Personal Blog Posts - Todd Race Copywriting

Is the Fear of Being First Interfering with Our Efforts to Go Green?

Is the Fear of Being First Interfering with Our Efforts to Go Green? Climate change is pushing humanity to the limit, but we are finding solutions. The greatest challenge lies in crafting those changes into our new reality and doing it quickly enough to make a positive and lasting difference. Lately, I have been reading […]

Concern for Community: The Seventh Cooperative Principle

Images of people in red orange, orange, yellow, green, blue and purple

Credit unions pride themselves on their commitment to their communities and demonstrate that concern in many ways. This includes supporting charitable drives in the neighborhood, bankrolling local small businesses, or sponsoring financial literacy efforts aimed at their friends, neighbors, and fellow credit union members.

This commitment can be seen in the social media feeds, email newsletters, and web posts of credit unions all across Canada and the United States. I believe it is a sincere commitment and is one of the greatest strengths of the credit union movement as a whole.

Co-operation Between Co-operatives: The Sixth Cooperative Principle

Co-operation Between Co-operatives is the Sixth Cooperative Principle organizations aimed at achieving economic strength and autonomy by banding together, it is clear that credit unions have a role to play in supporting similar organizations. This is an extension of the goal I have written about already: promoting credit unions’ local role in supporting local small […]

Why Credit Unions? A Statement of Principles

Multi coloured stick people fill a piggy bank

There is a set of cooperative principles maintained and shared by the International Cooperative Alliance. These seven principles are:

Voluntary and open membership
Democratic member control
Member economic participation
Autonomy and independence
Education, training and information
Co-operation between co-operatives
Concern for community

Voluntary and open membership: The First Cooperative Principle

A drawn image of a crowd of people of all colors

No matter what your financial situation looks like, the door is open, without gender, social, racial, political or religious discrimination.

Democratic Member Control: The Second Cooperative Principle

As a member of your local credit union, you participate in deciding who will oversee the general direction of the institution, and it will act to serve its members and community. And refreshingly, your influence is based on being an individual member – not on the number of voting shares you bring to the table. In some ways, it seems like a radical concept, but it doesn’t need to be.

Credit unions work by offering members a sense of ownership along with the feeling of inclusion I talked about in my last post. And that sense of ownership can be empowering.

But that sense of power brings with it a feeling of responsibility. We are collectively involved in real decisions with real consequences. And those decisions should not be taken lightly.

Member Economic Participation: The Third Cooperative Principle

Credit union members behind a sign promoting Member Economic Participation

The purpose of any credit union is to offer economic and financial benefits to its members. And that means you. Because the credit union belongs to its members, rates and fees are set to benefit everyone in the credit union. And services are put in place to help each of us.

In the News, SRI & ESG, Samples

Putin’s Attack Adds New Urgency to Renewable Energy

Putin’s little escapade has fundamentally affected many political and economic conversations, including the need to push towards renewable energy. A significant portion of the oil and LNG used in Europe originates in Russia and threats to shut off that supply threatens to have a significant immediate impact on the European economy. By converting to renewable energy, Europe can avoid that trap.

Sir John A MacDonald’s Mixed Legacy Serves as an Example of Governance within ESG

Sir John A McDonald, Canada's First Prime Minister

Governance is the third tenet of ESG and generally refers to the internal workings of a corporation and its impact on that company’s overall performance and public reputation.

This is where scandal is most likely to crop up, often suddenly and without warning, mainly because not enough attention is spent examining its roots.

And political and historical examples of the impact of scandals like this are not hard to find. One of the most prominent in Canadian history almost destroyed MacDonald while he was in office. Other events during his second tenure as Prime Minister have served to seriously damage his legacy.