The current members of the Board of Directors, approved at the Annual General Meeting held May 28, 2009, are:

Don McCreesh, Chair
President, The Garnet Group Inc.
Oakville, Ontario

Hilary Pearson, Vice-Chair
President and CEO, Philanthropic Foundations Canada
Montreal, Quebec

Ian Bird
Senior Leader, Sport Matters
Ottawa, Ontario

Marcel Côté
Founding Partner, SECOR Consulting Inc.
Montreal, Quebec

Punch Jackson
Former Executive Director, Libraries, Community and Voluntary Services
Alberta Municipal Affairs
Edmonton, Alberta

Ruby Lam
Community Development Consultant, CITTA Consulting
Toronto, Ontario

Susan Lewis
President, United Way of Winnipeg
Winnipeg, Manitoba

Kevin McCort
President & CEO, CARE Canada
Ottawa, ON

Vanessa Reid
Spaces and Conversations for Transformational Change
Montreal, Quebec

Martha J. Tory
Senior Partner, Ernst & Young LLP
Toronto, ON

Faye Wightman
President and CEO, Vancouver Foundation
Vancouver, British Columbia

Richard H. (Dick) Wilson
Calgary, Alberta

Stéphane Vaillancourt
President and CEO, The YMCAs of Québec
Montréal, Québec

Bob Wyatt
Executive Director, The Muttart Foundation
Edmonton, Alberta

Organizational affiliations are for identification purposes only.

Don McCreesh is an active leader in Canada’s voluntary sector having served for over 35 years as a leader with a number of charities and not for profit organizations. He currently serves as the Chair of the Board of Imagine Canada and acts as the Chair of the HR and Governance Committee. Don is also Chair of the Standards Program and Promising Practices Initiative.

He began his “35 year volunteer career” with the YMCA where he was appointed a “youth” member of the board of the YMCA of Hamilton – Burlington and eventually went on to serve as Chair of that board; Chair of YMCA Canada; a member of the Executive Committee of the World Alliance of YMCAs (where he served as Treasurer and Chair of a Global Organization Review that led to a reorganization at the international level and the creation of the Global Operating Plan); and is a Past Chair of the YMCA of Greater Toronto. During that time Don has also served as a volunteer and on the boards of a number of other not for profit organizations focusing on fundraising, youth, employment, governance and immigrant issues.

During 2006 he served as the voluntary sector’s Interim Fairness Advisor resolving issues between Service Canada and from 2000 to 2005 served with federal Voluntary Sector Initiative as Co-Chair of the IM/IT Joint Table and as a member of the Senior Sector Steering Committee.

Professionally Don is a management consultant and a corporate director currently on the boards of Brainhunter Inc. (Chair), Educators Financial Group (formerly Ontario Teachers Group) and VenGrowth Private Equity. He has served as Lead Director of Rand. These roles follow a 35 year career with five major international blue chip corporations culminating in roles as a corporate officer and global head of the Human Resources functions at Nortel Networks, Canadian Imperial Bank of Commerce and Celestica.

As President of The Garnet Group Inc., Don consults to the corporate and not for profit sectors, focusing on personal and organization performance issues, executive coaching, executive compensation, HR functional audits, merger & acquisition support, corporate social responsibility, governance and organization design.

Don has an MBA and BA, Psychology from McMaster University and is certified as a Chartered Director by the Directors College. At the Chartered Director graduation ceremony 2006, Don was awarded the “Gilbert Bennett Gold Standard Award” as the top graduate of the Chartered Director Program. He now serves as a leader in the professional development of other directors, acting as a faculty member at The Directors College.

Ian Bird is the Senior Leader at Sport Matters Group. Most recently, Ian supported the development of a sport and social inclusion strategy within the J.W. McConnell Family Foundation, a pan-Canadian municipal sport and physical activity policy framework, and a series of campaigns to ensure provincial and federal sport policy commitments during recent elections. A two time Olympian in field hockey, Ian has volunteered in a leadership capacity with Motivate Canada, the Public Policy Forum, SportWeb, Coaches of Canada, Athletes CAN, Commonwealth Games Canada, and with the advisory committee to the Secretary of State (Amateur Sport). In 2003, Ian was selected (over Wayne Gretzky, amongst others) as the recipient of the Bruce Kidd Award as Canada’s Athlete Leader of the Year.

Marcel Côté’s 30-year consulting career as Founding Partner and President of SECOR Consulting Inc. has focused on strategic advice to top management in several Canadian companies and, more recently, in France. Prior to establishing SECOR in 1975, Mr. Côté taught at the Universités de Sherbrooke and du Québec à Montréal. His expertise in growth policy is reflected in his books: By Way of Advice: Economic Strategies for a Market-Driven World, Growing the Next Silicon Valley and If Quebec Goes…The Real Cost of Separation. He serves on the boards of four public corporations and is active in the YMCA, the Compagnie de Danse Marie Chouinard and the Montreal Symphony Orchestra.

Punch Jackson’s career has spanned the public, private and nonprofit sectors, with an emphasis on active living, recreation, volunteerism, youth development and libraries. In his current role, Mr. Jackson formerly oversaw Libraries, Community and Voluntary Sector Services for the Alberta government. His extensive volunteer work has included hands-on roles as a coach and School Council Chair as well as directorships with the Canadian Camping Association, the Skills Program and Media Awareness.

Ruby Lam’s career has centred on equity issues and strategic planning in Canada and the United States. As a consultant she has advised domestic agencies such as the United Way of Greater Toronto, Centre for Addiction and Mental Health and the Canadian Cancer Society on community outreach, community development and capacity building. As Deputy Director of the White House Initiative on Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders, Ms. Lam founded this national initiative involving 32 departments and agencies. Her volunteer commitments have included the Mayor’s Committee on Community and Race Relations (Toronto), Race and Culture Advisory Committee/Addiction Research Foundation and Touchstone Youth Centre.

Susan Lewis has been committed to the United Way movement since 1977, when she began with the Winnipeg agency. Since 1985 she has served as President. She also sits as a board member for the Winnipeg Free Press and Centennial Neighbourhood Project and was a member of the Advisory Committee to Mayor Murray on “The New Deal.” She is a current member of the Manitoba Voluntary Sector Council and the Manitoba Foundations Council.

Kevin McCort has spent nearly his entire adult life engaged in international humanitarian and development work. After graduating from high school Kevin McCort took part in a Canada World Youth exchange between Canada and Indonesia. He spent over three months in a remote Indonesian village in South Kalimantan.

During his university years Kevin volunteered with the World University Service of Canada (WUSC). For almost a year he worked with a Malian agriculture parastatal company, living in a small village just north of the border with Cote d’Ivoire.  His work helped the people of Mali look at ways to improve livestock management and commercialization, dealing with issues such as migrant herders moving large cattle herds through agricultural land, and managing conflicts between migrants and sedentary farmers.  After Mali, Kevin went with WUSC to Zimbabwe. There he spent two years placing and supporting Canadian teachers who were assigned to Zimbabwean high schools and teacher training colleges.  In those two years he drove 100,000km visiting 60 different mission schools, and remote government schools.

In 1992 Kevin joined CARE Canada. From 1992-1997 he was involved in humanitarian and emergency relief missions around the globe. He has dealt with a food crisis in Haiti, drought and conflict in Somalia, aiding Somali refugees in Kenya, helping people in Bosnia and Croatia caught in the civil war there, and dealing with the effects of the Rwandan genocide in Zaire, Tanzania and Burundi. Kevin was one of the first humanitarian workers in Goma, in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, when 1 million refugees flooded across the border.  Arriving in the area by plane, he landed right in the middle of a war zone as the refugees all around them came under attack.

From 1997 to 2000 Kevin headed CARE’s operations in Zambia as Country Director. He helped create and manage development programs in agriculture, education, health, micro-enterprise and humanitarian assistance.  

In 2000 Kevin become part of the senior management team of CARE Canada, and in 2008 was appointed CEO.  Today he oversees all the operations of CARE Canada around world, and is CARE Canada’s primary representative within the global CARE movement. In Canada he is a recognized national spokesperson on international development issues, particularly on economic development and microfinance.

Hilary Pearson’s career has spanned the public, private and nonprofit sectors. She began her career in policy with the federal government, moving to Montreal to become Vice-President, Strategic Development at Royal Bank of Canada. As a management consultant she worked with several national and local charities in health, culture and social services. Since 2001, Ms. Pearson has headed up Philanthropic Foundations Canada. As a volunteer she serves on the boards of the Stratford Festival of Canada, Centraide of Montreal and is a member of the Charities Advisory Committee, reporting to the Minister of National Revenue.

Vanessa Reid has focused her career on building healthy, vital communities locally and internationally at the grassroots and through corporate, political and public policy avenues. As a researcher, filmmaker and communicator Ms. Reid is sought after for her creative insights into social innovation, creativity and entrepreneurship and group potential and transformation. The Montreal-based social service organization she founded, Santropol Roulant, operates as a Living Lab, engaging young people in community using food as a vehicle to break isolation between the generations and to strengthen and nourish community.

Martha J. Tory is a senior partner at Ernst & Young specializing in serving not-for-profit organizations. She has extensive experience serving on charitable boards of directors. She is currently the Treasurer and a member of the following boards of directors: the Institute of Competitiveness & Prosperity, The Learning Partnership and PREVNet (a Networks of Centres of Excellence). She is also Chair of the Governance Committee and on the Board Directors of Crescent School.  Ms Tory has served as Chair of the following boards: the United Way of Greater Toronto, Family Service Association of Toronto, St. Clement's School and Trinity College at the University of Toronto.

Faye Wightman is the President and CEO of The Vancouver Foundation, Canada’s largest community foundation. Faye joined the Foundation from the University of Victoria, where she served as Vice President, External Relations for two years. As president of the B.C. Children’s Hospital Foundation she oversaw a 650% increase in revenue during her 14 year tenure, and led the marketing efforts that saw the Foundation win the Marketer of the Year award from the B.C. chapter of the American Marketing Association. Faye has always been involved in the nonprofit sector in higher education, health care, the Canadian Red Cross, and the United Way of the Lower Mainland.

Dick Wilson retired in May 2006 after 38 years in the communications business in Alberta. He began his career as city editor of one of Calgary’s daily newspapers, followed by in-house communications and external public affairs roles in the petrochemical, coal, electricity and oil and gas industries along with advertising agency experience. Mr. Wilson’s most recent positions were Vice-President Public Affairs and Advisor, Office of the President at EnCana Corporation. In addition to Imagine Canada, he now fills a governance role for three Alberta-based community service organizations, as Trustee of the Ernest C. Manning Awards Foundation, a Director of Mount Royal College Foundation, and the Canada West Foundation.

Stéphane Vaillancourt holds a Bachelor degree in Electrical Engineering from École Polytechnique de Montréal and an MBA from McGill University, and has enjoyed a highly successful career holding senior management positions in the areas of business development, sales, marketing and strategy development with Bell Canada, Stentor and Connexim.

He was appointed President and CEO of the YMCAs of Quebec in November 2002. The YMCAs of Quebec is a charitable organization that contributes to the development of spirit, mind, and body, and to the well-being of individuals, families, and communities. It works especially to help children, seniors and the disadvantaged, as well as families, new arrivals and youth at risk. Its twelve centres and multiple other points of service are visited yearly by over 100,000 people who benefit from the many programs it offers ranging from community and child development programs to language courses and physical fitness activities.

In addition to a wide range of professional and personal responsibilities, he has been involved for many years in a variety of social and community works in support of youth and seniors, notably as Chair of the “Petits Frères des Pauvres”, the mission of which is to provide a lifelong friendly and affectionate presence to relieve the isolation and loneliness among the elderly.

Stéphane is currently Vice-Chair of Cybercap, a charity with a mission to help youth at risk by offering them the possibility to discover and experiment digital media in order to help them better their personal, social and professional situation.

Bob Wyatt has been executive director of The Muttart Foundation since 1989.  He has been a leader in the voluntary sector at the local, provincial and national levels, including serving as sector co-chair of the Joint Regulatory Table during the Voluntary Sector Initiative.  He has been involved in a large number of public-policy initiatives at both the provincial and national level, including serving as a member of Imagine Canada’s public policy committee.  He is in regular contact with provincial and federal governments, including through the Muttart Consultations process that he initiated more than a dozen years ago.  He is the author of a soon-to-be-published book resulting from a sabbatical research project examining the role of voluntary-sector umbrella organizations in affecting public policy related to the sector.  He has served on a number of boards of directors, ranging from Philanthropic Foundations Canada to the governing body of his church.  He is a credentialed parliamentarian and has provided advice to a large number of voluntary sector organizations.  He is the national parliamentarian for Big Brothers Big Sisters of Canada.