Rosalind Lockyer, Founder & CEO of PARO Centre, Top 10 Admired Women Leaders of 2022 | IERA Women Leaders

In addition to the standard characteristics often found in outstanding female leaders, Rosalind Lockyer brings an exceptional blend of qualities that are the foundation for her award-winning leadership style. As a successful social entrepreneur, Rosalind has harnessed her passion and drive into a National organization that supports diverse women across Canada.

With humble roots in a small office on the corner of May and Victoria streets in Thunder Bay, Ontario, Rosalind’s remarkable leadership qualities lead to the growth of North America’s largest Peer Lending network and PARO Centre for Women’s Enterprise as a leading women-centered economic development organization.

As a leader, Rosalind has a unique ability to listen to women and transform that information into meaningful systems that support diverse women and their families exactly where they are, whether geographically or on their business journey. Driven by compassion and the understanding that all women experience life in diverse ways, Rosalind blends empathy and pragmatism to achieve incredible success, ignited by a uniquely genuine desire to lift all women and support them in reaching their dreams in their businesses and personal lives. This approach is anchored in a strong belief that helping women, both on a large scale and small scale, generates and sustains a significant impact.

Rosalind’s leadership of the PARO Centre has been recognized and celebrated internationally since 1995. Her exemplary leadership qualities have earned her a reputation as a visionary and systemic disruptor with impressive wisdom and strategic thinking abilities. Rosalind understands and actionizes the absolute truth that strong stakeholder relationships are vital to organizational and individual success. Rosalind’s ability to organize and foster support ecosystems for her organization translates into a strong and diverse ecosystem for PARO women. As a natural innovator, Rosalind can observe and analyze current political and cultural landscapes and anticipate trends, keeping PARO and PARO women one step ahead. This quality allows for developing a resilient and sustainable organization positioned to adapt to challenges, experience countless triumphs, and provide exemplary service to enterprising women.

PARO was founded on the idea that the best support for women is each other. PARO’s “women supporting women” strategy is the core foundational value that inspires all PARO programs and services. At PARO, we support women entrepreneurs through the whole lifecycle of their businesses. From start-up to growth and scale-up, PARO’s support strategy is intersectional and diverse and meets women where they are. PARO’s inspiration is the stories of the women themselves. Each program and support system is designed to fill gaps in service for women entrepreneurs, evaluated for effectiveness, and adjusted, if necessary. A significant aspect of this strategy features women’s empowerment and celebration of successes.

As a brilliant strategist, Rosalind puts her heart and soul into everything she does, mentoring and guiding her high-performing and passionate team. As is also true for PARO more broadly, Rosalind believes that empowering her team to achieve their dreams is the best way to mentor, inspire and encourage her team resulting in excellent client support for PARO women. Rosalind is a gifted people person; she naturally carries a warmth that is supported by a solid logical strategy, rendering the organization and the supporting team an extraordinary force.

“The advice I would like to share from my journey is that you can only be as strong as the people around you. The development of PARO has been largely focused on rallying a positive network with people who are empowering, rather than those who bring you down. It’s important to be respectful and kind to people who experience life in negative ways, but you must surround yourself with positive and empowered people. I believe this is the key to success. It is PARO’s strong team, ecosystem of support, network, and positive partnerships that have allowed us to achieve our goals as an organization that supports incredibly diverse women from many diverse backgrounds and geographic regions,” says Rosalind. “While PARO always has goals, the future is wide open. I like the way Garth Brooks said it, ‘and now, I’m glad I didn’t know, the way it all would end, the way it all would go. Our lives are better left to chance. I could have missed the pain, but I’da had to miss the dance.’ What he’s saying here is that the dance is the best part, and I believe that is true in my (and PARO’s) journey of life, as well.’” WL