Mentorship: How the Burnaby Hospital Foundation’s Kristy James and Danielle Sleiman are helping each other

Often, the hardest part of changing jobs is leaving your team behind, especially when you’ve developed strong relationships with key staff members. So why not simply skip that part?

Danielle Sleiman and Kristy James met when the former was hired as the marketing and events coordinator for North Vancouver’s Lions Gate Hospital Foundation in 2011. James, then the director of donor relations at the foundation, saw something in Sleiman.

“My first impression was that she was young and eager—she hadn’t had a lot of experience in nonprofit but was extremely creative and willing to try new things,” James says. “She was great at learning and always asked questions like ‘What could I have done differently in that?’ and ‘Do you think it was okay?’”

In May 2013, James left the foundation to become the executive director of Western Canada for Cystic Fibrosis Canada, the national charitable not-for-profit that’s committed to finding a cure for the eponymous disease. Not so coincidentally, in October of the same year, Sleiman was hired as the organization’s event and  community manager.

“Danielle took a year off to travel, and when she came back I said that I could really use some help,” remembers James with a laugh. A couple of years later, when James left again—this time to become the CEO of children’s charity Variety BC—Sleiman took her role.

“When Kristy hired me, I had very little experience in the nonprofit sector,” says Sleiman, who had a bachelor’s degree in communications and starred on SFU’s soccer team.

“I came from a competitive sports background. She really just believed in me and instilled this confidence right off the bat. She was so willing to open up her network to other professionals in the  organization that I could learn from and share her advice and pay it forward.”

James left Variety to become the CEO of the Burnaby Hospital Foundation in October 2017. During that time, Sleiman had become the development director of corporate partnerships and sponsorships at Ronald McDonald House BC and Yukon.

“I called her up and said, ‘You ready for a hospital?’” recalls James. “And she’s like, ‘Yep.’” Sleiman is now the vice-president of development at the Burnaby Hospital Foundation.

“We keep joking that, if I am going to go somewhere else, would she take over this role or would she come with me,” says James. “Even our board is like, ‘Yeah, we kinda get that you’re a little partnership there.’”

That partnership has evolved considerably in the decade-plus that the duo has been working together. “As we both move through different organizations through different stages of our careers, we both continue to evolve, and I think that’s where we’ve maybe seen a change with the type of work we’re doing,” says Sleiman.

“Now Kristy can get out and do more meetings with high-level network donors and do all these great speaking engagements because she’s able to evolve her career and not have to necessarily be in the office all day, every day.”

James also has an eye on where Sleiman can evolve and grow. “I know where, in my mind, if she were to be a CEO, what she’d need to work on a bit, so I try to give her those opportunities,” James says, citing things like working with the board, writing strategic plans and putting together annual budgets. “And if I have a schedule conflict for a presentation or something, let’s have Danielle step in and take on that role instead of moving it.”

Asked about the best advice she’s  received from James, Sleiman thinks for a moment before revealing a lesson from when they first started working together.

“I was new and it was overwhelming; there was so much going on,” says Sleiman. “I’m paraphrasing, but she said something like, ‘There’s going to be a lot of balls that are always in the air. Make sure you keep the glass ones in the air and let those rubber ones drop, because you have a team and community around you that’s here to support.’ That’s stuck with me.”

For James, one gets the feeling that mentoring Sleiman isn’t much work at all these days. “Danielle is so good at coming in with a notepad and going, ‘Okay, so that didn’t go as planned, what can I learn from this?’” she says. “She’s so much more advanced in her career than I was at her age.”

This time around, Sleiman doesn’t need to think much before coming in with a response. She replies instantly: “Because of you.”