SPEAKERS

We are pleased to present the following speakers, panelists and instructors.


BRENT BAROOTES
President and CEO, Partnership Group – Sponsorship Specialists

For over three and a half decades, Brent Barootes has been at the forefront of sponsorship and partnership marketing in Canada. As President and CEO of the Partnership Group – Sponsorship Specialists®, he has worked directly with municipalities for over 15 years to create and optimize their sponsorship strategies and revenues.

Brent's expertise is further underscored by his Amazon Canada best-selling book, "Reality Check – Straight Talk about Sponsorship Marketing." A seasoned speaker, Brent is known for his engaging style and has presented at numerous conferences, as well as delivered a compelling TEDx talk on "Busting the Work-Life Balance Myth." He currently resides in Nanaimo, BC.


JAMES O’CONNOR
Vice President, Partnerships at A&C Inc.

James brings the discipline, dexterity, and skill of his former career — a professional dancer with the Boston Ballet and National Ballet of Canada — to successfully landing some of the most high-profile partnerships in Canada.

Notable deals include category partnerships for the revitalized Union Station, Meridian Credit Union’s naming of Meridian Hall and Meridian Arts Centre, Virgin Mobile’s sponsorship of Yonge Dundas Square, and TD Bank’s presenting sponsorship of Bike Share Toronto.

Like all A&C members, James has consistently chosen to work with worthy organizations, including Harbourfront Centre, the Royal Conservatory of Music and AIDS Committee of Toronto.


SCOTT ELLIOTT
Manager, Corporate Sponsorship Program at the City of Peterborough

Scott Elliott joins us from the City of Peterborough where he has successfully developed and grown a Sponsorship Program that is now generating more than 1-million dollars annually in non-tax revenues.    Scott has more than 25 years’ experience working in the public sector sponsorship industry, including time with provincial government programs and his role with the City of Peterborough.


SUNJAY NATH
Hall of Fame Speaker

Sunjay Nath travels globally sharing insights on leadership and performance. He is best known for his trademark, “The 10-80-10 Principle” which is a framework that helps individuals and teams improve performance. This methodology combines best practices with small wins to help people empower themselves.

The framework is the synthesis of years of studying many different business models and philosophies and then distilling them into a very simple and easy to apply framework. Some of the concepts it compasses include The Pareto Principle (The 80/20 Rule), The Gallop Research that was used in the writing of “Now Discover Your Strengths”, Sir Isaac Newton’s Laws of Motion and Jack Welch’s concept, Differentiation.

Most successful organizations use these concepts in one form or another. The 10-80-10 Principle can be used to explain why Apple is such a resounding success and how the financial meltdown occurred in 2008. It can also explain why we care more about gas prices than mortgage interest rates even though the latter has a significantly larger impact on our lives. The successful understanding and application of this principle will have a tremendous impact on the performance of any individual, team or organization.

Sunjay was a founding Vice President of an e-learning company based in Toronto that has gone on to become a multimillion-dollar company. He started an international speaking business when he was 19; he wasn’t even old enough to rent a car. This was particularly problematic when he would travel. As a speaker, Sunjay has travelled extensively and addressed in person well over 1,000,000 people around the world since 1995. In 2005, Sunjay became the youngest Canadian (and third youngest in the world) ever to earn his CSP (Certified Speaking Professional). The CSP is the highest internationally recognized designation that a speaker can aspire to achieve. In 2018 Sunjay was inducted in the Canadian Professional Speakers Hall of Fame.

With his background, Sunjay offers a rare combination of both left and right brain activities to engage all audience members. Sunjay holds an undergraduate degree in Mathematical Engineering, a degree that after the first year of the program, 80% of the students failed out. He also holds a MBA and currently he is working on his doctorate in business administration.

Always striving to achieve Sunjay has earned is Black Belt in Tae Kwon Do, has run a full 26 mile (42km) marathon and has jumped out of a perfectly good plane (some call it skydiving.) He is a magician, a comedian, a professional actor, he can juggle and in university he was rated as one of the country’s top debaters.

Sunjay is the author of The 10-80-10 Principle, The ABCs of Student Leadership, a contributing author for the book, Professionally Speaking. His new projects include learning to sing “Row, Row, Row Your Boat” in rounds … by himself.


ROB RICHARDSON
Coordinator, Facility Advertising & Sponsorship, Town of Aurora; Principal, R2 Marketing Inc.

Rob Richardson is an award-winning municipal sponsorship strategist with over two decades of experience building high-impact partnerships that deliver real community value. With a career spanning public, private, and non-profit sectors — including roles in partnership development with the City of Toronto and his current leadership at the Town of Aurora — Rob has negotiated millions of dollars in sponsorships, naming rights, and advertising agreements.

Known for his engaging style and practical insights, Rob brings a rare blend of municipal know-how and business development savvy to the table. He is passionate about helping municipalities elevate their sponsorship game — not just by “selling space,” but by creating meaningful, mutually beneficial partnerships.


EDDY SIDANI
Customer Success Lead, SponsorPulse

Entering his 6th year with SponsorPulse, Eddy’s passion is in sponsorship strategy and the building/nurturing of client relationships. His role requires him to work closely with numerous brands, properties, and agencies, being a trusted resource of best-in-class consumer insights. Eddy works with some of the largest buyers and sellers in the North American sponsorship industry, helping them optimize their portfolios via SponsorPulse’s strategy, valuation, and measurement solutions. His experience ranges across many passion points – including sport, entertainment, music, culture, lifestyle, cause/charity, and academia.


VICTORIA MAHONEY
Head of Marketing & Partnerships, Harmony Marketing

Victoria is a marketing, partnerships, and communications specialist with experience in media relations, event management, social media and government relations. Recently named one of the top 40 under 40 for event professionals in North America, Victoria is the lead on all Harmony Marketing clients and is the co-producer of the Toronto Waterfront Festival and Sugar Shack TO in Toronto.

Victoria was instrumental in bringing the World’s Largest Rubber Duck throughout Ontario in 2017 which brought over 750,000 people to Toronto’s Waterfront alone. Victoria specializes in sponsorship, experiential marketing, government relations and communications for festivals and events and is the head of all public relations and social media for clients.

In her spare time, Victoria teaches tap dancing classes in the east end of Toronto. She also loves to travel and has visited all 7 continents and over 40 countries.