Liz Weaver
Co-CEO & Consulting Director, Collaborative Leadership
Tamarack Learning Centre
Liz Weaver is the Co-CEO of Tamarack Institute where she is leading the Tamarack Learning Centre. The Tamarack Learning Centre has a focus on advancing community change efforts and does this by focusing on five strategic areas including collective impact, collaborative leadership, community engagement, community innovation and evaluating community impact. Liz is well-known for her thought leadership on both collaborative leadership and collective impact and is the author of several popular and academic papers on the topic. She is a co-catalyst partner with the Collective Impact Forum and leads a collective impact capacity building strategy with the Ontario Trillium Foundation.
Liz is passionate about the power and potential of communities getting to impact on complex issues. Prior to her current role at Tamarack, Liz led the Vibrant Communities Canada team and assisted place-based collaborative tables
From 2006 – 2009, Liz was the Director for the Hamilton Roundtable on Poverty Reduction, which was recognized with the Canadian Urban Institute's David Crombie Leadership Award. In her career, Liz has held leadership positions with YWCA Hamilton, Volunteer Hamilton and Volunteer Canada. In 2002, Liz completed a Masters of Management, McGill University. Liz has been awarded Queen's Jubilee Medals in 2002 and 2012 for her contributions to volunteerism in Canada and in 2004 was awarded the Women in the Workplace award from the City of Hamilton.
Sylvia Cheuy
Consulting Director, Collective Impact
Tamarack Learning Centre
Sylvia is a Consulting Director of the Tamarack Institute’s Collective Impact Practice Area and also supports Tamarack’s Community Engagement Practice Area. She is passionate about community change and what becomes possible when residents and various sector leaders share an aspirational vision for their future. Sylvia believes that when the assets of residents and community are recognized and connected they become powerful drivers of community change. Sylvia is an internationally recognized community-builder and trainer. Over the past five years, much of Sylvia’s work has focused on building awareness and capacity in the areas of Collective Impact and Community Engagement throughout North America.
Prior to joining Tamarack, Sylvia was the founding Executive Director to Headwaters Communities in Action (HCIA), a grassroots citizen initiative that fosters collaborative leadership and action in support of a long-term vision of well-being for Ontario's Headwaters region. This experience gives Sylvia practical knowledge and first-hand experience of what it takes to engage and mobilize positive community change. Her work with HCIA was published as a chapter entitled, A Citizen-Led Approach to Enhancing Community Well-Being in the newly published Handbook of Community Well-Being Research.
Sylvia completed her Masters Diploma in Social Innovation at the University of Waterloo in 2013 where she explored opportunities to create change within regional food systems. An active volunteer in her community, Sylvia serves as a member of HCIA’s Leadership Council. She also served for nine years on the Board of Community Living Dufferin where she was instrumental in securing $2.8 million in funding for CLD's shared home with Theatre Orangeville, the community's professional theatre company. Sylvia lives in Caledon, Ontario with her husband John Graham and their three children: Gabriella, Garrett and Sean.
Galen MacLusky
Consulting Director, Community Innovation
Tamarack Learning Centre
Galen is a Consulting Director of the Tamarack Institute’s Community Innovation Practice Area. He is passionate about working with community organizations to help build and scale new ideas that deepen their impact. At the core of his work are approaches that help organizations engage with those who are impacted by their services and test new programs and services with minimal investment. Over the past five years, Galen has used these approaches to help Fortune 500 companies and non-profit organizations across North America reinvent the services and programs they provide.
Prior to joining Tamarack, Galen was an independent consultant and head of the social sector practice at Bridgeable, a leading Canadian service design consultancy. These roles gave Galen the unique opportunity to explore the differences and commonalities between non-profit organizations working at different scales, and practical experience in helping them tackle their most pressing challenges. His work on collaborative approaches to innovation was published in the design management institute’s journal. Galen completed his Masters of Science in Engineering Design Innovation at Northwestern University and his Bachelors of Applied Science in Mechanical Engineering at the University of Waterloo.
Galen volunteers actively in grassroots mental health support services in Toronto as a facilitator with the Peer Connection, a mental health peer support group, and as an advisor with
Lisa Attygalle
Consulting Director, Community Engagement
Tamarack learning Centre
Lisa works with cities and organizations to help them meaningfully engage their communities. Over the last six years her work has focused on creating authentic engagement strategies and training staff teams, teaching and writing about innovative engagement methodologies, designing and facilitating workshops with a focus on raising the voice of the context expert, integrated communications planning, and the use of technology and creativity for engagement. Lisa advocates for simplicity in infrastructure, frameworks and design and loves applying the principles of marketing, advertising, loyalty, and user experience to community initiatives.
Pamela Teitelbaum
Consulting Director, Evaluating Impact
Tamarack Learning Centre
Pamela is a Consulting Director of the Tamarack Institute’s Evaluating Impact Practice Area. She is passionate about supporting and facilitating an interplay of learning and evaluation that creates transformative experiences aimed at developing healthy, equitable, gender-responsive and rights-based communities. Pamela believes that increasing access and awareness about evaluation strategies, methodologies and processes leads to more critical, collaborative and long-term community change.
By increasing the capacity of communities to engage in and employ strategically-designed evaluation and learning practices, more possibilities are created for stakeholders and beneficiaries to experience the value of community changes and how they lead to effective, efficient and impactful outcomes. In 2010, Pamela founded a consulting company specializing in evaluating and supporting capacity building, educational design, training, monitoring and evaluation, social policy research and community engagement. With over 20 years of experience designing and facilitating training, leading social policy research and evaluation processes, she has worked extensively within the international and Canadian NGO sector in the fields of international human rights education, gender equality, and community development.
Kevin McCort
President and CEO, Vancouver Foundation
Kevin McCort is President and CEO of Vancouver Foundation. With more than 30 years of service to the non-profit sector, he has earned a reputation as a smart, strategic leader who always puts community at the heart of his work.
Since 2013 Kevin has led Vancouver Foundation through a period of significant transformation with a new focus on seeking systemic change by addressing root causes of pressing social, cultural and environmental issues. The Foundation contributed over $63M towards building healthy, vibrant, livable communities across BC in 2018.
In 2013, Kevin was awarded the Queen’s Diamond Jubilee medal and in 2019, he was appointed to Canada’s National Committee for Gender Equality. Kevin currently serves on the Boards of Community Foundations of Canada, Friends of Vancouver Foundation, and the B.C. Unclaimed Property Society.
Learn about the Vancouver Foundation
Kris Archie
Executive Director, The Circle on Philanthropy and Aboriginal Peoples in Canada
Kris Archie, a Secwepemc and Seme7 woman from the Ts’qescen First Nation, is passionate about heart-based community work and facilitating positive change. Kris is the Executive Director of The Circle. In all of her roles, Kris works to transform philanthropy and contribute to positive change by creating spaces of learning, relationship-building and activation.
Learn about the Circle on Philanthropy and Aboriginal Peoples in Canada
Al Etmanski
Author, Community Organizer, Social Entrepreneur
Al is an internationally bestselling author and one of Canada’s thought leaders on social innovation. An author, blogger, advocate and social entrepreneur, Al has specialized in innovative, multi-sector solutions to solving complex social challenges. Al is a founder of the J.W. McConnell Family Foundation’s Social Innovation Generation (SIG) initiative. He brings unprecedented expertise from the social innovation field as the co-founder of the Planned Lifetime Advocacy Network (PLAN) which has supported the creativity of families to address the financial and social well-being of their relative with a disability.
Molly Harrington
Assistant Deputy Minister, Research, Innovation, and Policy Division - Government of British Columbia
Molly Harrington has worked for the British Columbia publica service since 1994 and has been the Research, Innovation & Policy Assistant Deputy Minister since September 2008. In this role, she is responsible for income and disability assistance policy and the province's disability and social innovation strategies. She is currently co-chair of Partners for Social Innovation.
Molly commenced her government service with Small Business, Tourism and Culture, working on economic mitigation strategies. She then moved to Forest Renewal BC, working with community, employment and business development programs with local government and First Nation communities. She then went on to be a part of the Treaty Negotiations Office, and worked as both a negotiator and as Director of the Treaty Implementation and Legislation Branch. Molly served as CEO and ADM within the Ministry of Finance from 2005 to 2008, in charge of the Crown Agencies Secretariat.
Molly holds a B.A. in economics and history from the University of Toronto and an M.A. in planning from the University of British Columbia. She received a Graduate Diploma in social innovation from the University of Waterloo in 2012.
Tatiana Fraser
Co-founder System Sanctuary & MetaLab
As an award winning social innovator and published author, Tatiana has 20 over years of experience leading and scaling social innovation aimed to advance girls and women’s leadership and empowerment. She is co-founder of Metalab, a platform designed to support and incubate systems innovation where she recently launched System Sanctuary, a global peer learning platform for systems leadership and The Gender Lab. She is co-founder and past Executive Director of Girls Action Foundation and Co-author of Girl Positive (Random House, 2016).
Tatiana is recognized as an Ashoka Fellow and one of Canada's Top 100 Most Powerful Women (Women’s Executive Network) and has served on numerous boards and advisory committees including The UN Commission on the Status of Women, President of CKX and The Carold Institute, Treasurer for Food Secure Canada, Vice President of Exeko, and Director of Actua among others. Tatiana is also a mother and loves running, doing yoga and spending time by the ocean.
David Hanna
National Coordinator, Inspiring Communities, New Zealand and Director, Wesley Community Action
David Hanna brings more than 20 years of experience facilitating community-led development and collaborative processes in New Zealand that have engaged advocates and adversaries; citizens and corporations; champions and the disengaged. His work focuses on the toughest and most complex projects including working with gang families, those experiencing homelessness and addictions, seniors and vulnerable populations. His work is embedded in an intercultural perspective and he has worked with Maori leaders across Aoetearoa New Zealand. David’s experience as a non-profit leader, community member and national director for Inspiring Communities brings a wealth of perspectives about how to scale change at the local community and national levels.
He has worked as a national NGO youth director, a policy manager in Central Government, a consultant on youth development, a trainer in policy analysis and now a director. Key themes across his activities are bicultural/Treaty of Waitangi perspectives, systemic/holistic action/thinking, positive child and youth development and grounding what we do in an authentic spirituality.
Shauna Sylvester
Executive Director, Centre for Dialogue, Simon Fraser University
Shauna Sylvester is a Professor of Professional Practice and the Executive Director of Simon Fraser University’s Centre for Dialogue. She is an award-winning social entrepreneur, facilitator, and commentator. She was the Co-founder and Executive Director of five initiatives – the SFU Public Square, Renewable Cities, Carbon Talks, Canada's World and IMPACS - the Institute for Media, Policy and Civil Society. She has served on the boards of Vancity, Vancity Capital, Mountain Equipment Cooperative, the BC Assessment Authority and several non-profit boards. Shauna is committed to excellence in public engagement and hosting difficult conversations.
For over 30 years, she has served as a facilitator and host to hundreds of community and stake-holder dialogues related to sustainability, poverty reduction, democracy, urban planning, transportation and climate change. She has a passion for cities and has served as the lead facilitator for the Mayor’s Task Force on Affordable Housing in Burnaby and Vancouver and the convener of Moving in a Livable Region - a consortium of transportation and land use planning leaders in Metro Vancouver.
Vanessa LeBourdais
Founder and Executive Director, DreamRider Productions
Vanessa LeBourdais, Founder and Executive Director of DreamRider Productions, is the creator of the Planet Protector Academy. This suite of innovative digital programs trains kids to be long-term change agents on environmental issues, using an arts-based, embodied approach rooted in theatre, ceremony and transformational learning. DreamRider has reached over one million children in 150+ cities across Canada, into the US, and now India. Vanessa’s innovative approach to governance, organizational development, and media production is based in kindness, systems thinking and emergence. Vanessa initiated/co-led a successful equity shift in the 42,000-member Facebook group, Nonprofit Happy Hour. Vanessa is an Ashoka Fellow.
Brian Caillou
Director, Indigenous Program Area at The Banff Centre
Brian is the Director for The Banff Centre’s Indigenous Leadership program area, which designs and delivers leadership development and organizational development programs and applied research for Indigenous leaders. Brian is Cree and a member of the Sucker Creek First Nation in the Treaty 8 area of northern Alberta. He is married and has two children as well as four grandsons and one granddaughter. In August, 2009 Brian received a Blackfoot name, Apahto’kii which means pine, as in pine tree, for his community work.
Brian holds a Bachelor of Arts in Political Science, a Bachelor of Laws and a Master of Laws from the University of Alberta. He has taught as a sessional instructor and has published works in various academic journals and in book chapters. Brian’s research interests include Aboriginal leadership, self-government, community economic development, and treaty rights. He practiced law for eight years before taking on his current role. He has also served as a Sessional Instructor teaching Indigenous studies and law and society courses at University of Alberta and University of Calgary.
George Aye
Co-Founder, Greater Good Studio
George co-founded Greater Good Studio with the belief that design can lead to positive behaviour change. Previously, he spent seven years at global innovation firm IDEO before being hired as the first human-centred designer at the Chicago Transit Authority. Since founding Greater Good, he has worked across multiple social issues including autism, criminal justice, education, public health and health care. George is an Adjunct Full Professor at The School of the Art Institute of Chicago. With his co-founder, he was awarded the TED Prize City 2.0 (2012) and recognized in the Public Interest Design 100 list (2013). The studio’s work was featured in the Stanford Social Innovation Review (May 2018), LEAP Dialogues: Career Pathways in Design for Social Innovation (published 2016) and Public Interest Design Practice Guidebook (published 2015). He is a frequent speaker and workshop facilitator.
Lindsay Daniller
Principal, Daniller Associates
Lindsay Daniller is an innovative and adaptive leader in collaborative leadership and partnerships, community innovation and engagement and change management in fast-paced complex environments both in her original home of South Africa and in Edmonton. In addition, she is a skilled facilitator with public, private, business and community organizations and has been in a variety of leadership positions in organizations in both countries. She is a highly skilled executive in strategic communications, stakeholder facilitation and consultation and evaluating outcomes and measuring impact. She is also a skilled public speaker, writes speeches and notes for others and has been a master of ceremonies for numerous events locally, nationally and internationally. Lindsay is a Tamarack Associate, an organisation internationally renowned for collaborative leadership, social innovation and collective impact.
This includes a position of Senior Manager of the Tourism Enterprise Partnership in South Africa, where she played a central role whose mandate is to create business, development and transformational opportunities, the legacy project for 2010 World Cup™ and opportunities for those who were previously marginalized under apartheid. In Canada, she was Vice President (Communication), Economic Development Edmonton, working with the business community she helped develop stronger networks and opportunities for Edmonton nationally and internationally.
For over eight years Lindsay was a member of the REACH Edmonton Leadership team, in the role of the Director of Community Initiatives and Strategic Development. REACH Edmonton Council for Safe Communities aims to catalyze and support community action to make Edmonton a safer city. REACH brings together diverse people and organizations to create the conditions for communication and successful collaboration.
Facilitating and assisting in the solving of complex issues for various organisations and organisational development are passions for Lindsay, and she now brings this expertise in her role as Principal with Daniller Associates
Tom Klaus
Founder, Tenacious Change LLC
Tom Klaus’ entire career has been in the nonprofit sector. He created Tenacious Change, LLC to animate and equip people, organizations, and communities to lead change for the greater good. Tom is also a Thought Leader with the Tamarack Institute and an adjunct professor at Eastern University (Philadelphia) in the College of Business and Leadership. He is a graduate of William Penn University (BA, English & Religion); Drake University (MS, Counseling); and Eastern University (PhD in Organizational Leadership).
Tom is a self-described “pracademic.” As a practitioner, his clients typically include local, statewide, regional, national, and international organizations and agencies, and he has recently served on expert panels for the Office of Adolescent Health. In 2018 his work included guiding and consulting on two community change “collective impact” initiatives in Buffalo, NY and Palm Beach, FL; talent management strategy planning for a nonprofit in New Orleans, LA; leadership development with a 1,000+ staff nonprofit in San Luis Obispo, CA; adaptive and implementation evaluation for a large nonprofit in Alice, TX.
Tom regularly works in adaptive strategy planning, community engagement and mobilization, the collective impact collaboration strategy, talent management, organizational change and resilience, board development, program sustainability, leadership development, team development, strategic conflict management, and evaluation.
Mark Cabaj
President, From Here to There Consulting
Mark’s current focus is on developing practical ways to understand, plan and evaluate efforts to address complex issues (e.g.
Mark is President of the consulting company From Here to There and an Associate of Tamarack Institute.
Thank you to our partners
