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Address to the First Excellence in Executive Leadership Certificate Graduates

By Alisha Thompson

11 December 2020

Certificate graduate Alisha Thompson's address to the first ever class of Excellence in Executive Leadership recipients.

When Julie asked me to speak at today's event, I felt humbled and happy to spend time with my fellow Executive Program grads. Then I saw the speaker lineup included Rose Patten, and I felt both excitement and worry. There is no way I can follow Rose Patten! She is a walking, living legend in the world of leadership and management.

Here is a quote from Rose that I believe embodies the challenges in the world: "Leadership has never been more important! It has never been harder! Success involves embracing disruption, adapting, and self-reinvention. This is not intuitive and requires a new consciousness and mindset for Leaders at all levels."

2020 has not been easy for anyone in the world. We are all adapting to the "at-home virtual digital" culture. If there is one word representing what I see all around us and embodied at Rotman, it is "Resilience." We've learned how to increase our resilience and encourage it in our colleagues, how important it is at the best of times, let alone during a global pandemic, how resilience ties back to every aspect of leadership.

This year personally, I was very ill, managed a global team, and managed two at-home learning curriculums for my children. My situation is not abnormal for today. I am willing to bet this sounds like life as usual right now for many of us. People speak of zoom fatigue, of loneliness…

These are just some of the issues we're dealing with, but we have Rotman tools and support to help us. We are passing on these tools to our next generation leaders. As Rose discussed, Intentional Leadership is more important than ever. As executive graduates of Rotman, we are promoting and living the values ascribed by Rotman, including compassionate and contextual leadership.

This past year, we paused travel for our North American and European teams. We have not seen each other in person for almost a year. There have been colleagues who have had physical and mental challenges relating to COVID or lost family members. We are hopeful with the new vaccine that we will see each other maybe sometime this year.

Before Rotman, my leadership style was more transactional. Now I can look more from the lens of empathy point of view based on the Big Eight.

In my time at Rotman, I've taken programs in leadership, finance, executive presence, design thinking, negotiation, and risk management—to name a few. Rotman provided me with a robust network and sense of community. Since joining the Rotman family, I've grown and transformed my role and impact within my organization and my sphere of influence: helping and mentoring others by extension with new skill-sets. Rotman provides stellar education and opportunity for those willing to invest time and an open mind. The return on investment leads to doors opening, network conversations, new roles, new careers, and of course, skills enhancement.

Thank you, Rotman, to invest in us and provide us with opportunities to shape our future in this dynamic digital landscape for next-generation roles. I feel honored to be part of such an accomplished, self-aware cohort.


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