Events

El Salvador Sweat Equity Program

Recently a group of Rotarians and friends of Rotarians went to El Salvador to build homes for poor people living in a rural mountain area.  Vicki will take you through their journey in El Salvador highlighting the building of 7 houses, school visits, donations and other highlights.  Come out and learn about this amazing country with its gracious people.

Vicki Malo

Vicki’s desire to help others through hands-on started several years ago when organizing groups of foot care professionals to go to the West Indies and provide much needed help to the locals.   Rotary was instrumental to the success of these programs. This led to her joining Rotary 3 years ago to help others locally and around the world. As she loves to travel and experience other cultures, joining sweat equity international programs fits into her mission of providing care and necessities to the less fortunate.   Vicki is an engaged member of Rotary and we are very happy to hear from her at our meeting.

In 2014, Gloria was coaching a group of 15 women to develop interview and job skills. They had all served time in prison for crimes like drug dealing, entering Canada with drugs and fraud. Over the 3 months of coaching, Gloria discovered they needed more than soft skills training. They needed serious help in areas such as anger management, emotional support, social skills and interpersonal skills. They were having an extremely tough time integrating into society and were considered high risk for re-offending and suicide. Prior to this, Gloria had never met anyone who was in prison or given any thought to how they ended up there or what happened after they served their time. Gloria realized then, that she live a sanitized life. In this presentation Gloria will be sharing what she learned from these women and the gaps in the support they need when they leave prison and how they inspired her to take action.  About Gloria: An incident in the workplace propelled Gloria on the path she’s on. Had it not happened, she would not have discovered she was not being treated the way she wanted. She would not have discovered also that many people wanted to be treated differently and that most of us haven’t identified how we want to be treated. She realized that how you communicate is how you are perceived and how you are perceived is how you are treated.

The soul-searching from this incident along with surveys, discussions with diverse groups, her interest in verbal and non-verbal communication, experiences, education and training steered her to start her company, Clearly Speaking. She takes a holistic approach to communication and so her training and coaching deliver more than clients expect. She changes her clients’ awareness of communication.

The first workshop she developed was Communication For Women to teach them how to change their perception of themselves and change their communication image. Over the years, client feedback, training requests and changes to the workforce have channelled her focus to soft skills for career development. The workshops Gloria has developed and the 6 books she wrote address areas of concern to employees like helping their boss to help them, having a  simplified way to prepare for performance appraisals, working with different generations and multi-cultural coworkers, navigating workplace politics and etiquette, language fluency and being strategic with their careers.

She specializes in communication skills for foreign-trained professionals, communication for parents, coaching in communication and presentation skills for students and professionals, networking within an organization and externally, interview skills and etiquette, communication and culture. 

The books Gloria wrote are (K)New Words, ABC For Speakers & Presenters, ABC For The Workplace, ABC’s Of Networking, An English Guide For Pronunciation and Mispronounced & Misunderstood.       

Gloria faced a moment of truth when she recognized how she did not want to be treated. There is always a little bit of sunshine peeking out from behind dark clouds, always something to be learned from every interaction. The choice she made and the actions she took as a result uncovered her potential.

She speaks about the lessons she learned from her own experiences and others because those experiences are universal and maybe some people are waiting for their moments of truth.

Aaron Goertzen, CFA | Senior Economist & Director | Economic Research
BMO Capital Markets 

 

 

Aaron contributes to a diverse cross-section of activities within the Economics department. His coverage of the North American agri-food industry is widely distributed to clients and the media, while his agricultural forecasts appear in each issue of The Goods, the department’s monthly commodity price publication. Aaron also contributes to the department’s country risk program, reporting on economic and political risk across a wide range of jurisdictions. He also plays a central role developing macroeconomic scenarios for the bank’s stress testing and financial reporting activities.

Prior to joining BMO, Aaron was an economist in the Economic Analysis and Forecasting Division at the Department of Finance Canada.

Aaron joined BMO’s economics department in 2012. He holds an MA in Economics from the University of Toronto and a CFA charter.