who already carry meaningful responsibility for strategy, people, culture, resources, and outcomes.

This is not primarily for people who are only thinking about starting a business. The initial focus is on leaders already carrying the weight of leadership in the marketplace.

Participants likely include leaders who:

  • Make a good living through their business or leadership role
  • Employ staff or carry responsibility for people
  • Shape strategy, culture, and decisions
  • Carry real leadership pressure and influence
  • Want their faith to shape how they lead
  • Desire trusted peers who understand business and discipleship

The challenge we see

Many leaders have been discipled for church life, but not for the real weight of business leadership.

Business owners and senior leaders regularly face decisions about hiring, firing, growth, conflict, cash flow, succession, risk, culture, and stewardship. These are not only business questions. They are discipleship questions.

How does a leader follow Jesus under pressure without losing their soul? How can a company become a place where people are treated with dignity and care? How is success stewarded so it becomes Kingdom impact rather than simply personal achievement?

Marketplace Leaders Network exists to help Christian business owners and senior leaders be formed by Christ in the very place where they lead.

Our three core promises

The simple language of the network

Be formed spiritually as you build.

Leadership pressure is not separate from discipleship. It is often one of the places where Christ forms the leader most deeply.

Lead people redemptively, not transactionally.

Business leadership is about more than performance, productivity, and profit. It is about people, culture, dignity, and faithful stewardship.

Turn business success into Kingdom impact.

Influence, capital, creativity, relationships, expertise, and opportunity can become gifts for the flourishing of employees, churches, neighbourhoods, and the city.

Why another network?

We are not trying to replace what already exists.

There are already many excellent Christian business resources, conferences, ministries, peer groups, and organizations. Marketplace Leaders Network is not being developed because those resources do not exist.

Its distinct role is to become a local Ottawa relational and discipleship layer for established Christian business owners and senior marketplace leaders. We want to learn from strong existing resources, partner where possible, connect leaders locally, and apply formation and discipleship in real business contexts.

What makes this different?

  • Local to Ottawa and leaders who consider Ottawa home
  • Discipleship-first
  • Carefully selected and relationally safe
  • Business-literate and practical
  • Applied inside real leadership decisions
  • City-minded, not only individual-focused

The pathway

Listen → Gather → Practise → Multiply

Listen

Begin with conversations that name the real pressures, needs, and opportunities business leaders carry.

Gather

Invite leaders into trusted rooms for prayer, peer counsel, spiritual formation, and practical wisdom.

Practise

Apply redemptive leadership in real business decisions, teams, systems, and relationships.

Multiply

Mentor others, host conversations, collaborate for the city, and shape the next generation.

Current stage

We are listening before we build.

Marketplace Leaders Network is currently in a listening and validation phase. The first step is to speak with established Christian business owners and senior marketplace leaders to test whether this need is real, whether the proposed response is valuable, and what kind of pilot would be worth their time and commitment.

Based on those conversations, the next step will likely be a small six-month pilot with a carefully selected group of business owners and senior leaders.

The pilot may include:

  • A monthly gathering
  • Confidential peer conversation
  • Spiritual formation
  • Prayer and discernment
  • One real business or leadership challenge
  • Practical application between meetings
  • Individual check-ins

What flourishing could look like

Not merely a stronger network — a different kind of leader.

Over time, we long to see Christian business owners and marketplace leaders in Ottawa become more spiritually grounded, relationally connected, and practically equipped.

We long to see leaders who build without losing their souls, make decisions from belovedness rather than striving, steward success without being owned by it, and treat employees not merely as staff or cost centres, but as people entrusted to their care.

The fruit we are praying for is a community of leaders whose inner life, business life, and public impact are increasingly integrated under the lordship of Christ.

Are you an established Christian business owner or marketplace leader in Ottawa?

We are currently listening, learning, and inviting a small number of leaders into conversations that will shape the first pilot.

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