A proud Opa himself, Ken credits his grandfather with teaching him the importance of balancing hard work, family and community service. Growing up, Ken saw his grandfather live a full and complete life. While exceedingly successful and generous, he passed away with little saved as most of his resources had been given to schools, his church and average people he knew that were simply going through a rough patch.

“If I am half the man my grandfather was, I will have succeeded.”

Once described as a “towering egghead” by the media, Ken Boessenkool is one of Canada’s leading conservative strategists. His list of work accomplishments are long including his current role as the J.W. McConnell Professor of Practice at the Max Bell School of Public Policy at McGill University, and Research Fellow at the CD Howe Institute.

In the course of his career, he has worked for and founded a variety of public affairs firms; played senior roles in provincial governments; was a senior regulatory economist with two electricity firms; and volunteered for and strategized Conservative campaigns nationally and in British Columbia, Alberta, and Ontario.

While Ken has been front and centre in Canadian politics for almost three decades – working with Stephen Harper, Ralph Klein, Jim Dinning, Christy Clark, Stockwell Day, Ric McIver and many others – he remains most proud of the following stand-out initiatives that helped change people’s thinking and lives.

• His early work on taxation and the family in the 1990s was central to the Harper proposals on direct payments to families for childcare. These policies won over Liberal proposals for a national childcare program.
• Lead political staffer on the single rate tax in Alberta in the 1990s for Ralph Klein’s government under Stockwell Day.
• Co-chairing the founding convention for the Conservative Party of Canada in 2005 and co-authoring the first policy book for that party approved unanimously at that convention.
• Chair of the board of Sonshine Community Centre, helping women and children escape from domestic violence and rebuild their lives. The Centre is also committed to working with children to stop the cycle of abuse.

A bold, intuitive thinker and prolific writer, Ken is looking for ways to influence policy and make this next chapter better for his fellow Canadians. Today’s challenges force him once again to find conservative solutions to non-traditionally conservative issues.

And while he’s doing this, Ken won’t forget lessons learned watching his grandfather balance work with family. Committed to being the best Opa ever, Ken’s also got plans with his wife, daughters, spouses and extended family and friends. These plans will likely involve some dare devil acts in the outdoors, maybe a Formula 1 race and definitely some complicated mixology involving tequila, bourbon or, optimally, both.