Linda Dalgetty appointed vice-president (finance and services)

I am very pleased to announce the appointment of Linda Dalgetty as vice-president (finance and services) effective July 7, 2014.

Linda joins the University of Calgary with more than 20 years of broad-based North American and international finance and business experience, most recently as senior vice-president and chief financial officer of Saxon Energy Services, where she was responsible for all of the financial functions of a global organization, including reporting, planning, operational accounting and information technology. Previous to her work at Saxon, Linda contributed many years to Agrium where she provided leadership to finance, IT and operations. During her time at Agrium, Linda looked for opportunities to leverage diversity of thoughts and opinions to improve decision-making. Linda also has a background in audit, working as audit manager with Ernst and Young.

Linda is a Calgarian and alumna of the University of Calgary, holding a bachelor of commerce degree from the Haskayne School of Business. She is also a chartered accountant and earned an associate diploma in agribusiness from the University of Guelph.

Linda is active in the community, volunteering as a community shelter co-ordinator for Inn from the Cold and also was a mentor for Agrium professionals. Additionally, she has experience volunteering internationally — in 2010, she assisted in the construction of a drug rehabilitation and psychiatric outreach centre in Freetown, Sierra Leone and in 2007 volunteered with impoverished rural children in Cusco, Peru.

As vice-president (finance and services), Linda will be responsible for a large portfolio that includes finance, human resources, information technology, risk, and the office of the internal auditor. She will be the university’s chief financial officer and will help the university pursue our Eyes High strategic direction by working closely and collaboratively with members of the university’s leadership teams to make informed, responsible and innovative decisions that optimize the use of university resources. Linda will lead the finance and services team and seek ways to ensure staff are engaged and enabled to produce quality work.

I would like to thank Jake Gebert for his commitment to producing positive change within the finance and services portfolio, and for all his work that leaves this university with a balanced budget, improved budget model and strong fiscal health. His contributions during his 13 years with the university have been invaluable. Jake is with us until the end of June, so we still have a few weeks to thank him for all he has done for the university. And we are pleased that Les Tochor will serve as acting vice-president (finance and services) from July 1-6, until Linda assumes her new position with us.

I would also like to thank the members of the advisory selection committee for their great work in bringing Linda to the university: 

Dru Marshall (provost) 
Ed McCauley (vice-president, research)
Firoz Talakshi (Board of Governors’ representative)
Jim Dewald (Deans’ Forum representative)
Richard Sigurdson (Dean’s Forum representative)
Ronald Kneebone (General Faculties Council representative)
Hussein Warsame (General Faculties Council representative)
Paul Rogers (The University of Calgary Faculty Association representative)
Robert Scorey (Management and Professional Staff Association representative)
Leslie Potter (Alberta Union of Provincial Employees representative)
Raphael Jacob (Students’ Union representative)
Sarah Akierman (Graduate Students’ Association representative)

Please join me in welcoming Linda to the University of Calgary.

Elizabeth Cannon
President