The Canadian Government Executive Summit is just one week away and, with all the changes taking place in Ottawa, this year’s summit couldn’t be taking place at a more opportune time. Recently we had the chance to sit down with John Richard Jones, the group publisher of Canadian Government Executive, to discuss the conference and what it might mean given the political context that Canadian government professionals of all stripes are now facing.
V: Canadian Government Executive (CGE) has over 20 years of experience in the government sector and for a number of years the magazine has also been producing an Annual Summit designed to discuss best performance and leadership practices. As is often the case, the public service is currently undergoing some change, or restructuring, thanks to a new government on the Hill. Has this affected this year’s conference?
JJ: We definitely have made a few changes this year and I’d say that this is certainly a year of change for public sector executives and for our country. Even without the recent election, all orders of government in Canada have embarked upon an ambitious change agenda. At the federal level, the broad government-wide label is Destination 2020. This Summit is designed to equip today’s and tomorrow’s program executives and managers with the latest thinking and lessons learned around how to engage employees and lead impactful change by harnessing proven tools and methods such as leadership insight, Lean, Balanced Scorecard, Big Data, performance measurement and evaluation as well as Business Intelligence.
We have also sent out invitations this year’s to industries outside of the public sector arena that could benefit from the content of the summit—but also provide public sector executives with a view point and information exchange that they want to know more about. For example, we invited senior executives from the IT and the life sciences industry. We believe they will add some real value to the discussions and networking.
V: What speakers will be coming to this year’s event?
JJ: Well, Paul Niven, one of our featured key-note speakers, is going to tackle the issue of driving employment engagement through a revitalized strategy and the balanced score card approach.
John J. Scherer, another noted speaker, is going to examine high performance and how to improve performance by creating the right cultural conditions. I’m also really excited about Donald Farmer, who is going to discuss his perspectives and research as it relates to the human factor when making decision around data and research.
V: Where can someone get more information if they would like to attend? Are you still accepting registrations?
JJ: Yes, we are still accepting registrations and have a reserve of tickets for last minute attendees from both the private and public sector. We offer special pricing opportunities for new professionals, associations and those who wish to attend outside the public sector arena.
For more information you can visit their website: http://rightcrowdevents.com/events/cge/summit/
And for special pricing consideration, simply type in the code “Leader18” at the time of registration.