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AI Essentials
Engagement Record · AVA Research
AI Essentials
for DLCG
Canada’s first enterprise AI training pilot for mortgage professionals, built and delivered by AVA Credit Inc. for DLCG Mortgage Group.
2,271
professionals trained
24.8%
of the ~9,150 network
97%
positive on core concepts
01
What it was
An eight-month consulting engagement between AVA Credit Inc. and Dominion Lending Centres Group to design and deliver a national AI enablement program for mortgage professionals.
What began as a three-deliverable package (an eBook, a one-page cheat sheet, and a coaching slide deck) grew into a bilingual enterprise training platform with its own domain, an embedded AI assistant, a full automated delivery stack, and a validated set of training outcomes.
A copilot, not an autopilot. The human operator elevated, not replaced.
The engagement was formalized in an Independent Contractor Agreement effective July 1, 2025, delivered through Matthew Dobson and sponsored by DLCG CEO Gary Mauris. The original term ran to December 31, 2025 and was extended through February 2026 to complete the French build-out and training. The curriculum was built on Dobson’s pre-existing IP, the Working with Generative AI body of work and the RGI Framework (Retrieve, Generate, Interact), customized for real mortgage lending workflows.
02
What was built
Eight deliverables, of which three were contracted.
Deep playbook
AI Essentials eBook
First Edition, 8 chapters plus appendices: building blocks, the engine, RGI, prompting, practice, benefits & risks, governance, guardrails.
Session spine
Live Coaching Deck
18-slide facilitation deck (v3.0): the instructor-led spine for live Zoom delivery.
Desk reference
Quick Guide
One-page cheat sheet (v3.0) of the essentials and the prompt formula.
Self-paced
Web Deck
Interactive online platform: a self-paced version of the full curriculum.
Infrastructure
dlcg.io
Dedicated training domain (registered Aug 2025, owned and managed by AVA), running a WordPress site with bilingual English and French hubs.
AI assistant
Isaac (v2.1)
Embedded training assistant trained on the full curriculum, session transcripts, and platform resources, scoped to training questions only.
CRM integration
Velocity3 AI Assist
In-CRM connector for ChatGPT or Gemini via the user’s own API key, with built-in privacy guidance for client-facing drafting.
Delivery stack
Automated pipeline
Calendly registration, Zoom with cloud recording, Constant Contact reminders, Google Workspace identity, and Analytics, all built for clean handoff.
Bilingual delivery. The platform shipped in both English (AI Essentials Training) and French (Formation Essentiels IA), with the Québec market served by a localized lead, Jean-Philippe Laforge.
03
Delivery & timeline
Jul – Sep 2025
Planning & Building
Built the dlcg.io platform; developed curriculum, core concepts, use cases, and interactive demos.
Oct 9 – Nov 6, 2025
Pilot
23 sessions, 1,309 participants; methodology validated and refined.
Nov 12 – Dec 17, 2025
Corporate Training
6 further sessions (#24–29) scaling to corporate staff.
Jan – Feb 2026
French Build-Out
Contract extended to deliver the French platform (Formation Essentiels IA) and training.
2026
AI Essentials+
Advanced expansion: master classes, tool deep-dives, fireside chats, community.
All sessions ran as one-hour live Zoom deliveries. Attendance built steadily, peaking at 246–253 participants in the mid-November corporate sessions. Session #17 (October 28) was a Chairman Live session featuring Gary Mauris on stage, the kind of visible executive sponsorship that signals a priority, not an experiment.
04
What participants said
| 97% | Methodology landed Positive on Core Concepts / RGI, from roughly 8 minutes of instruction. Efficient pedagogy. |
| 74% | Reached beginners Used AI less than 30 minutes a day, the intended audience, not just early adopters. |
| 95% | Forward demand Want continued training, direct justification for AI Essentials+. |
| 94% | Cost not the barrier Say cost is not an obstacle, which removes the most common objection to adoption. |
Where the network expects leverage: Admin & CRM (59%), client emails (58%), deal structuring (39%), market research (37%), learning & PD (31%): a blueprint for the next phase of use-case development. Live chat ran overwhelmingly positive, with senior leaders among the voices.
05
The governance throughline
Strategic Advisory · OSFI Guideline E-23
Training was the literacy layer of a compliance strategy
Running alongside the training was a quieter deliverable that gave the engagement its strategic weight: a strategic advisory on OSFI Guideline E-23 (Model Risk Management). A preliminary report analyzed the draft on July 14, 2025; a final report followed January 1, 2026, after OSFI published the finalized guideline on September 11, 2025.
The thesis: although OSFI does not directly regulate brokerages, its third-party provisions mean federally regulated lenders will contractually flow E-23 compliance down to the brokers they fund. Routine AI use, such as prompts touching client financials or deal structuring, may constitute governed “models,” requiring prompt logging, PII masking, output validation, and enterprise-grade tools. Mandatory lender compliance: May 1, 2027.
The advisory positioned AI Essentials as Phase 2 (network-wide training) of a five-phase brokerage compliance roadmap, the connection that elevates this from a training project to the literacy foundation of an AI-governance transformation, tying directly into AVA Credit’s own E-23 / B-10 work.
06
From scope to platform
The engagement’s defining feature was expansion. The contracted scope grew into the delivered platform.
Originally contracted
Actually delivered
eBook, cheat sheet, slide deck
→ All three, plus Web Deck, microsite, AI assistant, and use-case library
Corporate staff + agent network
→ Bilingual English / French delivery across 29 sessions
Downloadable evergreen resources
→ Full automated delivery stack on a dedicated domain (dlcg.io)
Live and recorded coaching
→ 29 live sessions + recordings + Velocity3 CRM integration
Training only
→ Training + OSFI E-23 governance advisory (two reports)
The client
DLCG Mortgage Group
A publicly traded mortgage brokerage group listed on the Toronto Stock Exchange, with a network of roughly 9,150 licensed professionals across Canada. AI Essentials was delivered network-wide, in English and French.
DLCGMortgage Group
TSX: DLCG
The record, in one line
A three-deliverable training contract became a bilingual enterprise AI platform that trained 2,271 professionals, validated its methodology at 97% positive reception, and laid the literacy foundation for a regulatory-governance roadmap pointed at May 2027.
AVA Credit Inc. × DLCG · Engagement Record
Prepared June 2026