Marie-France Bellemare – Executive Director

With a Bachelor’s degree in Social Work and a Master’s degree in Cooperative and Community Development Management from IRECUS, Université de Sherbrooke, Marie-France has worked for nearly 12 years in local development, including roles as coordinator of a social development roundtable and economic development officer at CDEC Centre-Sud/Plateau Mont-Royal.

After serving as Executive Director at the insertion company Le Boulot vers, she joined the TIESS team as a transfer advisor to pursue her three passions: social economy, innovation, and local development.

At TIESS since 2016, her work focused primarily on scaling up, measuring the social impact of social economy enterprises, and circular economy. She notably led the project “Social Economy and Circular Economy: Synergy Potentials and Promising Business Models.”

She is the lead author of two guides, “Scaling Up in the Social Economy” and “When Franchising Becomes Social: A Manufacturing Manual.”

Marie-France took over the helm in February 2021 from Agnes Beaulieu, who co-founded and led Insertech since 1998.