Jamaican Canadian entrepreneur and philanthropist Wes Hall is on the shortlist for the 2023 National Business Book Awards for his memoir No Bootstraps When You’re Barefoot: My Rise from a Jamaican Plantation Shack to the Boardrooms of Bay Street.

The $30,000 annual award recognizes the best business-related writing and research in Canada.

The book titled No Bootstraps When You’re Barefoot: My Rise from a Jamaican Plantation Shack to the Boardrooms of Bay Street follows Hall’s personal story about growing up in poverty in a home where domestic violence was prevalent. The book details how he overcame these challenges and trauma to achieve personal and financial success, as well as how he now uses his voice to advocate for social justice causes.

Hall’s podcast, Between Us with Wes Hall, features conversations on systemic racism with leaders of colour. The founder of the anti-Black racism

initiative, BlackNorth, he is also one of the investors on the hit TV series Dragon’s Den.

This past October, Hall told his remarkable story from the podium at York University on receiving an honorary degree, Doctor of Laws, honoris causa.

The other books on the shortlist are Unprecedented: Canada’s Top CEOs on Leadership During COVID-19, and The Next Age of Uncertainty: How the World Can Adapt to a Riskier Future.

Unprecedented: Canada’s Top CEOs on Leadership During COVID-19 is a series of essays that explain how Canada’s biggest companies survived the corporate world during the COVID-19 pandemic.

The Next Age of Uncertainty: How the World Can Adapt to a Riskier Future provides insight into the Bank of Canada from the former Governor and experienced economist, Poloz.

The 2023 winner will be selected by an independent jury and will be announced at an in-person event on Nov. 8.

Last year’s winner was Billion Dollar Start-up by Adam Miron, Sébastien St. Louis and Julie Beun.

Previous winners include Plutocrats by Chrystia Freeland, The Patch by Chris Turner and Viva MAC by Andrea Benoit.