CFA Montréal recently conducted an “Economic Outlook and Members' Needs Pulse Check Survey” on the coronavirus pandemic to support members and raise awareness of the CFA designation.

The survey of local members on the coronavirus pandemic was separated into two sections:

• Members' needs and health: To reach out to members, help adapt their services and extend them to candidates.
• Members' economic perspectives: To showcase their expertise and promote the CFA designation in the media.

The results provided insights that will help the local society to better serve its membership and keep them engaged during these exceptional times. The survey indicated that members wanted greater access to webinars and research pieces that discuss various economic outlooks and recession scenarios. In terms of soft skills, remote work and crisis management came first.

Carl Robert, CFA, President of CFA Montréal, said: “The challenge was not just to adapt the technology but to remain relevant, as our members were quickly drowning in webinar offers from everywhere.” 

As a result, the CFA Montréal launched a new series of webinars with high-profile economists and strategists and the first webinar took place on 24 April 2020 (Spotlight on the COVID-19 crisis with Martin Coiteux).

“We are each living through this period in our own particular way and developing new skills as we need to adapt to different kind of challenges. As it is well known that every financial crisis has a great impact on professionals, it was also important for us to check on how our members were coping psychologically and we were pleased to see that most of them claimed to receive sufficient support from their firms is these troubled times,” Carl Robert added.

This initiative successfully helped to raise the profile of both CFA Montréal and the CFA designation. Thanks to the collaboration of 306 members (out of 2900), the local society was able to share its members’ views on the recession, the best opportunities in the stock markets, and who they think will emerge most quickly from the global recession.

CFA Montréal shared the results with the local media and secured seven pieces of coverage – across TV, radio, and print media. It also shared the survey results with universities and key stakeholders in the finance industry.

This is not the first time that CFA Montréal has seized the opportunity to position its members as experts in the news based on a survey. “As Margaret Franklin mentioned in the Town Hall, we are neutral and non-commercial. We try to capitalize on this by bringing a new perspective to a current subject covered by the media,” Carl Robert concluded.

This initiative could be followed by a second survey to see how members’ opinions evolve in the coming months, as well as an event to discuss the lessons learned during this crisis.

• Read the press release and economic survey results