The current president of the Southern Plains Co-op Robert Grimsrud has been elected one of the directors with Federated Co-operatives Limited (FCL). The election took place on March 3 in Saskatoon during the 90th annual general meeting of FCL. It came in as an exciting change.
“It’s pretty exciting to be on the board of directors for Federated Co-op,” said Grimsrud. “I didn’t know what to expect. I guess you can say I was fairly surprised and happy with the outcome. Going in I didn’t know what the result would be.”
Grimsrud has been on the board of Southern Plains (formerly Estevan) Co-op for 24 years and has been president for the past 22 years. Now he felt it was the time to move forward.
“I’ll be stepping down at the annual general meeting that’s going to be held in the next couple of months,” said Grimsrud on March 11.
“And I just thought it was a good time, I guess, to move on from that position. Don’t get me wrong, I thoroughly enjoyed it, but I just thought it was a good time to move on,” he added.
There will be an election during the next Southern Plains Co-op annual general meeting. Grimsrud’s term would be up in any event, so now he just won’t be filling the position. The president’s position will become vacant and will need to be filled either by acclamation or by election.
With FCL Grimsrud will be one of 15 directors representing 15 districts across western Canada, from Manitoba to B.C. There are six directors from Saskatchewan all together, and Grimsrud will be representing all of the co-ops in the southeast.
The new position will bring new responsibilities and will require a serious time commitment when it comes to board meetings, which always take place at the FCL head office in Saskatoon.
“There is a lot of time commitments involved with the meeting dates, a lot of information to go through. It’s a big company. Typically it’s been the largest business in Saskatchewan; at least it was for many, many years,” Grimsrud said.
Beside regular board gatherings, Grimsrud will also be meeting with local co-ops that he represents in the southeast.
In the near future, he plans to start off with some orientation.
“I guess you have to orientate yourself to the job, get a lot of background information on what’s been taking place and acquaint yourself with the various divisions of the company and get to know the people, the senior leadership team with Federated Co-op and your 14 other board members as well. That’s probably the first call to duty as far as being a director with them.”
Grimsrud also pointed out that FCL constantly develops and moves forward rapidly, so he will need to get up to speed quickly.
