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It’s been five years since the Greater Toronto CivicAction Alliance (CivicAction) and Maytree came together to put the spotlight on leadership diversity. Since then DiverseCity’s six research reports have exposed a critical gap: our leaders – the decision-makers, influencers and role models – do not look like the rest of the city region. Now it’s time to find out what GTA residents think about this issue. On Wednesday, May 22, join DiverseCity at a special anniversary celebration hosted by the Canadian Club of Toronto as leading Canadian pollster Nik Nanos shares the findings of the first public opinion survey on leadership diversity.
Too many Torontonians believe they can have no impact on their community, let alone their city. We’ve been working to change that. On Wednesday, March 20, Maytree is bringing together community leaders, organizers and those interested in making change where they live for CollaborAction: Building Blocks Learning Exchange.
Matt Galloway spoke about the report, “Get on Board, Corporate Canada”, with the lead author, Beata Caranci. She is a Vice President and Deputy Chief Economist at TD Economics.
While Black History Month is a great time to reflect on the accomplishments of historical figures such as Desmond and other prominent black Canadians, it also presents an opportunity to showcase the efforts of today’s role models and rising stars. Black Canadians are still breaking barriers, changing lives and contributing to Canada’s culture and legacy.
Ernest Tuckett doesn’t mince words when asked how he feels diversity should be addressed in the legal profession. Tuckett is a strong advocate for promoting minorities and believes there has to be some form of consequence to get outside law firms to respond effectively.
Women and minorities tend to gravitate toward boards for smaller, more community-based nonprofits. It’s now time for the next step, says columnist Robert Rodriguez.
With the help of a new grant from The J.W. McConnell Family Foundation, Diversity on Board will assist partners in other cities across Canada develop similar programs.
No. 34 on our 2012 list of Toronto’s 50 Most Influential People is Ratna Omidvar, the city’s most dogged advocate for the underutilized skilled immigrant. She gets in the room with high-powered politicians and CEOs and makes an incontrovertible economic case for diverse hiring practices and mentorship programs. Her biggest converts: former Manulife chief Dominic D’Alessandro, RBC’s Gord Nixon and TD’s Ed Clark. Here, she tells us what makes somebody a person of influence in the city and who would top her own list. In her words, the “new elite.”
It just so happened that, as a 2011 CivicAction DiverseCity Fellow, Scrimshaw was ideally positioned to realize her vision for the organization.
More than 150 rising and established leaders from the business, public, labour, academic, and not-for-profit sector joined CivicAction Chair John Tory and CEO Mitzie Hunter at a breakfast event. Also in attendance were the DiverseCity Fellows, rising city-builders who were selected to be part of CivicAction’s leadership accelerator program, one of its hallmark initiatives.
The “Faces of CivicAction” are 10 volunteers who represent a cross-section of people working with the group that brings together community leaders to tackle the region’s social, economic and environmental problems.
Launched in April 2012, Diversity 50 is a new resource for directors and search firms to access when seeking board candidates beyond their own networks.
Ask any successful salesperson about how best to close a sale and he or she will tell you that the key to doing so is eliminating the foremost reason for the buyer to say “no”. That’s exactly what the Canadian Board Diversity Council did this morning with the release of its Diversity 50 — a list of 50 candidates who are either women, visible minorities or persons with disabilities, and who are willing, available and qualified to sit on corporate boards.
The Toronto-based Maytree Foundation is trying to coax the region’s biggest corporations towards policies favouring suppliers owned and run by visible minorities. It has its work cut out for it.
The Royal Bank of Canada has a mentorship program to help businesses owned by minority groups to bid for its supply contracts. At the Toronto Dominion Bank, bankers take part in educational events for small- and medium-sized companies to join its diverse supply chain. Even the YMCA, a not-for-profit group, now asks its potential good and service suppliers about their own diversity program before giving them its business. However, the supplier diversity practices at these three Greater Toronto-based organizations are the exceptions rather than the norm, says a new report released Wednesday by the DiverseCity.
Toronto, ON, November 21, 2012: The report, Supplier Diversity in the GTA: Business Case and Best Practices, released today, finds that most organizations in the Greater Toronto Area (GTA) are not actively seeking to spend money with companies owned by visible minorities.
For America, 2012 will go down in history as the year of the Latinos, the blacks, the women and the gays. That rainbow coalition won President Barack Obama his second term. This triumph of the outsiders is partly due to America’s changing demographics. And it is not just the United States that is becoming more diverse. Canada is, too, as is much of Europe.
On November 21, 2012, join Maytree and the Greater Toronto CivicAction Alliance for the release of the latest DiverseCity Counts report – “Supplier Diversity in the GTA: Business Case and Best Practices.”
There are more women at the boardroom table of Canada’s largest companies, but there are fewer visible minorities and persons with disabilities, according to the latest annual survey the Canadian Board Diversity Council.
Transcript of a conversation at the Ascend Canada Fall Conference 2012 with Ed Clark, Group President and CEO, TD Bank Group, who spoke to an audience of 400 business professionals about his career, leadership style and the importance of diversity at TD.
