Latest News
- Details
- Category: Telfer Announcements
The Strategic Leadership Cabinet’s mandate is to advise the Telfer School with regard to its strategic choices and to provide information that will permit the evaluation of the relevance, quality, and effectiveness of its current and upcoming programs. The Cabinet also assists in identifying the ways in which the business community and the public sector can contribute to the strengthening of the School.
Meet the Cabinet
Rob Ashe - Chair of the Strategic Leadership Cabinet (Telfer BCom ‘82) joined Ottawa-based firm Cognos in 1984 and served as President and CEO from 2004 to 2012. He transformed the company into a world-renowned producer of business intelligence software and grew it to become Canada’s first billion-dollar software company. Ashe stayed on as general manager of business analytics after the organization's acquisition by IBM in 2008. With an avid interest in advancing the technology sector in Ottawa, Ashe has been the Lead Independent Director at Shopify since May 2015. He’s a 2020 Lifetime Achievement Award recipient, an award from the Ottawa Business Journal and Ottawa Board of Trade. He was also the former Lead Director of Halogen, until its sale to Saba Software in 2017. Ashe is currently an Executive Partner at Bridge Growth Partners, the Lead Director of MSCI, a Director of ServiceSource International, and a Fellow of the Institute of Chartered Accountants of Ontario.
Louis Gagnon (Telfer MBA ‘97) has been with Intact Financial Corporation, the largest provider of Property & Casualty Insurance in Canada, since January 2007. Mr. Gagnon has served in many key executive roles beginning with Senior Vice President, Quebec, and including President, Intact Insurance; President and Chief Operating Officer; President, Service & Distribution; and, President, Canadian Operations. In June 2021, Mr. Gagnon was appointed Chief Executive Officer, Canada. In his current role, Mr. Gagnon is responsible for all Canadian-based business entities and operations including Intact Insurance, belairdirect, BrokerLink and Johnson Insurance. Prior to joining Intact, Mr. Gagnon headed a successful Insurance Brokerage with offices in Quebec and Ontario and was very active in provincial and national brokers associations. Mr. Gagnon is a member of the Board of Directors of the Insurance Bureau of Canada, member of the Telfer School of Management Dean’s Strategic Leadership Cabinet, member of the “Comité Consultatif International du recteur de l’Université de Montréal” and member of the Board of Directors of the CD Howe Institute. He has been an active board member and volunteer of many charitable organizations and is specifically very proud to have been involved with United Way for over 30 years.
Justine Hendricks (Telfer MBA ‘04) has a demonstrated history of working in the financial services sector and has been a critical member of the Canadian export community since 2006 at the start of her career with Export Development Canada (EDC). She took on the role of Senior Vice-President, Sustainable Business and Enablement in 2019, and added the role of Chief Corporate Sustainability Officer (CCSO) in May 2021. Hendricks has worked closely with EDC’s banking partners and is a key component of the business development group. She received a Trudeau Medal in 2017 from Telfer in recognition of her leadership, initiative and contributions to the business world.
Patricia Saputo is the Co-Founder and Executive Chairperson of CRYSALIA, which supports Enterprising Families to succeed multi-generationally by creating and delivering deliberate learning journeys for their family members. She is a role model for female leaders in male-dominated industries, the business world, and the community. After her career at Deloitte in the Tax Department, she was asked to join the Board of Directors at Saputo once they went public in 1997. As a lifelong learner and a believer that education is a never-ending process - a process for the betterment of oneself, one’s family and for continued improvement of communities around us - she truly enjoys educating others.
Macky Tall (Telfer MBA ‘92) is the Co-Chair of Carlyle Infrastructure Group, which includes efforts across transportation, renewables, energy, water & waste water and digital infrastructure. Before joining Carlyle, Mr. Tall served in a series of leadership positions at Caisse de dépôt et placement du Québec (CDPQ), one of the world’s largest infrastructure investors and the second-largest pension fund in Canada. He also served on CDPQ’s Executive Committee and Investment-Risk Committee and served as Chairman of the Board of Directors of Ivanhoé Cambridge.
Ian Telfer (Telfer MBA ’76), the Telfer School’s namesake, is a Canadian executive and philanthropist who is known for his strategic business success in the mining and resource sector. Telfer is the former chairman of Goldcorp Inc., a Vancouver-based gold mining company, and former chairman of the World Gold Council. Telfer led Goldcorp Inc. since 2005, first serving as Goldcorp’s President and Chief Executive Officer before being appointed Chairman of the Board in 2006. Telfer has earned the reputation of being a ‘visionary mining entrepreneur’ for his ability to grow multiple mining companies. His 30 years of success in the resource sector can be attributed to an intrinsic aptitude for strategically timed acquisitions and value-driven mergers. In 2015, Ian’s career in the mining sector earned him induction into the Canadian Mining Hall of Fame 2015, and the Canadian Business Hall of Fame in 2018. Telfer was also awarded an honorary doctorate from the University of Ottawa in 2015.
Kathryn Tremblay (Telfer BCom ‘95) is the CEO and Co-Founder of excelHR, Altis Recruitment, Altis Technology and excelITR, with over 30 years specializing in the human aspect of human resources. She has dedicated her career to the betterment of the staffing process, launching her entrepreneurial journey at the age of 21 when she launched a small staffing firm in the Outaouais region. Tremblay paved the way for a new way of qualified job sectors with prospective employers particularly when it comes to filling executive roles. With its affiliated companies, excelHR has become a recognized leader in the delivery of recruitment and staffing services in Canada. Tremblay is an avid mentor for women in the workforce and encourages young people to pursue a career in entrepreneurship. She was also named the 2021 CEO of the year by the Ottawa Business Journal and the Ottawa Board of Trade.
Stéphane Brutus is currently the Dean of the Telfer School of Management. Between 2006 and 2017, Dr. Brutus served as Dean (Interim), Associate Dean Graduate Professional Programs, Chair of the Management Department and Director at the Bell Research Center for Business Process Innovation at the John Molson School of Business, Concordia University. Previously, Dr. Brutus worked as a Visiting Professor at Universidade Federal da Bahia, in Brazil and Universidad Pablo de Olavide and Instituto de Empresa, in Spain.
James Price - Secretary of the Strategic Leadership Cabinet, is the Executive Director of Development and Community Engagement at the Telfer School of Management and is responsible for leading the school’s external outreach vision, development, and community engagement initiatives. Driven by a desire to make a positive impact on society, he takes great personal pride in building sustainable relationships and partnerships to advance higher education, research, innovation, and economic development. Prior to joining the School in 2019, James led Canada’s national stem cell advocacy and strategic funding efforts as President and CEO of the Canadian Stem Cell Foundation.
- Details
- Category: Latest News
The Telfer School of Management has just unveiled its Vision for a Better Canada. Director of Executive Programs, Glen Orsak, answers questions on how Telfer’s Executive Programs contribute to achieving this bold vision.
What are Telfer’s Executive Programs are all about?
Our focus is pretty much exclusively around leadership development. Lots of executive education shops have a much broader range of things that they do: how to be a better this or a better that. We have chosen to focus on Leadership. Leadership is about making things change, whereas management skills make things operate effectively. We work with leaders to transform their leadership capabilities. We also work with organizations who want to grow their leadership capacity. There’s always that dual focus. We’re serving an organizational need — a strategic imperative — and we’re serving the needs of the individual leader for their career or professional development.
How do these programs help contribute to a “Better Canada”?
You know, it’s funny. At one point our team penned a neat and tidy statement of purpose that declares that we are about: Transforming leaders. Shaping communities. Changing the World. It hasn’t gotten a lot of public attention, yet, but it still anchors a lot of our conversations. We’re all about transforming leaders. By doing that, we help shape organizations and communities. And by shaping and transforming organizations and communities, it is leading to a better world. Transforming Leaders for a Better Canada sharpens that focus for our programs, our community of practice and our customers and clients.
I know it sounds like a lofty goal — and it is. It made us stop and go, “Really? There’s only 17 of us!” But we realized that of course that’s what we’re doing. We are working with people every day who are going to become very accomplished and influential leaders, people who are setting out to have an impact in their own corner of the world based, in part, on the experiences they’ve had with us. So why would we shoot any lower than that?
Having a growing number of better companies in Canada, or better government institutions, or better healthcare organizations will certainly make Canada a better place.
Who are your Executive Programs for?
Lots of our clients are in the public sector, working for the public good — literally to make Canada a better place. Lots of our clients are in healthcare and they are, again, literally making Canada a healthier place. These people are absolutely committed to a better Canada. That’s what brings me back every day.
One of the things we tend to do really well is we create customized learning programs within certain communities and sectors. In the federal government there are communities of like-minded people. So, we created a leadership program for the policy community. We have a leadership program for the security and intelligence community. We have one for lawyers and people in the justice department. We have a leadership program for people in national defence and related sectors centred around huge complex projects — think military procurement. We try to find ways to build leadership programs that are contextualized, customized and relevant in those communities such that you’re not just gaining generic leadership skills but learning the practice of leadership in your own unique context.
How do your programs help leaders have a broader impact?
Some people have gone through our programs and five years later are sending their own leadership teams through our programs, too. They’ve described the huge impact it has had on the culture of their organization. The entire leadership conversation can change. Sometimes my team will know the entire executive team at such and such a health care institution or government department because almost every one of them has been through one of our programs. Obviously, that’s having a high impact on these organizations and communities.
I would also argue that our business has a very strong social mission. When you’re working in the healthcare or public sector, you’re working with people engaged in social, economic and community development. We’re trying to help leaders create culture shifts and to introduce progressive changes that will transform their workplaces. We have to bring these kinds of discussions into the room because our clients expect it.
What affect do you think your programs have on participants’ careers?
Can we attribute their success entirely to our programs? Of course not. It’s not a one-to-one correlation, but it doesn’t need to be. I wouldn’t take credit for your success, but I would certainly take credit for having nudged you in the right direction. And a nudge is good enough for me. I think that’s a valid intention to have, I think it’s the truth about what we do and it’s not too much hubris. We don’t set ourselves up as these heroic gurus of leadership. Rather, we position ourselves a co-pilgrims on a leadership journey — on the pilgrimage to make Canada a better place.
Has anything changed since the pandemic began?
Prior to March 13, 2020, we didn’t have much online programming. Since the first pandemic lockdown, every single minute of programming from then until now has been delivered in a virtual environment. The conversion to online was rapid and amazingly successful. You could say that the pandemic response in the executive learning space has opened all of our minds to virtual learning — and I think we will never go back to the old way. We can’t unsee the possibilities. Oh, we’ll definitely go back to the in-person learning experience, there’s no doubt about that, but there are a ton of things that we’ll no longer do in-person, because it no longer makes sense.
It’s given us all the push we’ve needed to innovate and improve how we deliver our programming — and that’s giving us access to a broader set of potential clients. We’ve already had people join our programs from across the country that probably wouldn’t have otherwise. Now, all of a sudden, we can enrich our engagement with communities outside of Ottawa and possibly have an even greater impact on shaping a Better Canada.
You can learn more about Telfer Executive Programs at telfer.uOttawa.ca/executiveprograms.
- Details
- Category: Donations / Fundraising
A special message from Stéphane Brutus, Dean of the Telfer School of Management
Every day at Telfer, we try to move our vision of a Better Canada forward. But some days we don’t just move it: we ignite it to greater heights. Today is one of those days.
Today, we ignite the Smart Money campaign, in support of Telfer’s Vision for a Better Canada. And we’re inviting you to join us in a campaign that we believe will make Telfer history. And change Canada forever.
Our Vision is fifty years in the making
Its goal is a greener, healthier, happier and wealthier Canada for all, made real by one-of-a-kind labs and institutes of research, learning and practice. You can be one of the first to inspire and help build these centres to achieve profound social change — and your smart money will be the impetus for more.
The Smart Money has always been on Telfer
Why else would Ian Telfer have made the biggest donation ever at the time to a Canadian business school? Why else would CEO Magazine have rated our Executive MBA program #1 in the world — twice?
They saw a School years ahead of its time, dedicated since day one to putting business to work for better. A School situated at the very core of Canadian decision-making. And a School that’s ready to throw its entire weight at helping Canada and utilizing its huge, untapped potential.
The world needs a Better Canada —and that will take a bolder Telfer
We’re asking you to help make both happen, by giving to the Smart Money campaign.
You and your money will be even smarter if you give right now — because every dollar donated will be personally matched by Ian Telfer himself, up to $50,000, to a maximum of $5,000 per individual.
You can make a one-time gift or a recurring gift. It’s all at telfer.uottawa.ca/en/donate/, which describes The Telfer Nation Fund and the Better Canada Impact Fund.
Join us in the ultimate start-up
In many ways, through our Vision, we’re launching a start-up, the biggest we’ve ever imagined. With an ROI that our children and their children must have.
You can be an early investor in a Better Canada. I’m in. Our faculty and staff are in. Join us.
Thank you,
Dean Stéphane Brutus
- Details
- Category: Donations / Fundraising
James Price, Telfer’s Executive Director, Development & Community Engagement, and the Telfer community engagement team are leading Telfer’s Smart Money campaign in support of our Vision for a Better Canada, the most ambitious awareness and fundraising effort in Telfer history. Just hours before we ignite the Smart Money campaign, he found a few minutes to explain what the campaign will achieve, what it’s going to do for Telfer and Canada, and why, of all possible moments, now is the time to make this happen. Every alumnus or citizen who wants to see a Better Canada can play an important part.
So, what’s at the heart of Telfer’s new Vision?
We feel that business has a critical leadership role in addressing some of the big challenges facing the country, whether it be social, economic, or financial. We are generating new knowledge, insights and practice through research, and most importantly applying that to developing young management students and mature management leaders.
And how does the Smart Money campaign fit in?
It’s a focused five-year effort to make smart and strategic investments in the future based on research, experiential learning, and program renewal.
Why is research-inspired teaching such a big part of the campaign?
Research creates new insights and translates into a better classroom experience, the thing that matters most. Our student evaluations show that our best researchers and practitioners are our best teachers - they’re constantly bringing in new ideas, new challenges and new case studies - and they're on top of the new knowledge within their communities of practice.
It also leads to better business practices
And not only for students, but for executives. As it relates to our vision and four themes, that means initiatives to implement new business practices around better inclusivity in the workplace; around structuring a family enterprise to support the next generation of enterprising leaders; around integrating sustainability into business decision making and reporting to shareholders, and around rethinking healthcare systems to be more effective and deliver better care to patients.
You mentioned family enterprise – that's important to the Canadian economy
It is, and we have an internationally recognized group of researchers and practitioners leading our efforts. We're building a whole next generation education program for family enterprises.
‘Next generation’ education for enterprising families – is that unique, as so often we focus on the family business itself or the patriarch/matriarch of the family business?
We’re focused on the next generation, the people who may or may not move into the family enterprise. We are looking at questions like what do these children and grandchildren do with the family wealth to create new but often related, enterprises? We’re looking at it more broadly than just the single business.
What are the three major thrusts that you mentioned for the next five years?
Number one is experiential learning: our Dean believes that it's through real life experiences that our students are going to truly unleash their potential. This is why we want to add an experiential component in every program and learning offering. And we want to integrate this in the student experience as much as possible. Competitions and clubs are great for that and we’re really strong there, but we want that experiential component where it matters most.
The second thrust is the research-informed teaching we spoke about earlier.
As for the third thrust, right now, post-pandemic, is the big renewal opportunity for Canada. So our new Dean has signaled a complete renewal of our programs - and the fundraising campaign will allow us to innovate across our undergraduate and graduate programs.
We’re also planning to build brick and mortar Telfer infrastructure?
Yes, where it makes sense. For the Thriving Organizations and Societies Lab, we have a major initiative to refit and build a state-of-the art lab that can actually look at workplace dynamics, how people work with stress, leveraging one of the strongest groups of occupational and workplace psychologists in the country.
A few people have commented that the Vision seems to have come about as a result of the pandemic
The work to develop the vision actually preceded the pandemic. We had gone through a collaborative process leading into our recent 50th anniversary to determine our areas of strategic impact. Looking back and looking forward, we realized that contributing to a Better Canada has always been part of the School’s DNA. And now the Vision also answers the call to ‘build back better’ that needs to happen in Canada.
Look at the Vision’s health pillar and the pandemic response: much of the issues are operational issues, and logistics issues. Or the Vision’s happiness pillar: The workplace now is transformed. Teams have been physically disconnected for a year. What does this mean for workplaces, teams and employee wellbeing?
And of course, there’s systemic issues around equity, diversity, inclusion. Our professors have been committed to this type of research for a long time, but recently we’ve gained a lot of attention around work that demonstrates how marginalized groups have suffered more than others during the pandemic, and any type of economic rebuild needs to keep them at the core.
We can't ignore any of it. The time is now, and we’re committed to all of it.
To an alumnus who wants to get involved, this is about “build with us” versus “we’re the best, give us money”?
Absolutely! We’re a very good School, we know where we want to go, but we need your help. This Vision and campaign are ambitious. Five years from now, everyone's going to know we're a top school — but we can't get there without you.
There are so many ways to give to all this
And every gift matters. Yes, we need transformative gifts that can help us build these Institutes and help us recruit new chairs and senior leaders. But as we build those centres, we need to grow our already strong team and amplify their work. In recent years we've had excellent recruitment and our faculty is a modern, motivated group — and every single dollar helps us continue to recruit even better.
Here’s another way your money can work: our institutes aren’t ivory towers. We bring in executives-in-residence, so our professors can work hand-in-hand with practitioners, linking research and teaching to the world of practice. By contributing to our Better Canada Impact Fund, you help advance this work and make sure it is connected to better pedagogy for students and better practice.
And with our commitment to experiential learning and the student experience, your contribution to the Telfer Nation Fund will help us accelerate and expand these unique opportunities for all students across all programs.
What are the different giving channels?
You can give to the Telfer Nation Fund which is all about experiential learning and improving the student experience, or the Better Canada Impact Fund, to support innovative research and its application to teaching and practice.
Any amount of support - one hundred dollars, one thousand dollars or a million dollars — it’s all going to be put to work in an extremely smart way. It’s all about getting Telfer, getting business, and getting Canada where we want and need to be five years from now.
This really is the time to start
In every way.
Excerpts from an interview with James Price
.png?x=433&y=0&x2=1199&y2=511)
- Details
- Category: Telfer Announcements
The Telfer Impact goes beyond the classroom. There are countless stories of students and alumni who have truly made a difference through their involvement, community engagement, entrepreneurial vision, and hard work. Over the last 6 weeks, we’ve shared some incredible stories of Telfer students developing into the next generation of leaders:
The CASCO Impact
20 years ago, two inspired Telfer students founded the non-profit organization, CASCO. Every year, Telfer students team up to host spectacular events that raise money for families at the Children’s Hospital of Eastern Ontario (CHEO). CASCO has donated over $560,000 to the cause ever since.
The Growcer Impact
After visiting communities challenged with food insecurity in Northern Canada, two Telfer BCom alumni, Alida Burke and Corey Ellis created a hydroponic system that grows produce in controlled shipping containers. From there, the business, The Growcer Inc. was born. Today, the company is part of Invest Ottawa’s accelerator program, and its systems are being sold across Canada, empowering communities around the globe to grow their own produce.
The PhD Impact
Telfer PhD candidate, Alex Chung researches the design of wearable technology that influences human behaviour change. As a result of the balanced program, Alex has been able to lead an active and fulfilling life, while impacting the future of wearable technology.
The Unscented Company Impact
BCom alumna, Anie Rouleau is living her dream, running her own eco-sustainable, B Corp certified cleaning product business, The Unscented Company (TUC). Through her innovative business model, Anie has caught the attention of the public with her Dragons’ Den deal to sell TUC products in 500 Canadian Tire stores across Canada.
The MBA Impact
After discovering the world of administration while working at Montfort Hospital, Mélanie Potvin decided to elevate her experience with an MBA in French at Telfer. Now she has the crucial knowledge and confidence in her leadership role as Project Manager for the Orléans Health Hub at the hospital.
These are just a few stories of the meaningful change that Telfer Students are creating. What will be YOUR impact?
- Details
- Category: Telfer Announcements
At the Telfer School of Management at the University of Ottawa, we believe that it is through hands-on learning experiences and community support that we can help our students reach their goals, accelerate their careers and make a positive impact on our collective future.
This is the case for The Growcer Inc. - an Ottawa-based social enterprise co-founded by Corey Ellis and Alida Burke, two Telfer BCom Alumni. The pair came up with the idea for their modular hydroponic growing systems after having visited remote communities who face food insecurity in Northern Canada.
The plug-and-play hydroponic system gives produce everything it needs to grow in a controlled environment, built inside retrofitted shipping containers. These enable northern communities, schools, Indigenous and regional governments, as well as other businesses and non-profit organizations to develop more self-reliant and sustainable local food systems.
Through Telfer opportunities and extra-curricular activities such as the E-Foundry course and Enactus, Corey and Alida were able to travel the world, understand the challenges communities face, and build their business. Enactus is a student-led organization that uses the power of entrepreneurship and business, to help solve social problems. In 2017, the University of Ottawa became one of The Grower's first customers and acquired one of the systems to grow local food that’s now being served in our own cafeteria.
Now, The Growcer has over 15 employees and operates out of Invest Ottawa’s accelerator program at Bayview Yards.
Find out more about The Growcer Inc.
Find out more about our Entrepreneurship at Telfer.
Find out about uOttawa's Enactus Chapter.
Subcategories
Student Voices
The following article was written by a member of our student community. The views and opinions expressed in this blog are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of Telfer School of Management. For more information or to flag inappropriate content, please
