Many people within the investment community are familiar with CFA Institute’s mission to promote the highest standards in ethics, education, and professional excellence worldwide. CFA Institute, CFA Societies around the globe, and CFA charterholders work to promote best practices within the investment profession. For some investment professionals, that journey begins before they finish their undergraduate programs.
Ten years ago, in 2014, the first Ethics Challenge took place in Toronto, with three student teams participating, each from a CFA Institute University Affiliation Program university in Toronto. This evolved quickly, and by 2017, the twelve member Societies across Canada hosted the inaugural CFA Societies Canada Ethics Challenge. Today, teams from all over Canada are preparing to participate in the 2025 CFA Societies Canada Ethics Challenge.
What is the CFA Societies Canada Ethics Challenge?
The CFA Societies Canada Ethics Challenge is designed to increase students’ awareness of the ethical dilemmas and issues they may face as investment management professionals.
Student teams are given an ethics case to analyze and evaluate. They have three weeks to work together before presenting their analysis and recommendations and participating in a question-and-answer period to a panel of judges selected by their local host CFA Society. Judges are provided with a grading rubric to evaluate teams based on the quality of their understanding of the ethical issues involved, their recommendations, and the quality of their analysis, presentation, and responses to the judges’ questions. Local champions compete in a National Ethics Challenge Round, where they are given a new case to present.
The CFA Societies Canada Ethics Challenge can help participants to:
- Take the first step in the path toward becoming a CFA charterholder
- Gain practical training on real-world ethical dilemmas and how to handle them
- Augment classroom learning by combining theory and practice
- Improve their professional presentation and teamwork skills
- Develop their resume/CV
- Showcase their university on a local and national scale
- Receive hands-on mentoring
- Network with professionals and peers to make in-roads to the industry
Why participate?
Lou Richard, a student participant on the 2024 CFA Societies Canada Ethics Challenge Championship team from HEC Montréal says, “During the winter of 2023, I completed an internship in ethics and compliance at CDPQ. When I read the description of the CFA Societies Canada Ethics Challenge, I saw many similarities with the work I had done during my internship.” Richard felt her internship would allow her to bring a unique skill set and perspective to her student team. Like many post-secondary students, the potential real-life application of the Ethics Challenge inspired Richard to sign up.
Richard attributes her team’s success to their strategy, where they divided up the CFA Institute Code of Ethics and Standards of Professional Conduct so each student could be a champion for their section of the standards.
Hassan Mehdi was a student participant on the 2023 CFA Societies Canada Ethics Challenge Championship team from Edwards School of Business at the University of Saskatchewan. He decided to join the Ethics Challenge thanks to Associate Professor Brian Lane, CFA, and his infectious enthusiasm about learning and business ethics.
Working as a small team with just three members (student teams can range in size from three to five members) and two student members in active co-op placements during the challenge, Mehdi attributes their success in the challenge to mastery of time management. Mehdi says the Challenge taught him to consider the nuances within people’s moral and ethical compasses, saying, “Everyone has their justifications and definitions of what is morally correct and what is ethically correct.” Mehdi took his role of playing devil’s advocate seriously, along with his teammates, allowing them to discuss, debate, define, and fully understand the intricacies of their case. He also talks about the real-world experience that went hand in hand with the challenge as second- and third-year university students, including flying to Winnipeg to participate in the local round of the competition.
Elvis Picardo, CFA, CIM, a volunteer judge from CFA Society Vancouver for the 2024 CFA Societies Canada Ethics Challenge National Round, reinforces student sentiments. Picardo describes the Ethics Challenge as providing the opportunity for participants to discuss finely nuanced ethical issues in a collaborative environment. “In the real world, ethical dilemmas often demand an instantaneous response or a decision that must be made under tight time constraints. By analyzing complex ethical cases, presenting them, and answering probing questions from the Ethics Challenge’s judges, participants learn how to think on their feet. They also garner insights into ethical issues that will be invaluable to them in their professional careers.”
Richard says that the CFA Societies Canada Ethics Challenge is a valuable experience for anyone looking to familiarize themselves with the world of finance and the CFA charter. There is so much to gain from the experience. For Richard, the Ethics Challenge reinforced that “We are all human and make mistakes; what matters most is how we are able to learn and grow from them.”
Get involved
If you want to find out more about volunteering as a judge for your local Ethics Challenge or how to enter a student team into the Ethics Challenge, please get in touch with your local CFA Society or info@cfacanada.org. 