Mackenzie Valley Environmental Impact Review Board embraces strategic planning and performance management to deliver on important mission

To best understand the scope and importance of the work being done by the staff at the Mackenzie Valley Environmental Impact Review Board [MVEIRB], it should be explained with the passion and conviction present in every conversation with individuals at this amazing public sector organization. 

“The Mackenzie Valley Environmental Impact Review Board [MVEIRB] is an administrative tribunal that was set up as a result of some of the modern comprehensive land claims that were signed in the Northwest Territories,” explains Kate Mansfield, Manager of Environmental Assessment Policy and Planning at MVEIRB. “Our board is a co-management board that gives representation to Indigenous people to have a say in decision-making about land and resource management in the Mackenzie Valley. We do environmental assessments in the valley, so if there’s going to be a major development project that’s coming into the territory that might be a cause of public concern, or might cause significant adverse impacts, then our board will take a good close look at that project and make a determination about whether or not it should proceed and if so, under what conditions.”

The importance of the work being done at MVEIRB can’t be overstated–these are critical efforts that work towards reconciliation between Indigenous people in Canada, as well as managing resources effectively, keeping track of development in the region, and understanding and combating the effects of climate change.

Longtime Envisio customers, Kate and the whole team at MVEIRB understand that deploying a technology partner can help drive more efficient and effective service delivery which, in turn, betters their ability to enact their legislative mandate. 

“Our board plays a really important role in the way that lands and resources are managed in the territory, and we use Envisio to help us keep track of the strategic aspects of our organization,” she says. “So we have a clear mandate from our legislation. We do environmental assessments. And Envisio helps us manage the strategic actions that help us do environmental assessments in the best way possible. We have a clear job, and this helps us understand how we can do it better. So that’s the way Envisio fits in.”

A long history of strategic planning informs the future

MVEIRB’s history with Envisio dates back to 2018, but they were committed to strategic planning even prior to that engagement. MVEIRB were already ahead of the curve when it came to understanding that strategy execution was key to enacting their mandate, and they’ve come a long way in how they manage and measure their progress against their strategic goals. 

“We’ve had lots of strategic plans, but I think part of that is just a function of the way that the organization has been evolving,” says Kate. “Our board was only established in 1998, and so there was a period where we were figuring out what our job was. And now that we’re in the next phase of our evolution as an organization, where we have a good sense of what our job is–we have a clear mission, and we have a clear vision in place about how we want to do this job in a good way. And so our use of tools like Envisio has evolved as the organization has matured.” 

It wasn’t always so clear, though—prior to onboarding Envisio, Kate and her team were using a good, old-fashioned (and outdated) mode of tracking their strategic plan. 

“Our strategic plan was a PDF. It was not a living document until 2018,” says Kate. “And even in that period, 2018 to 2022, the plan was a living document that was not fully functional. We didn’t have the routines established to be reporting regularly or consistently. But I think this time around it’ll be a little bit different, just because we have the motivation and that practice from last time around. And Envisio has provided us with a ton of help to make us understand those systems better, so that’s been really helpful.”

With many best practices in place (and a few Envisio workshops under their belts), Kate and the MVEIRB team have been developing a new strategic plan to guide them forward, from 2023 onward. Having Envisio inside the building, so to speak, has helped them as they’ve gone through the process. 

“We did our planning this time around in two main steps,” says Kate. “We had an external facilitator come in to help us with the big picture, making sure that our mission, vision, and goal levels were solid. And then Rob, our Customer Success Manager at Envisio, actually came and gave our staff a workshop to generate the actions that would best contribute to those objectives. So the upper level tiers of the plan were board-driven, and the bottom level was staff-driven, and then there’s been a little bit of iteration between those two poles, to make sure that there’s alignment between them. We’ve got all the bones in place, but we’re still doing some tinkering to make sure that our actions are contributing to the goals and objectives that the board has set.”

Four strong pillars ensure strategic success at MVEIRB

In listening to Kate explain the plan, its pillars, and their desired outcomes, her passion for the work at hand is evident, as is the thoughtfulness, duty of care, and meticulousness required to craft top-tier strategy. 

“At a high level, the mission of our board comes from our foundational legislation, which is the Mackenzie Valley Resource Management Act,” says Kate. “And so the mission that we work towards is to conduct fair and effective, timely, evidence-based environmental impact assessment processes that consider the protection of the environment, protecting the social, cultural, and economic wellbeing of the people and communities in the Mackenzie Valley, and the importance of conservation to the wellbeing and way of life of Indigenous peoples who live in the Mackenzie Valley. And then within that mission, the vision that we’ve created for ourselves is to make wise environmental assessment impact assessment decisions that balance the diverse values, interests, and knowledge of all residents of Mackenzie Valley, and ensure the protection of the environment for present and future generations.”

Environmental Impact Assessment Processes (Goal One)

“For goal one, the objectives are mostly about how to do environmental impact assessments in efficient and effective ways. So, how do we make sure we’re getting good evidence? How do we make sure that we’re gathering evidence in fair, participatory, and culturally appropriate ways? How do we make sure that we’re getting a broad suite of evidence? So we want to make sure that we’re balancing science with traditional knowledge that comes into our processes. And then, how do we make sure that we’re running timely processes and we’re meeting all of our legislative timelines? We need to be quick and nimble as much as we can while still making good decisions.”

Participation (Goal Two)

“For our second goal and with respect to participation, our objectives are mostly about making sure that we can hear from a wide range of people and voices that are not traditionally included in the environmental impact assessment process. We want to make sure we’re hearing from elders and women and youth and all the different parts of the population. And we also want to make sure that we can build good relationships that will allow us to hear these voices” 

Leadership (Goal Three)

“Goal three is again about leadership, but this time in maintaining and enhancing our network. So we have to build strong relationships with Indigenous Governments and communities, with the federal government, with territorial government, and with developers. So it’s about managing those relationships, and in some cases formalizing those relationships through memorandums of understanding or other plans. And then it’s also about enhancing and developing and maintaining our role as a leader–making sure that we step up when necessary, and that we are in a position to support others to step up when it’s better for the board to take a back seat.”

Organizational Performance (Goal Four)

“And finally, we have organizational performance. This fourth goal is all about being an efficient and innovative and values-based board. We want to make sure that staff and the board are knowledgeable, they’re informed, and they have a strong rooting in the board’s values. We want to make sure that everybody’s voice is heard and included at a staff and board level– that we’re benefiting from a diversity of perspectives and worldviews. And we’re also wanting to make sure that we’ve got improved accessibility. That was a big thing that we’ve heard that we need to work on, and so that’s included as well.”

Each of these pillars and their goals are supported by action items that are specific and measurable, with relevant timelines and assigned owners and contributors. Kate and her team also have some unstated, or perhaps imbued, principles that help to guide their strategic efforts.

“And I would just say that all of these goals set out to help advance some of the principles of reconciliation that are embedded in the land claims, and that are part of the fabric of a lot of the work that we do,” says Kate. “We want to make sure that we’re bringing up voices and making sure that there is equal participation and representation from Indigenous voices in our office, and in the processes that we run, and in the decisions that the board makes.”

Fair, timely, evidence-based decision making is empowered by Envisio

As Manager of Policy and Planning, Kate is in charge of curating the content in Envisio. Ensuring timely updates, keeping staff work aligned with strategy, and building out their soon-to-be-published public dashboard are all items that fall within her scope of work–work that has been enabled by Envisio’s strategy execution and performance management platform. 

“It’s quite easy to make updates. I really like that main dashboard where I can see what is assigned to me and what I need to report on, that’s really great,” she says. “There are a lot of good tools in one spot, where you can take a quick glance to see how you are progressing on your assigned tasks. I also really like the reports. I’ve already started generating a couple of different reports and playing around with ways that we can provide the board with high level updates on a regular basis.”