AS WE MOVE TOWARDS THE CLOSE OF THE 2011-2012 YEAR, we continue to remain focused on our two key priorities for our membership: programming and outreach.

On the programming front, we held roughly 60 events over the first three quarters of the 2011–2012 year and continued to focus on providing quality events that our members requested. While offering more technical and investment-related content will always be a staple of our programming efforts, we will certainly keep current on new trends and bring these to our members. In particular, the mentorship committee has delivered some innovative programming through its Day-in-the-Life series. Additionally, we were involved with the social media webinar for CFA charterholders offered by CFA Institute to national societies.

Indeed, our partnership with CFA Institute is as strong as ever, as we are at the forefront of a number of initiatives that are being carried out globally. This is a deliberate decision and is a core part of our outreach efforts. We have adopted the newly-designed global branding of CFA Institute for the Toronto society (you will see it on our materials and throughout our new premises) and were one of the first among the largest societies to do so. We welcomed a number of guests from the Institute at our official opening ceremonies for the new Society premises in May. To celebrate the 50th anniversary of the CFA Program, we took part in the ringing of the opening bell at the TSX, joining several other societies around the world, including New York, London, and Hong Kong, who took part in similar events. These highly visible initiatives will promote the CFA brand and serve to further our outreach efforts.

At the board level, we held a strategy session in mid-April to increase clarity and establish key tactics and metrics around our two key priorities of programming and outreach. This strategy document will be used as the basis for the three-year business plan for the society, which will ensure that we have a clear vision with key deliverables and metrics to remain accountable to our membership.

To that end, one of the key issues we hear from our members relates to the economic value of the CFA and, more broadly-speaking, industry compensation.

In the spring of this year, we partnered with all the other Canadian societies on a wide-ranging compensation survey with the assistance of Environics, who have tremendous expertise in this area. The purpose of this survey will be to provide meaningful total compensation data to our members across a number of different industries. We will also use this information to establish dialogue with our key employers to advocate on our members’ behalf and to demonstrate the value of the CFA designation. The survey will be available shortly and will be free of charge to members.

It was my distinct privilege to be your president this year and I look forward to continuing to see many of you at our events in the years to come. As always, we value your feedback. If you have any suggestions or ideas to assist us, please do not hesitate to reach out to anyone at our management office, board of directors or myself.