Quebec and Ottawa Region PD Day
Lower Canada College hosted the CAISap Quebec and Ottawa Region PD Day. With the help of co-host Molly McKay of The Priory and the guidance of our CAISap PD co-chair Sharon Cozens, the program featured sessions covering the topics of board governance, volunteer management, social media, trends in annual giving and stewardship. Each session brought with it the chance to reflect on how the theory discussed could be implemented in each participant’s program.
Antonia Maioni, alumna of The Priory and Sacred Heart schools (link to full bio), was able to share her experience in collaborating with boards and trustees. With Antonia’s prompting we explored a number of the challenges of volunteer/board management and discussed different ways to approach them.
Derek Cassoff, Director of Communications, Development and Alumni Relations Office, McGill University, shared his expertise in social media, highlighting current trends in information access. Derek was able draw attention to the need for regular updates of content in order to engage constituents.
Our final speaker Camilla Leigh, partner, Mather Leigh, (link to full bio), advised us that during the ”economic crisis” our annual donors still gave to those organizations with which they have close ties. There are great opportunities for growth and development in Annual Giving programs in the near future. The key elements to achieving these goals were summed up in three words -innovate- personalize- contextualize.
Lunch was held in the Saputo Lounge overlooking the Glenn Chamandy Arena. Thankfully, the lively discussion around the tables meant that nobody really noticed our Quebec teams losing to UCC in their second victory of the day!
In the afternoon, our group split for round table discussions on Alumni Engagement and Volunteer Management. Sessions that were later described as thought provoking, encouraging and excellent therapy.
John Vlahogiannis, senior coordinator of professional development at LCC, articulated the importance of participating actively in professional development.
Sharon Cozens noted the National Conference taking place in January 2013 and encouraging us to update our details on the CAISap and LinkedIn web sites.
Members were also advised to watch out for news of an upcoming 5 à 7 (that’s “happy hour” for those outside Montreal).
In all, over 30 advancement professionals and board members were present during the day. Thanks to all those who made time for the event. Thank you to Molly and Sharon for hard work in putting this together and to the staff at LCC (Shaun, Bina, Donna, Lucie & Sylvain) who helped to make everything happen when it needed to.
