Canadian Government Executive - Volume 24 - Issue 04

July/August 2018 // Canadian Government Executive / 21 INTERVIEW uting to healthy and resilient economies. We have a couple of tools we do this with. I think the piece we are well known for, like other regional development agen- cies, is the delivery of contribution pro- grams. So we are able to fund good ideas and good projects that lead to jobs and growth. We have a second line of busi- ness as well, called the Northern Projects Management Office, and our responsibil- ity there is to work with major projects, often mines, sometimes infrastructure, that are proceeding through the envi- ronmental assessment processes. We are responsible for helping to facilitate and coordinate the federal involvement in those review exercises. We work with, as I said, territorial governments, Indigenous organizations, specific communities. We work with industry, business, small enter- prises, and we work substantially too in partnership with territorial governments and agencies with the intent of aligning our strategies and priorities with theirs so we can together achieve common goals in the North. Q: Working in Canada’s North as a public servant has, as you know, a lot of challenges asso- ciated with it: geography and distance, shared governance with Indigenous communities (some of which are working under mod- ern treaties), and decentralised organizations. In your particular case, you also need to keep an eye on Ottawa as you carry out your activities. I wonder if you could reflect a little bit on those unique challenges and the opportunities to have an impact as a public ser- vant in northern Canada. Certainly. Let’s tackle the distance one first. So I lead an organization that cross- es three or four time zones with offices many of thousands of kilometers apart from each other and distant from Ottawa. So as you noted, George, there’s a distance gap, and that has many diverse impacts. My goal for the organization is to have a high-functioning coherent team – and we are performing that way, I’m please to say – and to have coherent policies and activ- ities. What’s really helped a great deal in achieving this is the evolving systems – the communication systems, information sharing systems – that are more powerful every year. We “live” on Webex! The gov- ernment of Canada has built some very helpful collaboration systems internally [information access, sharing documents, building documents together, (GCconnex , GCpedia)], and all of these we employ to mitigate that distance, to help our team feel and act as a coherent team. Then, of course, all of this just reaching to Ottawa, having that ability to bridge those dis- tances using technology and start to link, using those personal connections over Webex, video conferencing if we have to, to start to increasingly bridge the knowl- edge, the awareness, the personality of the regions and help each region – Ot- tawa and the North – be better informed and understand each other well, and to build the personal relationships as well. We are exploiting every technology we can to bring ourselves closer together – to bring our ideas, our knowledge closer to Ottawa as well. Q: Having said that, I am sure you have still logged many miles in airplanes in your career. Well, I do indeed log many, many miles in an airplane; it’s simply part of doing that job, and I am fortunate that I love the North, so I love being there. It also means that I am completely comfort- able with approving travel for my staff. For example, we send administrative as- sistants from Ottawa to Yellowknife for two weeks to fill in gaps. They acquire experience, they understand the North better, we exchange training: we are very mobile workforce in terms of learning and development. Again, to cross-inform, crosstrain, to build that shared under- standing. We also use any trick we can to cover distances; for example, we’re working hard to engage our stakehold- ers. We’re anchored in the three northern capitals – that’s where our offices are – but we’re serving communities that are again hundreds or thousands of kilome- ters away. Flying is one option, of course. But the most unique work-related travel that worked very well was when our busi- My goal for the organization is to have a high-functioning coherent team – and we are performing that way, I’m please to say – and to have coherent policies and activities. What’s really helped a great deal in achieving this is the evolving systems – the communication systems, information sharing systems – that are more powerful every year.