Supporting not for profits this holiday.

Vancity Holiday eCardsA few days ago, I wrote about my growing fondness for the Vancity Community Foundation. Well, today we get to share that love with our members and staff with the launch of our Vancity Holiday eCards.

Each one sent adds $1 to a donation pool at the Foundation, and senders can decide whether they want to support enterprising nonprofits, housing and homelessness or food security. It’s all contained here on a description page on ChangeEverything.ca.

I hope it’ll be an engaging way for people to connect over the holidays while supporting local issues.

Selfishly, it’s nice to see our main website and ChangeEverything.ca work together. For me, it’s putting together the pieces we already have to work harder together.

Props to
Mary-Jo Dionne and Currency Marketing for helping to make this happen.

So check out the eCards. Any guesses as to how many days it will take to hit $10,000?

Supporting the Vancity Community Foundation.

One area of Vancity that I’m excited to get more involved with is the Vancity Community Foundation. I didn’t have much to do with the Foundation until fairly recently when I chose them to receive the donation made in my name when I was named GonzoBanker of the Month back in March.

And then recently, I went to their 20th anniversary celebration, and was in awe of what they accomplish in our communities every day. Brave, inspiring work that reminded me of all the reasons I work at Vancity.

Here are those videos, and I urge you to check them out.

Community Stories
20th Anniversary
Donor Stories

I have written before that one of the main things I love about doing what I do at Vancity is that it is an organization whose presence would be sorely missed by many in our area if it were to disappear. It is an organization that matters, which is not a sense I’ve ever had about the companies I’ve ever worked for before. It is a profound thing.

I’ll be writing more about the Vancity Community Foundation soon, we’re about to launch a very cool way to support their work.

Honoured and amazed…

The Top 10 People of 2009As I was getting ready for work this morning, I looked at my computer a little bleary-eyed and saw this tweet from Jeff Stephens. It was a nice way to start the day.

A few weeks back, Bank Technology News told me I had been named one of the top 10 innovators of 2009. I was humbled, kind of in disbelief, honoured and thrilled.

Today, they published The Top 10 People of 2009. I netted out in the coveted number 2-3-4 spot, along with Aaron Patzer of mint.com and Jeff Carter, CEO of azigo.com and co-founder of the Center for Future Banking at MIT’s Media Lab.

Bank Technology News wrangled us together on a conference call and published this story: Where Innovation Is, and Isn’t, in Retail Banking.

So, I guess this constitutes a good day…