New leadership at Sail Canada

The 2019 Sail Canada Annual General Meeting and Leader Summit took place Montreal, Quebec, wrapping up on October 18. The Sail Canada Board of Directors, Staff, Provincial Sailing Associations, Committees, Coaches and Partner Representatives gathered throughout the week to discuss current affairs and establish working plans for the future.

The AGM highlighted the main strategic goals, accomplishments, and planned initiatives moving forward. Sail Canada said goodbye to longstanding Chair, Todd Irving, after serving on the board since 2003. Todd has devoted countless hours to Sail Canada’s – overseeing our training programming, branding, and overall leadership. The Sail Canada membership elected two Directors at Large and a Chair.

Sail Canada extended many thanks to departing Board member, Janet MacMillan who has shown much dedication and commitment to the board over the years. Janet has been an immense asset to the organization, always willing to provide expertise and support. Her knowledge within the field of Communications & Public Relations has helped the organization a tremendous amount. Barbara Pike and John O’Dwyer were welcomed to the Board for a 3-year term as Directors at Large.

Hugh McGugan as the Chair was elected Board Chair. Mr. McGugan has been a member of the Sail Canada Governance Committee for the past 5 years and Chair for the past year. Professionally, he has held a variety of training and customer facing roles in the high-tech industry for the past 30+ years.

As a part of that world, Mr. McGugan considers that he is constantly reinventing himself as the business evolves both with technology development and logistically, and feels that his skills are highly applicable to Sail Canada’s operating environment where they faced with similar changes both on the technology and business/funding sides.

Hugh McGugan has been an active volunteer in sailing and other local community activities for many years including youth outdoor hockey league coaching, youth sailing & race teams lead and Sail Training Director at NSC, as well as judging, regatta safety roles and 6 years of Board experience at Sail Canada.

One of his first roles on the Sail Canada Board of Directors was to initiate consultations and assist staff and the Board in the re-formulation of Sail Canada’s Strategic Plan – Participation/Development/Performance, and working with the Provincial partners, to roll that plan out to Sail Canada’s member clubs/associations and other stakeholders.

Source: Sail Canada