Although she has yet to choose her destination, one thing is certain: when Elizabeth McDonald steps down as president and CEO of the Canadian Film and Television Production Association later this month, it will be only the beginning of a new chapter in the librarian-turned-lobbyist’s diverse career.

McDonald’s eight years atop the CFTPA leave a significant legacy. The fruits of her tenure include the Prime Time in Ottawa conference, which she helped refine, the Profile reports on the economic state of the film and TV industry, and a successful CFTPA mentorship program. She has also demonstrated a seemingly endless capacity to wrestle Ottawa for tax and funding concessions.

More importantly for McDonald, however, she believes progress has been made for her constituency.

‘I think I helped reposition producers,’ she says. ‘When I first came to the CFTPA, it was an old boys club. The broadcasters and cable guys would get together and make the deals. With a very able board, I was able to come and say ‘Not so fast, guys.’ We opened the door for the producers, and I think that’s helped open the door for the creators, and that’s going to make a big difference in the development of public policy.’

Affecting public policy wasn’t foremost on McDonald’s mind when the North Bay native graduated from McGill University with a master’s degree in library science. But after working for the National Library of Canada in Ottawa on a task force for the Ministry of State for Science and Technology, and later for consulting firm Peat Marwick as a consultant in 1983, McDonald found her legs as a creative problem-solver.

In 1984, Marwick sent McDonald to the CBC as a follow-up to an Auditor General report that suggested the pubcaster wasn’t using its information systems efficiently for strategic planning. She met with Paul Gaffney (then senior director for strategic planning), offered him her thoughts and then said he really didn’t need her services or their $15,000 price tag.

Less than two months later, she found herself working for the CBC as a strategic planner – although McDonald claims the only reason she got the job was because her birthday was the same as Gaffney’s.

She picks the highlight of her tenure at the CBC as working with Sheelagh Whittaker (Gaffney’s eventual replacement) and her team on the successful application for CBC Newsworld, which eventually launched in 1989.

When Michael McCabe, then-president of the Canadian Association of Broadcasters, needed someone for strategic planning in 1988, McDonald took the job, becoming senior VP of television.

‘I left the CBC believing that I would get experience and come back,’ she recalls.

But her time at the CAB (during which she helped assemble Taking the Lead, the association’s first strategic plan) led to a position as VP of programming services at the Canadian Cable Television Association in 1992. She worked with then-CCTA president Ken Stein and Sandra Macdonald, her predecessor at the CFTPA, on the Cable Production Fund. McDonald credits Stein with showing her the value of finding common ground in forging public policy.

‘He taught me to reach out and try to make those who are not in the public sector understand what the public sector is about, to try to find the answers and work with everyone,’ she recalls.

When Sandra Macdonald left the CFTPA in 1995, she recommended McDonald as her replacement. Was her successor prepared for what was in store – government cuts, a looming ACTRA strike and a copyright fracas?

‘Nobody on this earth is prepared to be an association president, unless they’ve done it at another association,’ says McDonald. ‘These are such tough jobs. In my case, you have 400 bosses, all of whom have legitimate needs and who are waiting for you to do something for them, and they’re all different.’ But, as she points out, big or small, they all have views to be heard and are paying members.

McDonald has had the good fortune to preside over the CFTPA during an industry boom time. What the future holds for domestic producers is not so certain, however.

‘I think [the industry] has had an amazing period of growth,’ she notes. ‘I think the challenge will be the sustainability. We’re going to go through a government change and the economy isn’t quite as hot as it was before… I’m not sure where this sector will fit in.’

It would be understandable if McDonald held a dim view of government, given the frequent policy clashes, but in fact the opposite is true. She believes the next federal election might hold the seeds of relief.

‘The two leadership candidates, Paul Martin and Sheila Copps, have been immensely supportive of this industry,’ she says. ‘And I think that [Finance Minister] John Manley has tried to be. [But] I feel very strongly that Paul Martin supported the Canadian Television Fund and the tax-credit measures himself. I have had meetings with him and he knew the file, and he was excellent as a minister of finance. Sheila Copps also knows this industry and fights for it.’

But McDonald expects change, including an increased give-and-take between producers and government.

‘I think in exchange for [public involvement], producers are going to have to deliver the audiences, etcetera,’ she says. ‘It’s not just going to be ‘here’s the money, do it.’ There’s going to have to be accountability for this money… People are going to have to demonstrate that they have business plans that are not based solely on public financing.’

McDonald is also concerned about how the industry may react to hard times and the prospect of change, and hopes the diverse interests will be able to find common ground.

‘If everybody makes noise but it’s not melodic, then government is less interested in listening to you,’ she says. ‘If you can solve a lot of problems for a lot of people at the same time, then that’s a great solution [for them]… I think that people are worried, and sometimes when people are worried they’re not logical. You really have to sit there and say, strategically, what are our objectives? And that is really hard to do. This is a really complex industry, so it is easy to fall into minutiae.’

The rigors of funding are only some of the issues her as-yet-unnamed successor will have to tackle. Digital rights management and intellectual property rights are also on the list. With all this, it seems an unfortunate moment for abdication, but McDonald thinks her timing is right.

‘I can’t tell you how important it is to be fresh,’ she says. ‘People really have to guard against being stale in these jobs. I care too much about this sector, too much about content, too much about the creative opportunities here and abroad to be stale. So my job now is to take all this energy and find something else to do with it.’

And where will the fall find her?

‘I’d like to do some policy work, not necessarily only within the film and television world,’ she responds. ‘I think I’ve learned some stuff in the public policy area that would be very useful, so I’d like to look at that as well. But right now, I’m open.’

-www.cftpa.ca

– with files from Peter Vamos