On March 19, KCR Community Resources in partnership with Volunteer BC present a special Nourishing Volunteer Managers session featuring Doug Rankmore, former CEO of the KGH Foundation, speaking on “Leaders Eat Last: Servant Leadership for Volunteer Programs”. Mark your calendars to join us at this free session for both volunteers and non-profit leaders (registration info below). Get to know Doug and his philosophy, a little more in today’s article.
“I’m originally (and perhaps always) a prairie boy,” says Doug. “I was raised and taught how to be a good human in Brandon, Manitoba.”
Doug credits his start to working in the non-profit sector to good luck. “I was finishing my Masters with a mass of loans and one of my professors recommended I apply to a be Director of Research at the March of Dimes in Toronto. There I came to understand the power in people coming together for a common cause.”
“Working with people with incredible values and ways of being in the world really appealed to me,” explains Doug, who for many years was CEO of Braintrust Canada, a local organization that was started to support people with brain injury. “The impact of brain injury and how challenging it is to help people living with brain injury has never left me.”
During his 11 years at the KGH Foundation, Doug identifies that he was able to help bring about great changes for the community, while working “with wonderful humans”. He remains “very grateful for the opportunities” he has been given and recognizes that a world without volunteers and non-profit organizations would be “barren”.
“I had the honour of working with four auxiliaries to KGH,” shares Doug. “They were an incredibly committed group of people whose drive and organization lasted more than a century committing millions of dollars to make sure the people of the interior had access to the best medical care – and in fact helped make KGH one of the most advanced treatment centres in the country. They were completely dogged in their determination to make a difference and contribute to their community.”
During his presentation Doug will share his notion of “Servant Leadership” that he actually learned about many years after already practicing it. “The concept of providing those you work with the tools, resources and environment they need to do the work we are all committed to, has just always made sense to me,” explains Doug. “To practice this type of philosophy, you just need to understand that ordinarily, it is not you who gets things done. It is those around you that get things done – but only to the degree that you can enable them to do their best.”
“If you keep your eye on the goal instead of your ego, it usually becomes obvious that while the leaders plays a key role – the role is actually to empower others,” continues Doug. “I love when a team has a mission and they all put their best into it. For me, the concept of excellence is embodied when the result is greater that the sum of its parts.”
If you would like to attend, please register here: www.eventbrite.ca/e/community-engagement-training
