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Capturing Your Co-operative Advantage

Don't miss out on this wonderful opportunity to hear from TWO great speakers at our next webinar learning event. Our speakers will highlight the importance of integrating and marketing your co-operative advantage; they will provide you with the proper tools and methods to engage your co-op stakeholders and distinguish your co-op brand from the rest of the competition.

[ register here ]

The "MOCA" Strategy

Georgina Whyatt of Oxford Brookes Univeristy will be presenting on the Marketing Our Co-operative Advantage (MOCA) Strategy . Webinar attendants will understand how to implement this as a marketing strategy and what organizational factors in your co-op can enable you to capitalize on your co-operative advantage. Applying MOCA to your co-op business is very much the responsibility of all levels of the co-op and not simply the marketing team.

The MOCA Strategy Presentation will highlight:

  • Understanding the core elements of MOCA
  • MOCA's relevance to co-ops of all sizes and types
  • Why implement it as part of a marketing strategy?
  • What organizational factors enable/ hinder its implementation?
  • How to address the challenges to your co-op's MOCA strategy

Creating a Co-operative Identity Online:

In today’s wired world, the internet is the single most important tool for marketing your business or organization. For co-operatives, this means more than just marketing their goods and services: it also means promoting what makes co-ops different from other enterprises.

Donna Balkan,has researched the extent to which Canadian co-operatives reflect the co-op difference on their websites, and the results may be surprising.

In her presentation, she will talk about:

  • Why it is important for your website to reflect co-operative values and principles
  • The Co-operative Identity Web Index (CIWI), a tool for measuring online co-op identity.
  • Best practices in promoting co-operative identity online, including co-op websites and social media sites from Canada and beyond.

The Beta Project: Behavioral Economics Technical Assistance for the Assets Field

The Behavioral Economics Technical Assistance (BETA) Project is a partnership between CFED and ideas42 with key support from the Citi Foundation. The goal of the Project is to use behavioral economics theory to improve the effectiveness and reach of products and services that help people increase their financial stability.

The Project accomplishes this by designing and testing behavioral interventions through real world products, processes and services, and then sharing the lessons and insights from these efforts with the assets field in highly accessible ways that help drive improvements in practice and policy. The BETA Project will tackle a range of issues, but at the core of the project will be the work with the pilot organizations to design and implement manageable, low-cost program adjustments based on well-documented behavioral theory and findings from behavioral economic and psychology research. The BETA Project delivers impact through quick, powerful innovations adapted within the existing framework of a given behavioral problem.

In 2012, the BETA Project team issued a Request for Proposals for sites to pilot behavioral interventions. To learn more, read this brief which examines themes among the 99 proposals received and identifies common challenges programs are facing. Check back often to see what we’re learning through the Project.

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A Lighter, Quicker, Cheaper Approach to Community Action: Conference Call Learning Event

Jump on a CommunityMatters® conference call for a 60-minute conversation about critical issues, tools and inspiring stories of community building.

This event is free but registration is required.

After a design or planning process, most communities end up with scores of potential actions. How do you prioritize dozens of competing options? How do you get some cool stuff done without breaking the bank or exhausting your list of volunteers? Easy: start with the petunias. That’s one key lesson from the “Lighter, Quicker, Cheaper” framework.

Join us and learn how to find the easiest, quickest and most impactful ways to start making things happen in your town. If you've used a Lighter, Quicker, Cheaper approach to get things done in your community, tell us about it when you register for the call.  We'll ask a few people to share their story on the line!

What is Lighter, Quicker, Cheaper?

Here’s how it works: Forget trying to raise five-, six-, or seven-figure sums to implement all of your streetscape improvements right away. Instead, go spend $15 at a garden center, grab a helper, and transform one weedy corner with some new planter boxes. Once people see what a difference that can make, it won’t be hard to get $100 bucks and enough volunteers to create a sidewalk café for a day, showcasing the potential of the space. And when people see how cool that is, it won’t be long until you have $1,000 and to buy some tables and chairs and create a pop-up pedestrian plaza. And if that works? Then you think about shelling out more money and making it permanent.

>> Learn more

SPEAKER:

Brendan Crain, Communications Manager, Project for Public Spaces

[ register here ]


This call is part of a capacity-building series offered jointly by CommunityMatters and the Citizens’ Institute on Rural Design.

The Citizens’ Institute on Rural Design (CIRD) and CommunityMatters are co-hosting a unique conference call series on Making It Happen. This three-part series will help you and your town move a design or planning process from paper to reality. Learn how to prioritize projects and score some quick successes, find the funding and resources for bigger projects, and build the long-term and support for change.

Social Enterprise Toronto Conference 2014: Trends and Opportunities

Social Enterprise Toronto (SET) is proud to host its premier annual Social Enterprise Toronto Conference 2014: Trends and Opportunities on January 29-30. The conference will bring together social enterprise practitioners, academics, government representatives and organizations with procurement possibilities.

DAY ONE: Bus Tour

The event will kick off on January 29 with a bus tour of five Toronto social enterprises. Participants will get an opportunity to tour the facilities and witness social enterprises in action. This will be a great opportunity to understand, connect with and celebrate GTA social enterprises. A detailed itinerary will be available shortly.

DAY TWO: Conference

The second day, January 30,  will be a full day conference hosted at The Learning Enrichment Foundation. The conference will include key speakers discussing procurement possibilities, emerging opportunities, as well as current trends within the sector. This gathering will be the perfect forum to facilitate collaboration among social enterprises and lead to action-oriented plans and growth opportunities.

Ticket Price Levels:

Bus Tour: $25 + registration fees

Conference Ticket (SET Members): $45 + registration fees

Conference Ticket (Non-Members): $60 +registration fees

Display Table Rental: $30

Please click here to read more about SET memberships. Membership forms are available here. Membership fees are pro-rated for the year, amounting to $10/month. For more on how to join the SET community, please contact us at socialenterprisetoronto@gmail.com.

Registration and Payment

Space will be limited.  We encourage all interested participants to register early. Registration will open on December 2nd. The deadline to register is December 31st, 2013. Registration must be completed on Eventbrite (starting December 2nd). Payment can be made online, over the phone or on the day of the event. We encourage all our participants to complete payment prior to the event to avoid long lines and delays. We accept credit card, cheques, money orders and cash. For more information on registration, please contact Melinda Noble at mnoble@lefca.org or 416-769-0830 ext. 2061.

Mature Workers: Understanding the Value of our Aging Work Force

11:00 am to 12:00 pm Eastern

According to Statistics Canada, 8 million Canadians, or 45% of our labour force, are over the age of 45 and close to 20% are over the age of 55. As this population continues to grow, it is critically important to ensure that mature workers find success and that employers can harness the knowledge and experience of this important segment of Canada’s labour force.

Join us in exploring the challenges and opportunities associated with Canada’s aging labour force from both the perspective of employers and workers.

Teleconference Format

11:00 am to 11:20 am | Speakers' Presentations

11:20 am to 12:00 pm | Questions and Discussion

Participation is free but space is strictly limited! Don’t delay in registering for this event.

An electronic package for participants will be sent by email prior to the event.

Guest Speakers:

David Pourreaux

David Pourreaux, CPC, Regional Director at Hunt Personnel in Montreal, has worked with various sectors. His specialties include: talent acquisition, human resources, system administration, recruiting and finance.

Leslie Acs

Leslie Acs, Executive Director of La Passerelle, Montreal’s leading employment and career transition centre, possesses many years of diverse management and human resources experience in private, public and not-for-profit sectors.  Leslie is also a member of CEDEC's Mature Worker’s Committee.

Register now

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