Canadian Guru To Address The NZPI Conference

Tuesday 26 March 2002

Leadership In The "New New" Economy, Digital Property Management, Emotional Intelligence (EQ) - Canadian Guru To Address The NZPI Conference

Leadership in the "new, new" economy. What is relevant to be a visionary executive in 2002? What is a strategic organization and why? What is infrastructure management? What impact does the new world of digital property management have on people, places and things? How to motivate staff in life-long learning? What is performance measurement? Why are companies moving towards EQ (emotional intelligence) as a measure for success?

These are a few of the issues to be addressed by Canadian Guru Alex K Lam, President - The OCB Network, at the New Zealand Property Institutes 2002 Conference being held in Rotorua on Friday 17 and Saturday 18 May 2002.

New Zealand Property Institute CEO Conor English said today, "During these times of change with high volatility in the business environment, the management of the organisation is becoming the most time consuming and very often, constraining element in the executive agenda. This new work environment demands a new and fresh look at management styles, leadership qualities, and visionary strategies in order to move your team to the next level of competency in the property management business. Alex Lam will provide an international leading edge perspective."

The New Zealand property asset base has a value of some $420 billion. What happens with that asset base is important to the New Zealand economy and our communities. The New Zealand Property Institute represents 3000 professionals who impact on that asset base either directly or indirectly. This conference is therefore a very important event.

Alex Lam says competency is any skill, knowledge, behavior or other personal characteristic that is essential to perform the job or differentiates average from superior performers. A competency-based approach to managing human resources is an essential step to ensure success in an organisation. Emotional Intelligence (EQ) is fast becoming the new measure for success in corporate America and around the world. The core competency required for managing today's corporate real estate; the steps required to implement competency assessment; and how to use the process for staff development are all vital issues.

Alex is one of several international key-note speakers at the Conference which has the theme "The New Sandpit". Over 300 people attended the Institute's first very successful conference last year.

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Guru Background

Mr. Lam is president and founder of The OCB Network, a company based in Toronto, Canada designed to help facility management organizations transform their business through customized learning and team visioning workshops in leadership and creativity. Prior to establishing The OCB Network he was president with EdFM International Inc. providing facilities call center, Y2K and building diagnostic solutions to corporate real estate organizations. He spent twenty-three years with Bell Canada as General Manager - Facility Management where he was responsible for over 2250 facilities with a staff of 379 professionals operating with an annual budget of $70 million covering over 12 million square feet of facility space. He was instrumental for the introduction of the award-winning ZeroWaste program.

He received the 1994 Facility Manager of the Year award from the Canadian chapters of IFMA and the Canadian Facility Management & Design magazine. He serves on BOMI Institute's Board of Trustees; the Board of Directors of the International Facility Management Association (IFMA), the Executive Board of the International Society of Facilities Executives (ISFE) founded by MIT, the Best Practices Committee of The Outsourcing Institute (OI); and the Editorial Advisory Boards and Contributing Writer of the Canadian Facility Management & Design magazine, Toronto and the Journal of Facility Management, London, UK. He is on the faculty of Ryerson Polytechnic University in Toronto teaching the post-graduate certificate program in facility management. He developed and taught Human & Environmental Factors in Facility Management at The University of Manitoba's masters program.

He is a frequent speaker at international conferences covering topics from leadership to facility management. He has just contributed a chapter on "Business Transformation for Facility Management" in the new upcoming Facility Design and Management Handbook: Theory, Practice and Technology to be published by McGraw Hill in Spring 2001. He received a Bachelor of Architecture degree from McGill University in 1967 and a Master of Theological Studies from Ontario Theological Seminary in 1995. He is a certified EQ-i administrator on Emotion Intelligence in workplace performance in 2000. Professional memberships include IFMA, ISFE, ASHRAE, AIGA, RAIC and the Strategic Leadership Forum. He is regarded by the profession as an educator and a mentor in the field of Facility Management.

In short, he is a guru!

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