Wendy Swedlove has been the President of the Canadian Tourism Human Resource Council since its establishment in 1993. The Council’s mandate is to support the tourism sector in addressing human resource issues. The Council has produced labour market information on the sector’s employment characteristics, growth, compensation and labour supply/demand gaps. It has developed national and international occupational standards, professional certification programs, paper-based and on-line work place training under the emerit brand and career information under the Discover Tourism brand.

In 2007 the Council incorporated into its mandate the Canadian Academy of Travel & Tourism, which provides tourism resources and programming to high schools, has developed tools and programs to integrate standards into post-secondary education, and has produced qualification frameworks identifying placement on a continuum of diplomas, degrees and industry credentials. To meet the challenges associated with recent and anticipated labour shortages, the Council has helped to transition under-employed Canadians into the tourism workforce, and assisted employers with the Canadian Government’s immigration and temporary foreign worker programs.

Mrs. Swedlove spent eight years with the organization that is now the Canadian Tourism Commission. Prior to her work with tourism, Mrs. Swedlove held positions with the Foreign Investment Review Agency, the Canadian Transport Commission, and the Department of Energy, Mines and Resources.

Wendy is a member of the advisory boards of the tourism and hospitality programs of the University of Guelph and Ryerson University, and is the proud recipient, on behalf of the Council, of four awards. In 2012, the University of Guelph bestowed on Wendy an Honorary Doctorate degree.