Have you ever stood in a place where sound carries farther than you expect? For me, that place is Katepwa Lake (a deep glacial spillway, roughly 2 km wide and 180 meters deep, created by ice sheet meltwater ) â a long, quiet valley where your voice travels out, returns and reminds you that everything we send into the world comes back in some form. Nothing we do disappears. It echoes.
This year, I heard agricultural commentators note that farmers are already preparing for the October harvest. Months of planning â before a single seed goes into the ground â so the future doesnât arrive unprepared.
That level of foresight is not unfamiliar to anyone in this room.
In Complex Rehab Technology, every strong outcome begins long before the evaluation, long before the delivery and long before the final sign off. Our âharvestâ is the moment a client gains independence â and like farming, that moment is only possible because of the work we do long before it arrives.
iNRRTS know globally for the top-notch education we offer with our webinars and CRT Supplier certificate program are constantly planning. A slate of webinars for the upcoming year and more parts of the CRT Supplier certificate program, shows where we will be live on the floor.
As CRT professionals, we know what it means to plan.
We live in a world where details matter, timing matters, people matter and the consequences of our decisions last for years.
And I think often about the people who taught us that.
The mentors who shaped our judgment.
The colleagues who taught us how to think, not just what to do.
The ones whose voices still echo in the way we practice today.
One voice that has influenced me comes from Phil Jackson, who said:
âGood teams become great ones when the members trust each other enough to surrender the âmeâ for the âwe.ââ
That is the essence of this profession.
We stand with clinicians, clients, techs, funders and manufacturers, and we make decisions together that are far bigger than any one role. Jackson also spoke of the magic that happens when people commit themselves to something greater than their own ambition. And, everyone here knows what that feels like. We have lived it.
Which leads to a question we rarely ask out loud:
If someone hadnât invested in us, if someone hadnât guided us, challenged us and corrected us, where would we be today?
And then I think of this:
The Olympics take years of preparation to deliver two weeks of excellence.
Years of training, years of planning â all so that performers can rise to the moment when the world is watching.
If something that lasts for two weeks requires that much intention, why wouldnât we apply the same rigor to the future of our profession â a future that depends on excellence not for two weeks, but for decades?
That is why we must bring in new people now â younger Assistive Technology Professionals, Registered Complex Rehabilitation Technology Supplier, Certified Complex Rehab Technology Suppliers, new technicians, emerging clinicians.
Not later. Not someday. Now.
Invite them while our knowledge is still here to pass on.
Let them see how we reason through complex situations, how we adjust when a plan changes, how we advocate when a case becomes difficult and how we serve with commitment and integrity.
Give them room to practice, to stumble, to learn and to rise â with us beside them, not behind them.
Because when their moment comes, our goal is not simply that they take over.
Our goal is that they take us further.
What we invest in today â our time, our teaching, our example â will echo across tomorrow just like a voice across Katepwa Lake.
We are who we are because of the people who shaped us.
And who we will become depends entirely on whom we prepare now.
Jason may be reached at Jason@phmobility.com.
Jason Kelln, ATP, CRTSÂŽ is president of iNRRTS and became the first Canadian iNRRTS Registrant in 2018. Kelln is the recipient of the Simon Margolis fellow award. Kelln serves on the Rehabilitation Engineering and Assistive Technology Society of North Americaâs Professional Standards Board and has been an owner of PrairieHeart Mobility since 2022.