Every other month, CFIB members lend their opinions to 'Your Voice,' a survey exploring a variety of current topics. The latest takeaways are showcased in a series of informative charts that summarize these findings.

Your Voice Highlights

September 2024

CFIB’s September Your Voice captures key insights on the current health of businesses and explores whether small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) across Canada would encourage others to start a business today. The survey also delves into the labour market challenges SMEs face.

Business Health

Business health includes factors such as cash flow, financial stability, employee and customer satisfaction, and the effectiveness of systems and processes. As of September 2024, 25% of businesses are in weak or critical condition, while one in three report being in strong health.

Sentiment on Starting a Business

Fewer than one in five business owners (19%) would advise someone to start a business at this time. The primary concerns include rising operational costs (89%),economic uncertainty (76%), the high tax burden (72%), and excessive government red tape (62%). Together, these factors highlight the challenging environment for SMEs, leaving many owners doubtful about the sustainability of new ventures.

Labour Market Challenges

Labour market issues remain a significant hurdle for SMEs, with the overall cost of labour (56%), difficulty recruiting skilled employees (52%), and labour quality concerns (51%) being the top issues. Additionally, concerns about workforce quality are widespread, with 40% of business owners expressing neutral or negative views, citing low productivity (69%), excessive personal communication (67%), and lack of motivation (66%). These issues highlight the growing difficulty SMEs face in maintaining a capable and productive workforce.

Addressing these challenges is critical to ensuring the success and growth of SMEs and fostering entrepreneurship in Canada.

Dive Deeper into the Numbers

Explore the interactive dashboard below to delve into the data from our September 2024 Your Voice survey.  You can filter the data by province, sector, business size, and age for SMEs across the nation.

Marvin Cruz

Director of Research

Explore more September 2024 insights and our extensive survey collection below.