CPRS Toronto’s strategic plan
To strengthen and evolve our chapter, CPRS Toronto identified three priorities in a new strategic plan:
Identity: Who we are, what we do?
It is increasingly clear in today’s world that we need to create a sense of community and support our community with resources and networking when we are still socially distant. The communications community has evolved beyond just Public Relations and needs to be reflected in our mission, incorporating the diverse communications functions. We are uniquely placed as an industry body to support our members with professional development and elevate our profession as a whole and act as a single platform to encourage all communications professionals.
Membership: Increase and diversify
What was and is also evident for us in the Toronto chapter of the society is the increasing need to look like our diverse population in Canada. We relooked at the way we support diversity and resolved to create opportunities for inclusion. Diversity is our strength, and we need to embrace it. We also decided to focus on growing our association by providing a sense of belonging and finding solutions to the membership’s cost for students, young professionals, the BIPOC population and new Canadians.
Finance: Stability, stability, stability
Finance is important, increasingly so in the current environment. All organizations had to pivot or make adjustments to ensure there is financial stability during the pandemic. It is even more important for a not-for-profit organization like ours. We need to be creative to build up a revenue stream to support our chapter, create and distribute content that matches the needs of the industry, and share best practices. Increasing the revenue stream alone is not going to do it. We also looked at our spending to cut costs wherever possible. Increasing sponsorship opportunities will also help our goal of reaching stability. All these actions, along with a legacy fund and ROI lense, are sure to put us on a path to financial stability and prosperity.