Huron-Perth Centre CEO Terri Sparling announces retirement in the spring
Huron-Perth Centre for Children and Youth CEO Terri Sparling has announced she will retire at the end of May next year.
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Creative solutions to seemingly impassable hurdles. Those are the accomplishments Huron-Perth Centre for Children and Youth CEO Terri Sparling is proudest of over her 27 years leading the organization.
Whether it’s forging partnerships with community organizations or putting everything she and her team has into ensuring the children they serve have the supports needed to overcome their challenges, Sparling’s passion for her work has helped build a foundation on which the futures of so many local kids depend on.
As the centre’s second and now longest-serving CEO since assuming the role from Don Keiller in 1997, Sparling has gradually come to the realization her time serving the organization as its leader is coming to an end so, last week, announced she will be retiring at the end of May 2021.
“Anyone who knows me would say, ‘Sparling will never retire,’ ” Sparling said. “I am not happy unless I have at least five projects all going on at the same time, so it’s not a surprise to my colleagues and friends that I’ve carried on in spite of the fact that my husband has been retired for five years.”
Since the Huron-Perth Centre last went through its accreditation process as a mental-health service provider – something Sparling said takes a “horrendous” amount of work to complete – she has spent a lot of time considering about how and when she could hand over the reins of leadership.
“I found myself thinking, ‘Do I want to go through another (accreditation in 2023),’ and the answer was a resounding no. I just don’t have the energy and, if I can’t be all in, I just don’t want to do it. I’d rather create space for somebody who has more to give,” Sparling said.
While Sparling knew she had to retire with enough time to allow her replacement to learn the ropes, she made the choice to continue leading the centre when COVID-19 hit the region back in March.
“The last thing I was going to do was bail,” Sparling said. “The time to lead is not when it’s going well, but when there are challenges.”
While the pandemic is unlikely to end before Sparling retires, she’s confident both her board of directors and staff are capable of steering the ship on the course she’s helped set since first joining the organization in 1991.
“Being able to nurture an organization that I’ve believed in, that is strength-based, that wants the best for all people starting with staff, I’d like to believe that it made a bit of a difference,” Sparling said. “I’ve worked in lots of different settings … but what I found that’s been compelling and kept me here is the hope that we can turn things around for kids.
“Often times, when problems become intergenerational or a difficulty over time, pathways get worn and people find it harder to break patterns that aren’t helpful. … But with kids, there is that sense that you can change their trajectory. So I feel grateful to have been part of a sector that has a lot of hope – has hope for families and hope for kids.”
Even after becoming CEO, Sparling said she kept a regular roster of clients until 2012, when she opted to step back and focus on supporting the centre, its staff and the kids they serve from a more strategic perspective.
Whether that was diversifying funding sources to ensure programming and services could be maintained or forging new partnerships to help area children, Sparling said she can look back on a career that meant something important to so many different people.
“There are many clients I’ve gotten attached to over the years. Every day, I had the opportunity to do something that brought meaning. It brought meaning to staff, managers, the community and of course our clients. Those are the people I worked with,” Sparling said.
Once she retires, Sparling plans to stay busy by volunteering with local organizations that provide front-line services, continuing her passion for creating stained-glass art work and, once the pandemic ends, travelling with her husband.
The search for a new CEO is well underway, and Sparling said the Huron-Perth Centre board of directors hopes to have selected her replacement well before she leaves her office for the final time.
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