Building for the future Leadership perspectives from CEOs of settlement service provider organizations

Service Provider Organizations (SPOs) in the immigration serving sector extensively impact the resettlement journey of millions of newcomers in Canada every year. As these organizations’ missions, values, and goals can help shape the future of Canada, their CEOs and senior management have an enormous responsibility in how they lead and support their staff. The transfer of leadership, knowledge, and work culture must be intentional to cultivate trust and respect across teams. These skills and approaches are not always easily transferable, and the more dialogue you can uncover, the more these actions and lessons learned may resonate with future generations of leaders in this essential sector.  This module was created to feature a series of interviews with CEOs and senior management to share their insights and convey lessons that may support their successors and leaders from other organizations.

We acknowledge the generous contribution of the following experts to this course:
• Anila Umar, President and Chief Executive Officer of the Center for Newcomers
• Chris Friesen, Chief Operating Officer of the Immigrant Services Society of BC (ISSofBC)
• Elise Herzig, Executive Director of Jewish Immigrant Aid Services Toronto (JIAS Toronto)
• Fariborz Birjandian, Advisor and former Chief Executive Officer of the Calgary Catholic Immigration Society (CCIS)
• Francis Boakye, Executive Director of ActionDignity
• La Maisonnee Management Team:
Guy Drudi, President and founder of La Maisonnee
Hameza Othman, Head of the Welcome and Integration Department of La Maisonnee
Paola Amariles, Head of the Employability Department of La Maisonnee
Wadih Karam, Executive Director of La Maisonnee
Zina Laadj, Senior Coordinator and Assistant to the Welcome and Integration Department of La Maisonnee
• Nawal Al-Busaidi, Chief Executive Officer of Immigrant Services Calgary
• Neelam Sahota, Chief Executive Officer of DIVERSEcity Community Resources Society
(DCRS)
• Queenie Choo, Chief Executive Officer of S.U.C.C.E.S.S
• Samina Sami, Chief Executive Officer of COSTI
The designations correspond to the positions held by the experts at the time of our course, and under whose
name we asked for their contribution.