Al sits down with Keenan Wellar. Keenan Wellar co-founded the LiveWorkPlay organization in 1995, and has served as the Co-Leader and Director of Communications since 1997. LiveWorkPlay helps the community welcome people with intellectual disabilities to live, work, and play as valued citizens. From a startup with just two staff, LiveWorkPlay has grown to a team of 25 with over 150 volunteers and more than 200 community partners. Keenan’s calling to this work started with a happy accident, as he revealed at a 2014 conference panel of the Association for Fundraising Professionals.
Mr. Wellar has undergraduate degrees in history and education from uOttawa, is a certified Ontario teacher, and completed a Masters of Applied Linguistics and Discourse studies at Carleton University. He holds a Professional Certificate in Non-Profit Marketing from the Sprott School of Business and is a BoardSource Certified Governance Trainer. In 2018 he became a Core Gift Master Facilitator.
Keenan has authored articles in numerous journals, mainly on topics related to non-profit governance and in 2018 became a regular contributor to Nonprofit Quarterly.
In his personal life, he is an enthusiastic Ottawa RedBlacks football fan, a passion he shares with his wife Julie Kingstone, along with a love for kayaking and photography.
Keenan and Julie are also co-owners of Wellstone Leadership Services Incorporated, providing coaching and consulting services to the non-profit community.
Season 2 of the Call Me Podcast is brought to you by CONNECT Communities. CONNECT’s mission is to Make Lives Better. We achieve this by providing complex and specialized services for people living with brain injury and stroke in a nurturing and innovative community environment. Through our Life Redesign Model™, we empower people by applying our knowledge and experience to coach, challenge and motivate each person to reach their unique personal goals and build a fulfilling life for themselves. CONNECT is one of few organizations accredited through Accreditation Canada using the Acquired Brain Injury standards. For more information visit their website: https://connectcommunities.ca/
