VANCOUVER—As the Conservative party gathers to chart a path to election readiness for 2019, grassroots delegates will finally hear from Stephen Harper who is now charting his own course to step down before the next election.

Several sources say Harper has made no firm decision on timing, but is looking at a likely departure after parliament breaks for summer but before it resumes in the fall.

His former policy director Rachel Curran said Harper has no intention of announcing his plans in a speech Thursday night to the Conservative convention, but will keep the focus on the Conservatives’ record in government and the future of the party following a video tribute. That’s in part because no final decisions have been made, and also because Harper has told people he would not take on other work until he steps down.

“And then he will move into a new phase of his life and his career,” said Curran. “I expect he’ll have more to say about that in fairly short order.”

Harper quit as Conservative leader in October after leading the party to defeat but remained sitting as MP for Calgary-Heritage. He has taken a back seat to the interim leader Rona Ambrose, advises her and other caucus members behind the scenes, works on constituency issues and shows up to Commons votes but does not speak up publicly.

According to sources who’ve spoken to Harper over the past several months, the former prime minister had no exit strategy for his post-political career, and had laid no groundwork for a possible political defeat.

Now that future is starting to take shape as Harper looks at putting his foreign policy interests and knowledge to use.

Harper is said to be weighing joining a handful of corporate boards, and launching some kind of foreign policy venture, according to several sources including some who would not speak for the record because they weren’t authorized to do so. A couple of those familiar with Harper’s thinking suggested he is not about to start up a foreign policy institute. But it’s not yet clear what his venture would look like, whether it means forming a global consultancy group, or an organization that would act more like a think tank, or provide training, whether it would be associated with one or more organizations or a university, be based in Canada or in a number of countries.

“I think he is considering all of those options,” said Curran.

Rick Anderson, once Preston Manning’s top advisor and a Conservative debate strategist in the last campaign, said while he was in office Harper pursued a keen interest in a variety of international files, ranging from security issues, including the Middle East, Russia, Ukraine, and China, to economic issues, including global trade and coordinated international fiscal and monetary policy, and “practical social policy like maternal and child health.”

“Before he went into office, relatively few people would have predicted that he would have such a keen interest in those areas and turn out to be so strong in them, including, perhaps himself,” said Anderson. Harper’s focus post-politics, said Anderson, “like other past prime ministers… tends to be a bit more outside the country than inside the country both because he actually has a deep interest in the foreign side of things, but also because he doesn’t see any particular value in former prime ministers involving themselves in domestic politics.”

Curran echoed that.

“He’s got a lengthy list of things he’s done and accomplished on that front. But I don’t think those will be his focus going forward. He’s had his political career, he’s had his career in public service, so I think he will look to build on his interests and his experience and his expertise, frankly, but I don’t think those will really be focused on domestic issues.”

A lifetime politician, Harper is not a lawyer or financier who could readily step back into a pre-political career. A frequent critic of the United Nations, Harper was unlikely to find an off-ramp there like former British prime minister Tony Blair once did. And as the government leader who railed against those who used political connections to further their personal fortunes after leaving office, and passed the Accountability Act to curtail such benefits, Harper’s options were constrained by finding a good fit with the political legacy he had wanted to leave.

The decision to stick around? One of necessity, said several. It wasn’t just that he didn’t want to pull a Jim Prentice — quit his seat outright after losing government as the former Alberta premier, PC leader and onetime Harper cabinet minister did, though that was part of it. The other factor was Harper — long described by supporters as a strategic thinker who games out his next steps — had no long-term plan.

The Globe and Mail first reported Wednesday Harper intends to step down from politics before the next election, though that had long been the assumption of his colleagues.

On Thursday, as the Conservative convention opens, the former Conservative leader — whose only public utterances have been brief bursts on Twitter since election night — will speak for the first time before about 2,100 registered delegates.

His wife Laureen Harper will hand out awards to the party’s volunteers, and Harper will speak for about 10 minutes after a video tribute hailing his contribution to reuniting the right and leading the merged Conservatives to three wins.

Longtime party supporter and strategist Jim Armour said his sense heading into the convention is that the mood in the party “is good.” Some of that can be chalked up to Ambrose’s deft performance as interim leader.

“I think there was also a realization that 10 years is a long time, and although we lost, we didn’t lose badly,” said Armour.

The party held nearly 100 seats across the country, despite being wiped out in Atlantic Canada.

Asked whether Harper needs to say sorry to the party’s membership for his loss to the third party leader Justin Trudeau, or if it’s too late, Armour said: “My sense is the Conservatives are kind of done with saying sorry. Why do we need to apologize for everything? I think it will be looking towards the future rather than looking at the past.”

That future won’t be decided until the party selects a new leader to replace Harper in May 2017. But this weekend aspiring successors and would-be leadership rivals will be out in force, glad-handing with the rank-and-file, to shore up possible future bids.

On Friday morning, before the start of policy workshop sessions — open to the media for the first time in years — members will hear a report by the head of the Conservative Fund, Irving Gerstein, who recently retired from the senate.

Elections Canada has reported the Conservatives outstripped the Liberals and the NDP— which was a distant third — in fundraising in the first quarter — news the party will likely trumpet in its biennial report to the grassroots. Conservatives raised $5.5 million in the first three months of 2016, less than at the same period last year when they were in government, but an improvement on contributions at the end of 2015 after the bruising electoral loss.

On Friday afternoon, Ambrose will host onstage interview-style chats with the three declared candidates, Kellie Leitch, Maxime Bernier and Michael Chong. Other as-yet-undeclared-but-presumed-to-be-interested candidates like Peter MacKay, Jason Kenney, Kevin O’Leary, and Lisa Raitt, will be featured in other speaking roles at the late afternoon session, billed Back to Blue, Looking Forward.

Many will also host hospitality suites, including Tony Clement, Chong and Bernier, as will several candidates for open seats on the party’s national council — the executive committee of the party.

“The fastest way to any voters heart is through free booze,” quips Armour. “It’s a well-worn tradition going back to the 19th century.