Five Good Ideas Podcast

How can you advance your non-profit’s values through the use of technology?   In this session, recorded live on January 23, Amy Sample Ward, CEO of NTEN and author of The Tech That Comes Next¸ and Katie Gibson, Executive Director of the Canadian Centre for Nonprofit Digital Resilience, presented their answers to this question.   [5:38] 1. Never put technology ahead of people. [10:23] 2. Create div...

When searching for a new office space, it’s all about the lease. In this session, recorded live on November 25, George Georghiades, Principal and CEO of Lexington Park Real Estate Incorporated, presents his advice on who to hire for help, what to look out for, and how to minimize risk in what is often an organization’s second largest expense. These are his five suggested steps for a non-profit’s l...

If the well-being of a non-profit organization depends on its financial health, then the quality of the relationship between senior, or finance, staff and the board of directors is key. In this session, recorded live on October 24, Michael Herrera, Chief Financial Officer at George Brown College, shares lessons from his wealth of experience as a staff member and a director. These are his five good...

The charitable sector has navigated many new challenges in the past few years. How do we now quantify our impact, respond to the future of work, and relate and respond to social movements?  In this Five Good Ideas session, recorded live on September 28, Sabreena Delhon, executive director of the Samara Centre for Democracy , discussed how to break out of default binary non-profit work processes to...

In this session, originally recorded on June 1, 2022, we asked Katharine Coons, National Senior Manager, Workplace Mental Health at Canadian Mental Health Association, to share her five good ideas on how create a psychologically healthy and safe workplace. Read the full transcript. Download the session handout. Five Good Ideas Reduce stigma Normalize the conversation Use appropriate language Hold...

In this session, originally recorded on April 26, 2022, we asked Teresa Marques, president and CEO of the Rideau Hall Foundation, to share her five good ideas on how to navigate effective development within the non-profit and charitable sector. Read the full transcript. Download the session handout. Five Good Ideas Form should follow function . Figure out your internal and shared goals, the table...

In this session, originally recorded on March 29, 2022, we asked Nandita Bijur and Galen MacLusky to share the mindsets and principles that have helped their organization, Prosper Canada, introduce and integrate human-centred design into their projects.   Download the session handout at https://maytree.com/wp-content/uploads/5GI-Mar2022.pdf . Five Good Ideas More poetry, less long-division Use des...

In this session, originally recorded on February 24, 2022, we asked Marlene Oliveira, a communications advisor and copywriter, to share her five good ideas on how to best get an organization’s communications fundamentals in order and how to plan to strengthen them. In her presentation, Marlene discussed the importance of specific frameworks, tools, and tactics, including a non-profit’s strategic p...

In this session, originally recorded on January 26, 2022, we asked Matthew Mendelsohn, a public policy entrepreneur, researcher, strategic advisor and public sector executive, to share his five good ideas on the best ways to influence the decisions governments make. Matthew provides an overview of lessons he has learned during his time in government, advocacy, consulting and policy think tanks. Re...

In this session, originally recorded on November 25, 2021, we asked Rosemarie Powell, Executive Director of the Toronto Community Benefits Network (TCBN), to share five good ideas about the lessons she has learned as the leader of a community-labour coalition charged with implementing community benefits agreements. Local communities want the workforce building public infrastructure to reflect the...

In this session, originally recorded on October 25, 2021, we asked Owen Charters, President & CEO of BGC Canada, to present his five good ideas about how a board can be better. They say strategy starts with the board, but is that really true, and should it be? Whether you’re an executive director or CEO (including an aspiring one), managing a board is a skill that’s rarely taught, yet vital to...

In this session, originally recorded on September 28, 2021, we asked Neena Gupta, a partner at Gowling WLG (Canada) LLP, to present her five good ideas about creating a successful hybrid workplace. COVID-19 forced employers and employees to adapt to a virtual workplace. More than one and a half years into the pandemic, many employees don’t want to go back to the old ways of working, and employers...

In this session, originally recorded on June 15, 2021, we asked Jeff Szeto, Chief Financial Officer at Avana Capital Corporation and Maytree, to speak about his five good ideas to enhance your finance toolkit. For anyone working in a for-profit, non-profit, or charitable organization, it is critically important to have a robust finance and accounting team that can help them understand and leverage...

In this session, originally recorded on March 25, 2021, we asked Lesa Francis, Avvy Go, Samya Hasan and Shalini Konanur to share five good ideas for racial justice change-making. How do we best address growing colour-coded inequality – for Indigenous peoples and peoples of colour, including Black Canadians? What are the institutional, structural, and systemic impacts of racism, faithism, and relat...

In this session, originally recorded on April 22, 2021, we asked Marina Glogovac, President & CEO of CanadaHelps, to share five good ideas for demystifying digital transformation. With a career spanning nearly three decades in technology and media (including working in the magazine industry during the shift to the internet), Marina knows the challenges that come from forced disruptions. She he...

In this session, originally recorded on February 25, 2021, we asked Royson James to share five good ideas about cultivating lasting relationships with media and journalists. How do you adopt a media mind and make it yours? At some point you may have gotten burned by media or just ignored. Since disengagement isn’t an option, how do you move on and germinate, nurture, and sustain lasting relationsh...

In this session, originally recorded on January 26, 2021, we asked Kristen Pennington to share five good ideas about workplace harassment. Workplace harassment complaints can cause significant organizational unrest, loss of reputation and damage to employee morale, in addition to considerable legal liability. In this session, Kristen Pennington, Partner, Employment and Privacy Law at McMillan LLP,...

In this session, originally recorded on December 3, 2020, we asked Mary W. Rowe to share her five good ideas for the non-profit sector to build a city, now and in the wake of a global pandemic. Mary is President and CEO of the Canadian Urban Institute. She is no stranger to how cities recover from disasters, having worked in New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina, and New York City during and followi...

In this session, originally recorded on October 28, 2020, we asked Nora Beatty and Alex Mazer to share five good ideas for building financial health through the workplace. With over 40% of Canadians living paycheque to paycheque, more employers are asking what they can do to increase the financial health of their staff. Alex Mazer and Nora Beatty of workplace retirement plan provider Common Wealth...

In this session, originally recorded on September 28, 2020, we asked Paul Taylor to share five good ideas about advocating for change. Many of us are seeing the need to create a better world, one that is more just, equitable and sustainable. COVID-19 has caused us to ask a lot of questions about how we can build back better. It’s a moment that has the potential to be profoundly transformative. In...

In this session, originally recorded on June 30, 2020, we asked Lindsay Groves and Susan Vardon to share five good Ideas about fundraising in the time of the COVID-19 pandemic. In this period of uncertainty created by the Covid-19 pandemic, many non-profit organizations have revised budgets and modified revenue projections to reflect the new reality. While it’s essential that we exercise caution i...

In this session, originally recorded on May 6, 2020, Christine Yip shares her five good ideas about maintaining morale while managing a remote team. After a few months of working from home, most of us will have fallen into some type of routine. At the same time, removed from our daily in-person contacts, relying on regular video calls, watching too many news conferences hoping for an easing of the...

In this session, originally recorded on May 26, 2020, Robyn Osgood and Dave McKechnie share their five good ideas about re-opening your workplace post COVID-19. Robyn Osgood, Managing Director, McMillan Vantage Policy Group, and Dave McKechnie, Chair, Employment & Labour Relations, McMillan LLP, discussed their five good ideas for organizations to implement as we think about re-opening our wor...

In this session, originally recorded on February 26, 2020, we look at how to build democratic power for change. Our speaker for this session is Michal Hay, the Founding Executive Director of Progress Toronto. As an organizer, her focus is on bridging the gap between people and the political power needed for progressive change. Our cities are becoming increasingly unaffordable and income inequality...

In this session, originally recorded on January 28, 2020, we look at how individuals, managers, and organizations can create psychologically safe workplaces with Christine Yip. As work becomes busier, deadlines tighter, and pressure to do more with less becomes the rule rather than the exception, it is not surprising that the “self-care” movement has become more popular than ever. But as organizat...