Richard Wiltshire, Campaign Manager | The role of campaign manager

Richard Wiltshire, Campaign Manager, Toronto, Ontario, Canada

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0:00 Why did you become a campaign manager?

So why sign up to be a campaign manager on a municipal campaign? I think for me, you know, it really boils down to just only only one reason, which is this city or the region that you live in you can, you have a choice: you can consume it or you can shape it, right? And if you want to shape it then you need to step up and make certain contributions to that to that area and our regions need people to be shapers of that, of the region. So my motivation came from a choice that I was making which says the city is not a given, my circumstance is not a given, it's not a given that my daughter will grow up in the way that things are. I have a choice and I can try to change the situation to make it better for not only my children but for others and being a campaign manager is a way that I exercised that choice to shape a region, so that was my primary motivation to get involved in and is my primary motivation to stay involved regardless of an outcome is that I have an obligation to try to make this community a better place to live not only for my kids but for others as well.

1:16 How did you feel coming out of a campaign that was unsuccessful?

I think coming out of a campaign and coming out of a campaign that you know by the primary metric of who won, we lost. You know how did I feel coming out? I felt that, umm, I felt extreme gratitude for having the opportunity to participate in a campaign, I felt gratitude for the candidate for the sacrifice that him and his family made. I felt way more connected to my city because I knew an area of the city far better than I had never known before i had develop empathy and understanding for a range of city issues that I didn't know. I mean it was an incredible experience and i bring that experience not only into my professional life where I think it's made me a better manager and a better strategic thinker but in my personal life where I see how my family interacts with public space and public services in a different way that I used to and I see the decisions that our city politicians make in a different light than I used to. So listen, I came out, we lost it, I cried but wow am I ever about a person for it at the end of the day.