New Leaders Roundtable - Change From Within: How to Introduce Change Within Your Organization

Over the last three years, our sector has gone through a tremendous amount of change, including an unprecedented increase in turnover of leadership positions. The New Leaders Roundtable is a monthly series curated to support these theatre workers through guest speakers, resource sharing, and peer to peer support.

Each meeting will begin with a 50 minute guided Q&A session with a senior leader in our industry. After the Q&A section, the guest speaker will leave the meeting, and a dedicated 40 minute Peer to Peer Session starts, where the attendees can discuss their shared issues and concerns in confidence, and benefit from each other’s experiences. 

The third session, Change From Within: How to Introduce Change Within Your Organization, will convene on Wednesday November 29th, 4pm - 5:30pm ET. Our guest for this session is Jivesh Parasram, Artistic Director at Rumble Theatre.

Jivesh (Jiv) Parasram is the Artistic Director at Rumble Theatre located in Vancouver, BC on the Unceded Coast Salish Territories (MST). Prior to taking on the AD role at Rumble, Jiv was the Associate Artistic Producer at Theatre Passe Muraille (Toronto, ON), and worked throughout the independent scene (mostly) in Toronto working in various capacities. He has a pretty broad span of experience having worked as a Director, Producer, Stage Manager, Designer, Production Manager, Dramaturge, Curator/Programmer, Arts Administrator - and even (Rarely) an Actor. He also teaches sometimes. Jiv has joined PACT at the negotiation table from time to time on the CTA with Canadian Actors Equity, participated in the Rising Tides program, and has facilitated for some of PACT's early EDI initiatives. He is a member of the Ad Hoc Assembly through which he has worked with the team to advocate for advancement of conditions and resources for artists outside the mainstream. Jiv also just completed a two year stint on the curation team for the National Creation Fund through the NAC. He is the founding Artistic Producer of the award winning (and unfortunately named) socio-politically mandated collective "Pandemic Theatre" where he continues to create work with co-founder and major collaborator Tom Arthur Davis. Most of his arts admin work in the past few years has been focussed around restructuring Rumble through a lens of Decoloniality into its latest incarnation to support the emergent needs of the Independent sector in Vancouver; shifting the organization to a joint leadership model; and developing a research stream focussing on how small cultural organizations can more meaningfully engage and exchange with existing community organizing initiatives. The thing that tends to peak peer interest is the idea of decentralizing the 'art' in the larger cultural happening. Read more about Jiv and Rumble Theatre.

During the Roundtable discussion, Christine Rossi-Wright, Senior Program Worker at the AFC, will be present to provide a supportive and empathic ear. At the end of Roundtable discussion, she will summarize what was discussed as a group and provide any insight and takeaways, with the overarching goal of ending each session on a constructive note.

Christine Rossi-Wright BEd, MSW, RSW (Ont.)

Senior Program Worker, The AFC

Christine is a registered social worker and holds a Master of Social Work degree from the University of Windsor. In her role at The AFC, Christine coordinates their Emergency Financial Aid program and provides direct social work support to clients in need. She is an instructor of the Mental Health First Aid Course and facilitates workshops and presentations directly for the arts & entertainment community. Christine's education and experience is complemented by her previous work as an actor in professional musical theatre and her strong ties to the Toronto arts community. Christine draws on her vast and diverse experience to create helpful educational content that primarily focuses on mental health and wellness, in an effort to reduce the stigma in the industry around mental health problems. 

Please register for this session by Monday November 27th, 6pm ET. This session is open to non-PACT members if space allows.

*This is our final session in 2023. The series will resume in January 2024.

If you have any questions or concerns, please email our Program Associate Panthea Vatandoost at pantheav@pact.ca.