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Cathy French | Colliers | Toronto Downtown

Cathy French

Senior Vice President & Managing Director, Workplace Advisory

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About

Professional Summary

Cathy brings 25 years of experience collaborating with clients to help them leverage the workplace as a strategic asset to attract, retain & engage top talent, enhance business performance, build culture and manage cost.  She has advised organizations across the globe and across industries on new ways of working, employee experience & wellbeing, workplace transformation, change management, sustainability, and real estate optimization.

Prior to joining Colliers, Cathy worked for RBC as the head of Global Workplace Strategy and Design in the Corporate Real Estate group.  She led a  team of strategists and designers and was responsible for workplace strategy and the design programs for office and retail, for the bank's 24M square foot portfolio.  Cathy developed the 'Workplace of the Future', a global strategy and program to transform RBC workplaces --  to enable organizational objectives, enhance the employee work experience, and optimize the real estate portfolio. She used a design-thinking methodology to engage employees,  gather data and insights and gain executive alignment. Cathy  implemented a measurement process to assess and quantify the effectiveness of the  workplace programs and to gather key learnings to apply for continuous improvement. These initiatives have laid the foundation to support the future of work and the workplace at RBC.

Accomplishments

CoreNet REmmy Award: RBC AI Workplace, MaRS Discovery District

Industry speaking engagements:

  •       Canadian Real Estate Forum - Strategies for  Productive Workplaces 
  •       WORKTECH -  Workplace and the  Employee Experience
  •       Metropolis Magazine – Employee Engagement in a Digital World
  •       Oxford Properties - Workplace Innovation Challenge
  •       IFMA Facility Fusion - The Evolution of the Workplace

Education

  • Bachelor of Science, Business Administration 
  • PROSCI Organizational Change Management, Executive Program
  • LEED Green Associate 

Services

Skills

Consultancy Services, Planning, Workplace and Interior Design

Service Lines

Workplace Advisory

Property Type

Office

My Team

Featured News

Dec 2, 2022

New HQ and New Ways of Working

A Canadian financial institution is embarking on a transformational initiative that will lead to the relocation of 3,500+ employees to a new state-of-the-art, digitally-enabled workplace that is designed to foster collaboration, inclusivity, and sustainability.
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Aug 18, 2022

The Future of Work

The engagement enabled the client to gain alignment on the purpose and objectives for hybrid working and develop the roadmap for the workplace of the future.
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