The YSI Working Groups on Co-operatives and Co-operation and Financial Stability are delighted to announce a Webinar on "Can Credit Unions Survive without Greater Co-operation?" With professor Dionne Pohler (University of Toronto / University of Saskatchewan):
Friday, 2nd of February 2018, 10-11 am EST / 4-5 pm CET / 8:30-9:30 pm IST
To access the webinar, please click here: https://global.gotomeeting.com/join/980220637
Can Credit Unions Survive without Greater Co-operation?
The Canadian credit union system is facing unprecedented challenges, and credit union leaders are struggling with how to structure their governance arrangements, not only within their own organizations but also at the system level. Dionne Pohler will highlight the efficiency-autonomy trade-off that is present in co-operation among credit unions. Credit unions need to identify a way to co-operate if they are to remain strong and effective organizations. This co-operation, and the efficiencies that it will create, cannot be achieved without first developing specific governance norms that will allow credit unions to give up some of their autonomy. Dr. Pohler will outline six design principles that could guide the development of these norms and encourage greater co-operation among credit unions.
Suggested Pre-Reading (available for free download at the provided links):
Pohler, D. (November 2017). Governance Challenges in Credit Unions: Insights and Recommendations. Filene Research Institute: Madison, WI.
https://filene.org/research/report-unlocked/governance-challenges-in-credit-unions-insights-and-recommendations
Fulton, M., Fairbairn, B., & Pohler, D. (September 2017). Credit Unions in Canada: Design Principles for Greater Co-operation. Centre for the Study of Co-operatives: University of Saskatchewan.
http://usaskstudies.coop/documents/pdfs/Credit%20Unions%20and%20Co-operation%20FINAL.pdf
Biography
Dionne Pohler is an assistant professor at the Centre for Industrial Relations and Human Resources and a research fellow with the Rotman Institute for Gender and the Economy at the University of Toronto. Dionne’s ongoing research seeks to understand how the design and implementation of different governance arrangements in interdependent social systems affect outcomes for different stakeholders. Previous research explored the impact of strategy, employment systems, human resource practices, and unions on employee and organizational outcomes, and her most current completed project examined multinational companies’ compliance with employment laws in Ontario.
Dionne is also a Filene research fellow, and a fellow in Co-operative Strategy and Governance with the Centre for the Study of Co-operatives at the University of Saskatchewan, where she previously held positions at both the Edwards School of Business and the Johnson-Shoyama Graduate School of Public Policy. Ongoing projects with Filene and the Co-op Centre include understanding the political economy of governance successes and failures, particularly in the Canadian credit union system and co-op federations.
As part of a desire to make her research useful to the communities she studies, Dionne helped develop a co-operative model of economic and social development in Western Canadian rural and Indigenous communities as one of the co-investigators on the Co-operative Innovation Project (CIP). CIP required extensive stakeholder outreach and engagement, and eventually led to the creation of a non-profit organization, Co-operatives First, dedicated to working with rural and Indigenous communities to address the needs identified by community members. Dionne was a founding board member of Co-operatives First.
Contact
Speaker:
Dionne Pohler, Assistant Professor, University of Toronto Centre for Industrial Relations and Human Resources, and Fellow in Co-operative Strategy and Governance, Centre for the Study of Co-operatives, University of Saskatchewan via dionne.pohler@utoronto.ca.
Group coordinators
WG Cooperatives & Cooperation, Holly Stephens & Esther M. Schmitt via coop@youngscholarsinitiative.org
WG Financial Stability, MÃriam Oliveira and Céline Tcheng via fs@youngscholarsinitiative.org