Monthly Musings from an Interim CEO (my last reflection post!)

This will be my last “monthly reflection post” in my role as Interim CEO of the South Island Prosperity Partnership (SIPP). (If interested, you can read my previous posts by following the thread backward all the way to April 2024 by starting with the previous one here ).

On October 7th, SIPP will enter a new era with a new leader at the helm. Yesterday we were excited to announce that Aaron Stone will take the reins soon–and I’ll remain in the Interim capacity until then. Read the full announcement here , and we’ll do the formal welcomes/intros with Aaron in October, and/or on a podcast potentially sooner! :)

I offer some thoughts on the CEO search and the future of SIPP leadership at the bottom of this post…

Anyways, while we eagerly await bringing Aaron up to speed and pointing his positive energy at the future; the work must continue! Here are some recent updates that I’d love to tell you about!?

Growing the TEAM + in a high-energy new facility!

• Camille Ruest is our most recent hire who will be the face of the new COAST facilities and help ensure it runs smoothly for members and co-workers! Among many fun facts about Camille is that she’s our only team member who has her own Wikipedia page (I’ll let you look it up on your own); oh and also, she got married this summer! Next time you’re through the COAST facilities on Herald St., give her a warm “congrats”!
• Also, not sure I mentioned this in my previous post, but a couple months ago we welcomed Kerry Billyard to the team as Ocean Ecosystem Navigator via our partnership with the Ocean Startup Project (see their announcement here ). While Kerry technically works for them, our agreement has her integrated into the COAST team (and you might find her working away in the new COAST facilities next time you visit, so say hello! ..unless she’s in a meeting, then just a wave is good enough).?
• We announced the move over to 517 Herald Street last month. We now have SIPP, COAST, IPC and several client orgs/companies locating together in one place -- and more to come as momentum builds! Working with or near collaborators is a great way to retain and develop personnel, enhance knowledge transfer, adopt or discover new technologies, and more. (I'm so interested in the benefits of working in proximity to others that I wrote about for Douglas Magazine here ). Ask us if you’re a fit for an office or hot desk (or other options)

COAST Membership Strategy - Launched!

As I’ve stated many times in the past, COAST (a subsidiary initiative of SIPP) is working toward establishing a world-class ocean/marine technology & innovation cluster in Greater Victoria (with reach all across Pacific Canada & international partnerships as well). In order to achieve the vision of creating 1500 “21st century-oriented” careers, transitioning members of the existing workforce into the sustainable Blue Economy, and working to reduce carbon intensity of the marine industry (through innovation and applied technologies), COAST needs to engage a wide swath of businesses, organizations, individuals, researchers and innovators.?

The team just launched a new membership structure (with any SIPP members with strategic interest in the Blue Economy being on-boarded at no cost). Learn about it here .?

Over 20 organizations joined in the first two weeks. Get involved by messaging COAST’s Director of Strategic Engagement, Sophie Silkes ! (Or fill out the form here , and she’ll reach out to you!)

Network with Ocean and Marine Technologists and Entrepreneurs

• Your next opportunity to attend a COAST mixer is in Vancouver on Sept 10th from 5-7 pm, at the Blarney Stone Pub in Vancouver, BC, Canada. This is a ticketed event as COAST transitions to prioritizing members.?
• COAST and SIPP will also celebrate the Grand Opening of the new Ocean Innovation Hub (near Rock Bay, Victoria) on Oct. 16th. Watch your email for your chance to RSVP.

Introducing: COAST Blue Pathways Initiative

I’ve been talking about workforce development side of COAST for the last few months (and previously announced Tom Roemer as the lead on this!), but now is your chance to learn about the Blue Pathways Initiative: COAST’s primary platform to offer workforce development and career pathways across the Blue Economy.?

Sign up for the first webinar on this on Sept 11 (11am-12pm) here .

Indigenous Prosperity Centre (IPC) working with the next generation of leaders!

From Aug 19–22, Indigenous youth from Pauquachin, Tseycum, Tsartlip, Songhees, Scia'new T'Sou-ke, Cowichan and Metís Nations attended IPC’s first Youth Day Camp under the Blue Economy theme!

Their jam-packed agenda had them learning about Native Plants at Tsawout (entrepreneurship); aquaculture from the Salish Sea Centre and Cascadia Seaweed; ocean date and protection from Ocean Networks Canada and the Canadian Coast Guard; and even whale watching with Songhees Tours and much more..

See the photos from the week at this IPC LinkedIn Post .??

Rising Economy Conference is back (March 2025)

- Planning is underway for the next Rising Economy Conference (March 2025); we’re bringing back the ad hoc advisory group with two brainstorming meetings planned (one in Sept and one in Oct). Sign up for the event newsletter (https://ourrisingeconomy.com ) and you'll see the most pressing content as it gets revealed over the coming months. We’ll have early-bird tickets available hopefully soon too!

"Victoria Rising"

- The Victoria Rising platform has a new profile uploaded featuring Dr. Sienna Bourdon, a family physician and managing director of Shoreline Medical. Check it out here: https://victoriarising.ca/dr-sienna-bourdon/ . Several new videos are in development as we seek to attract values-aligned personnel to the region (from entrepreneurs to family doctors!).

- We also recently hosted a SIPP summer mixer on Thurs, Aug 29 at CRAFT where we thanked all of our SIPP members and the people who helped make Victoria Rising initiative possible over the last many months. It was also a nice way to close out the summer season as things are about to get much busier for all of us (as is tradition in September I guess!)

Local Leadership Forum (it’s back! ..but invite only)

- On Nov 26, the Roy Group will be helping us facilitate an in-depth follow-up session to last year’s event (last year’s report is here: https://ourrisingeconomy.com/local-leadership-day/ ). Local Leadership Forum is all about prioritizing municipal economic constraints and determining collaborative solutions and actions.?

- This Friday, the organizing subcommittee will look at how our approach this year will build off of the momentum; for example, how to tie in the Family Physician Recruitment/Retention Stakeholder Roundtables (next one is on Oct 25), and linking Municipal Actions into the agenda.?

Municipal Engagement / SIPP renewal process:

In my July post, I mentioned that over my vacation days this summer I was going on a deep-dive on “governance” practices across Canada (more specifically “Collaborative Governance”). To clarify, by governance I don’t mean “how governments govern”; I actually mean: how society organizes itself to effectively solve problems at the local and regional levels. My thesis (shared by many) is that as problems and their solutions get more complex and interconnected, a major part of actually solving these problems is around how we organize ourselves to solve them. Too often the tendency is to point our finger at “the government” for not solving a major issue, when in reality they aren’t even equipped to do so in the first place (for a variety of reasons). Over the summer, I had so many conversations around this, including meeting some of Canada’s foremost leaders on these topics (like Karen Chapple at the School of Cities–who produced the Metropolitan Mindset project with Don Iveson, Zac Spicer at York who’s written extensively on local governance , Enid Slack at the Institute for Municipal Governance and Finance, and many others). I’ll share more on this later, but wanted to share one super useful set of publications from Enid’s team around the roles of Federal, Provincial and Municipal governments in addressing a cross-section of issues. It’s called the Who Does What series. In my world (economic development) this one in particular is worth exploring: https://imfg.org/report/economic-development/#report . The other topics, ranging from housing to childcare, can be found here: https://imfg.org/who-does-what-series/ . One caveat: collaborative governance goes beyond just Fed/Prov/Muni and into other roles across society. This is where SIPP fits in as a model of collaborative governance that could be expanded upon where appropriate.

- The above concepts are important as we seek to re-invigorate SIPP’s foundational structure as a “municipal-created” entity. Our approach is that we can engage all orders of government (including First Nations governments), along with other societal actors (businesses, academia, NGOs, associations, etc) and get better organized around local issues and opportunities. This is what I mean by Collaborative Governance. There are other ways to describe it (cross-sectoral collaboration, public/private/third-sector alliances, etc).

- Earlier this summer, Mitacs approved our application to engage a PhD researcher to look at "Collaborative governance innovations in Metropolitan Regions" using the SIPP model as a comparison to best practices across Canada. We’re hoping for some deliverables on this by December that will inform the above. You may see the talented Marcel Ramírez La Torre - Ph.D. (c) ?? at some SIPP events this fall! Here’s his post announcing the project .

- Last week at the Victoria Forum , an initiative founded by UVic and the Senate of Canada, I participated on an engaging panel on this topic with co-conspirators Danya Pastuszek, CEO of the Tamarack Institute, Leslie Woo, CEO of CivicAction (Toronto), moderated by Senator Ratna Omidvar. Here’s our post about the session with links to their respective organizations and LinkedIn profiles. It’s great to see this topic being picked up more and more (and a set of recommendations from Victoria Forum that will go to the Senate).

SIPP’s latest member profile

If you’re not aware, SIPP produces profiles that showcase the brilliance of our members. The latest one went up on August 23rd and it’s a Q&A with the District of Sooke’s Community Economic Development lead, Gail Scott. Gail is a seasoned veteran in the economic development profession and I’ve enjoyed working with her since she joined the District a couple years ago. Learn more about her work in Sooke here .

One more word on SIPP CEO Announcement and my term as Interim CEO

As my Interim role rolls to an end, I want to thank a few people. First and foremost the entire SIPP, COAST and IPC teams for working so diligently on keeping things rolling along. I hope I was able to bring a calming demeanor to the workplace during a time of rapid change and growth. We are so fortunate to have a remarkable, hardworking and fun-loving team in place. It seriously made my job easier knowing that these capable people just wanted to come to work each day and make a difference. Thank-you!?

Second, to our board, notably our past-Chair Frank Bourree and current Chair Terry Gunning for placing their trust in me to keep a steady hand on the organizational steering wheel. Their confidence in me gave me increased confidence (which still doesn’t mean I was completely confident…just a bit more so than if they had approached me with hesitation!). This trust also came with a much-appreciated endorsement from Emilie de Rosenroll, ICD.D , our inaugural CEO who I have worked with for eight years (starting in a maintenance garage, like a true start up!). Emilie passing the torch to me - though temporarily - without hesitation meant a lot to me, as does her continued friendship and support!

Lastly, I just want to speak to the elephant in the room (or, seemingly, in lots of rooms that I’ve entered over the last 6 months!): I’ve been so honoured by the sentiment behind questions like “so are you the next SIPP CEO?” and comments like “I hope the Interim title can shift to permanent!” time and time again. To answer the question (while, again, feeling totally honoured that people may feel this way about me!): I didn’t apply for the position. I explained why in a post many months ago when we announced the CEO search process, but to reiterate: 1) while I’ve loved (and still love) my work at SIPP, I’ve also been at this here in Greater Victoria for nearly 12 years! Eight years at SIPP, plus the 3.5 years that it took us to create SIPP in the first place! While this gives me a lot of insights into the organizational history, the hyper-local geopolitical environment, and how the Greater Victoria regional economy works (I definitely know that stuff better than anybody, I would say), it also means that the organization will benefit from fresh leadership and energy; and, 2) Being the CEO has been both a joy (I love growth and rapid change!) and a challenge (our largest audit process ever this past spring!). But honestly, I’m a practitioner first. In all their complexity and messiness, I actually love cities and metropolitan regions, and of course, the work of the economic development profession. Less fun = financial statements, HR, reporting to a Board (though our board is awesome!), and the unshakable feeling that I’m responsible for everyone and everything, all the time (aka: losing sleep). I’d love to shift some of my attention to things like “innovation in economic development policies and practices”, “innovation in collaborative governance”, and possibly sharing my knowledge through teaching, workshops, working abroad, etc. – at some point.

That stated, I’m 100% committed to ensuring that SIPP remains successful. And even though I joke around on occasion (okay, more than on occasion), I do take that commitment incredibly seriously..probably more seriously than is even reasonable.

I’m also 100% committed to ensuring that Aaron, our new CEO, has all the tools and support he needs to lead SIPP into the future. I’d love if you’d all help us out with that. This is a team effort and our region will only be more resilient, more innovative, more equitable and more sustainable, with your involvement. We’ll see you at the next SIPP events this fall!