PDF - Halifax Chamber of Commerce

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GOTTINGEN REVIVED
STRONGER FAMILIES
CORPORATE GOVERNANCE
Business booming on historic
Halifax street. Pg 16
Halifax doctor pioneers mental
healthcare model. Pg 22
Educational opportunities for
company directors. Pg 30
BUSINESS VOICE
H A L I F A X C H A M B E R O F C O M M E R C E | J U LY & A U G U S T 2 0 1 4 | V O L U M E 2 3 I S S U E 6
Canadian Bacon Cookhouse co-founder Mike Kennedy
named Halifax Chamber’s 2014 Person of the Year Page 12
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CONTENTS }
COVER STORY
Bite off more than you can chew,
then chew as fast as you can.”
– Mike Kennedy, Co-owner, Canadian Bacon Cookhouse
14
Photo: Paul Darrow
04 Events
06 President’s message
07 New & noted
09 Members in the news
12 Achin’ for the bacon
named Halifax Chamber’s 2014 Person of the Year
16 Gottingen chic
Business revitalization draws creative class
to Gottingen Street
22 Profile
Dr. Path McGrath
12
16
Achin’ for the bacon
Photo:Anita MacPherson/
AMacPhotography
Business revitalization
draws creative class to Gottingen Street
Board of Directors
Volume 23 Issue 6
Francis Fares, Fares Real Estate Inc., Chair
Rob Batherson, Colour, Vice-Chair
Andrew Boswell, Nova Communications, Past Chair
Business Voice is published 10 times a year for
members of the Halifax Chamber of Commerce
and Metro Halifax’s business community. Views
expressed in Business Voice are those of the
contributors and individual members, and are
not necessarily endorsed by, or are a policy of,
the Halifax Chamber of Commerce
Directors
Chamber Staff
Valerie A Payn, President and CEO
Nancy M. Conrad, Senior Vice President
Colin J. Bustard, Director of Finance and Administration
Jennifer Pierce, Member Services Specialist
Becky Davison,
Marketing and Communications Specialist
Trends
City desk
Where are they now?
Working for you
Message from the Chair
and Vice-Chair
SPECIAL FEATURES
30 Corporate governance
32 Safety and security
33 Workplace wellness
Gottingen chic
Stephanie Coldwell, Coldwell & Associates Consulting
Cynthia Dorrington, Vale & Associates
Carol MacMillan, The Shaw Group
Level Chan, Stewart McKelvey
Ruth Rappini
Capt (N) Angus Topshee, Maritime Forces Atlantic
Darren Nantes, The Nantes Group
Mark Fraser, T4G
Lori Barton, Beaumont Advisors Ltd.
Jamie O’Neill, Bluteau DeVenney
Don Bureaux, NSCC
Margaret Chapman, Corporate Research Associates
Mark Sidebottom, Nova Scotia Power Inc.
Valerie Payn, Halifax Chamber of Commerce
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No part of this publication may be reproduced
without written consent of the publisher. While
every effort has been made to ensure accuracy,
the publisher cannot be held responsible for any
errors or omissions that may occur.
Business Voice is published by
The Chronicle Herald, Custom and Community
Publishing Department
Publisher: Sarah Dennis
Director, Custom and Community Publishing:
Jeff Nearing
Editor:@e[o<_jpfơjh_Ya`ǃ_jpfơjh_Ya6^[hơbZ$Yơ
Layout & Design: Julia Webb
Contributing Writers: Mark Fraser, Jon Tattrie, Heather
Laura Clarke, Jane Doucet, Richard Woodbury
Christian Buhagiar, Richard Powers
Disclaimer
Sales Executives: Colin Mason, David A. McNeil
(902) 426-2811 x1163
Publications Mail Agreement No. 40032112
Cover Image By: Paul Darrow
Please address editorial enquiries
and changes to information to:
Halifax Chamber of Commerce
656 Windmill Road, Suite 200
Dartmouth, NS B3B 1B8
Tel: (902) 468-7111
Fax: (902) 468-7333
[email protected]
www.halifaxchamber.com
Business Voice magazine makes no warranties of
any kind, written or implied, regarding the contents
of this magazine and expressly disclaims any
warranty regarding the accuracy or reliability of
information contained herein. The views contained
in this magazine are those of the writers and adl[hj_i[hi1j^[oZedejd[Y[iiơh_boh[ǃb[Yjj^[l_[mi
of Business Voice magazine and its publisher
The Chronicle Herald.
Return undeliverable Canadian addresses to
Halifax Chamber of Commerce.
Copyright 2014 by The Chronicle Herald
All rights reserved. Reproduction of any article,
photograph or artwork without expressed written
permission from the publisher is strictly prohibited.
2717 Joseph Howe Drive
Halifax, Nova Scotia, B3J 2T2
Tel: (902) 426-2811
TheChronicleHerald.ca
BUSINESS VOICE
3
CALENDAR
CATEGORY
CHAMBER EVENTS
July
SUNDAY
SAVE THE DATE
FOR OUR
SIGNATURE
EVENTS!
JULY
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Date: Wednesday, July 16
Time: 12:00 – 1:30pm
Location: Halifax Chamber of
Commerce Boardroom,
656 Windmill Rd
Presented by: CIRA Medical Services
Date: Thursday, July 17
Time: 5:00 – 7:00pm
Location: 5991 Spring Garden Rd,
Suite 1100
October 22, 2014
November 13, 2014
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Date: Friday, July 18
Time: 12:00 – 1:30 pm
Location: Halifax Chamber
of Commerce Boardroom,
656 Windmill Rd
August
SUNDAY
MONDAY
TUESDAY
WEDNESDAY
THURSDAY
FRIDAY
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January 22, 2015
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THANK YOU TO OUR
JUNE SPONSORS:
AUGUST
Date: Wednesday, August 20
Time: 12:00 – 1:30pm
656 Windmill Rd
Date: Friday, August 22
Time: 12:00 – 1:30 pm
656 Windmill Rd
THANK YOU TO OUR CHAMBER
GOLF CHALLENGE SPONSORS:
EMPLOYEE
4
JULY & AUGUST 2014
BENEFITS
PRESIDENT’S MESSAGE
Leadership for changing world
Takeaways from the International Women’s Forum
VALERIE PAYN PRESIDENT
I have possibly the best job in the
world. I just got back from Berlin where
I, along with five other Nova Scotian
businesswomen — among 70 some from
Canada, and 800 from around the world —
attended an International Women’s Forum.
IWF advances leadership across
careers, cultures and continents by
connecting the world’s most preeminent women of significant and diverse
achievement. This organization brings
together an unprecedented global membership to exchange ideas, to learn and
inspire, and to promote better leadership
for a changing world.
The agenda for this conference was
innovation, productivity and the labor
force. All aligned to the Chamber’s strategic direction. Sound familiar to you?
Can you say, “Ivany Report?”
Never was it more evident to me that
we are in a global competition for talent,
and talent brings innovation. Forget about
our youth moving from Newfoundland to
Nova Scotia to Alberta. This competition
is worldwide.
Here is a brief summary of some of
my takeaways from the conference that
might resonate with you:
means radical technologi Innovation
cal disruption. The world’s top five IT
leaders will not exist five years from
now;
prevent the brain drain, we need to
To
keep the workforce and researchers
connected. Researchers and a welleducated workforce are vital, and
strength in education is key to innovation. We have that!
need more startups for innovation
We
and growth. Capabilities and creative
environments create new start-ups.
We have that!
are a definite asset — especially
SME’s
in the Mid-East. We have that!
Vocational training balanced with
academic research needed to keep/
gain top talent. We have that!
in the STEM sector are
Women
Germany’s top opportunity and underutilized resource. We have that! (BTW
— Germany acknowledges that it needs
to provide high quality, accessible
childcare if they are to access this
precious resource.)
are changing. And they must.
Cities
Many have single innovations happening — but need to link them together.
We have that!
— never be happy with the
Passionate
status quo. Do we have that?
must be diverse — you won’t be
Boards
innovative having Boards that look like
you. Do we have that?
you don’t disrupt yourself for innova Iftion,
someone else will. Do we have that?
We are not alone in our challenges
here at home! The good news is that we
have many of the resources needed for
strong future economic growth, and the
knowledge to achieve it.
Let’s get to it.
Letter to the Editor
Universities generate export revenues
Conspicuous by its absence from
Business Voice’s June feature Made in
Nova Scotia by Tom Mason is the incredibly high value of export revenues
generated by Nova Scotia’s universities.
A 2011 study conducted by Gardner Pinfold Consultants Inc. for Nova
Scotia’s university sector concluded
that the province’s universities generate an estimated $840 million in annual export revenue, placing the sector
second when compared to the province’s traditional top exporting goods
sectors (see the One Nova Scotia Report,
An Excellent Post-secondary Education
(PSE) System, pg. 37).
6
In 2007, The British Council (the UK’s
leading cultural relations agency) dubbed
education “the great invisible export”.
The total export component of Nova
Scotia’s highly visible universities is largely
attributable to increased out-of-province
enrolment (14,525) and differential tuition
fees for international students (6,605).
The province’s universities are talent
magnets attracting well-educated and
highly qualified future citizens to Nova
Scotia, a high percentage of whom will
stay in the province following their
graduation.
A 2010 study of the economic impact
of international students conducted by
JULY & AUGUST 2014
the Council of Atlantic Ministers of
Education and Training (CAMET)
indicated their total economic impact
on Nova Scotia’s economy exceeded
$345 million.
The evidence is absolutely clear:
Nova Scotia’s universities generate
huge economic and social benefits for
the province and should be included
in any conversation about provincial
exports.
Peter Halpin,
Executive Director, Council of
Nova Scotia University Presidents
NEWSMAKERS
NEW & NOTED
New to the Chamber this month
BLUEBERRY SKIES WEB DESIGN
Cheryl Masters, Owner and Designer
Prospect Bay NS
Ph: (902) 471-6836
[email protected]
www.blueberryskies.ca
Web Design
CAPALANCORA CONSULTING LTD.
Capalancora helps you Stay The Course
when faced with change to your organization or operating environment. Let’s
plan, manage, communicate, market
and relate to your audiences so you
meet your bottom line and protect your
reputation. We’ll help you align your
activities, plans, structure, processes
and messages with your purpose.
Angela Court,
Owner & Senior Consultant
Ph: (855) 926-2672
[email protected]
www.capalancora.com
Public Relations/Affairs
EDGRANTCO CONSULTING INC.
Ed Grant, Owner
17 Mary Fenton Ct
Bedford NS B4A 4G7
Ph: (902) 403-7665
[email protected]
Business Consulting
EVEXIA / CREATIVE WELLNESS
SOLUTIONS INC.
Discover Evexia! A company-branded
online wellness portal that promotes
camaraderie through social media and
team challenges connecting your workplace community in new and exciting
ways! Evexia helps employers create
a culture of health and well-being for
employees through customized challenges, expert coaching, goal trackers,
interactive videos and live webinars
through web-based platforms anywhere,
anytime.
Lydia Makrides, President and CEO
PO Box 3061
Tantallon NS B3Z 4G9
Ph: (902) 820-3096
www.evexia.ca
Health and Wellness
HALIFAX SUMMER OPERA FESTIVAL
ASSOCIATION
The Halifax Summer Opera Festival
presents three fully-staged and -costumed works of opera and musical theatre every year. Founded in 2005, HSOF
chooses more than 70 university level
singers from over 300 auditions across
North America. HSOF also supports
tourism in the HRM, with 17 performances every August.
Nina Scott-Stoddart, Artistic Director
Lunenburg NS
Ph: (902) 634-9140
[email protected]
halifaxsummeroperafestival.com
Music
IDEAL ENGINEERING
Ideal Engineering Inc. has provided
engineering services to Atlantic Canada’s leading industrial facilities, heavy
construction, fabrication companies,
mining facilities, and health care facilities since 2001. Services include: design,
stress analysis, welding engineering,
CADD, inspection, testing, certification,
and project management. Products:
MAXSTACK II.
J. Aubrey Stewart, President
PO Box 384
New Glasgow NS B2H 5E5
Ph: (902) 396-1818
[email protected]
www.idealengineering.com
Engineering
LOBOTECHNIC
LOBOtechnic is a technology-to-market
accelerator. We help electronic inventors turn their ideas into reality faster by
BUSINESS VOICE
facilitating the specification and prototyping phase of their products, speeding
up development, guiding clients through
certification processes and designing for
manufacturability.
Colin DeWolfe, Owner
Fall River NS
Ph: (902) 401-9790
[email protected]
www.lobotechnic.com
Research/Development
MACKEIGAN MARKETING
& COMMUNICATIONS
At MacKeigan Marketing & Communications we deliver professional, outsourced marketing, design and public
relations services to either support your
marketing department, or to be your
marketing department. We work with
sole proprietors, entrepreneurs, small
and medium-sized businesses to create,
enhance and maximize their marketing
potential.
Megan MacKeigan,
Owner & Managing Director
Halifax NS
Ph: (902) 401-1640
[email protected]
www.mackeiganmarketing.com
Marketing
METRO LADIES GOLF INC.
We offer golf programs for women and
girls in the Halifax region. Our unique
membership will have you playing more
golf. Our female-centred approach
creates a fun, welcoming environment
where ladies of all abilities are encouraged to play, learn and succeed. We are
owned by a member of the PGA of Canada, with over 20 years of experience.
Sara Wilson, Director & Coach
538 Windsor Junction Rd
Windsor Junction NS B2T 1G1
Ph: (902) 449-2062
[email protected]
www.metroladiesgolf.ca
Golf
7
NEWSMAKERS
MUSKRAT MINERALS INCORPORATED
PROFALCO CONSTRUCTION
Liz MacKenzie,
Communications Director
Halifax NS
Ph: (902) 233-7255
[email protected]
www.muskratminerals.ca
Mining
Profalco Construction is an experienced
Nova Scotia based construction, renovation and painting company. With state
of the art equipment, Profalco is armed
to tackle any painting job, while also
offering general contracting services
as well as disaster restoration. Contact
Dominick Desjardins and Shawn McGee
at www.profalcoconstruction.com for
all your renovation needs.
Dominick Desjardins,
Chief Financial Officer
51 Joseph Young Street, Suite 301
Dartmouth NS B3A 4V9
Ph: (902) 402-7253
Z$Z[i`ơhZ_di6fhe\ơbYeYedijhkYj_ed$Yec
www.profalcoconstruction.com
Builders Commercial
NEW LIFE BUSINESS SOLUTIONS
Debi works with small business owners
to increase clients, sales and sanity! She
helps develop focused strategic sales
and marketing plans. Debi also delivers
business development training through
small business organizations. Her no
nonsense approach of “THINK IT –
PLAN IT – DO IT” is for clients who
want to see results!
Debi Hartlen MacDonald, Owner
881 Prospect Rd
Prospect Bay NS B3T 2A5
Ph: (902) 850-3018
www.nlbs.ca
Consulting (General)
TARGET CANADA
Minneapolis-based Target began
opening Canadian stores in March of
2013. Today, Target Canada employs
approximately 20,000 team members
and serves guests at 127 stores across 10
provinces. Since 1946, Target has given
five per cent of its profit through community grants and programs. For more
information about Target’s commitment
to corporate responsibility, visit target.
ca/corporateresponsibility.
Steeve Azoulay, Manager,
Government Affairs
(Quebec & Eastern Canada)
9900 boul. Cavendish, Suite 300,
Montreal QC H4M 2V2
Ph: (514) 404-4518
[email protected]
www.target.ca
Retail
THE PERFORMANCE VIEW
BUSINESS SOLUTIONS
An Authorized Partner of Everything
DiSC products and newly released The
Five Behaviors of a Cohesive Team
based on Patrick Lencioni’s bestseller
The Five Dysfunctions of a Team. We offer
workplace customized training solutions
in communication skills, teambuilding
and leadership development. For products or public and in-house programs
contact us.
Kathy Stanford, President
Dartmouth NS
Ph: (902) 483-0206
[email protected]
www.performanceview.ca
Training Programs
VSI WORLDWIDE TRADING
Hillary Chouinard, President
300-1533 Barrington St
Halifax NS B3J 1Z4
Ph: (902) 880-3071
[email protected]
www.vsiworldwide.com
Import/Export/Trading
Are you a new member?
To submit your 50-word blurb for
New & Noted, please contact Jennifer
Pierce, Member Services Specialist,
at [email protected]
or (902) 481-1227 within the first
six months of membership.
8
JULY & AUGUST 2014
NEWSMAKERS
MEMBERS IN THE NEWS
Movers and shakers, our members are newsmakers
one,” she says. “I look forward to assisting the Residence Inn with expanding
their customer base and to help celebrate
their 10th anniversary this year.” The
Residence Inn Halifax opened its doors
in September 2004.
Cathryn
Tracy
Photo: Contributed
E3 OFFICE FURNITURE EXPANDS
TO OTTAWA
CATHRYN TRACY NEW SALES
MANAGER WITH RESIDENCE INN
Cathryn Tracy has joined Residence
Inn Halifax Downtown as Sales Manager. Along with Tracy’s background in
marketing, event and executive meeting
planning, she says she brings a client
angle to the table. “Having been a former client booking meeting space and
accommodations for delegates, I feel
exhilarated to now be on the ‘other side
of the table’, offering a thorough understanding of a client’s expectations and
to be given the opportunity to meet each
Halifax based e3 Office Furniture
recently expanded to the Ottawa-Gatineau area. A Halifax Business Awards New
Business of the Year finalist in 2011, the
company now services all four Atlantic
Provinces and the Ottawa-Gatineau
area. “It has been an amazing four years
for our business. We realized our goal
of being a regional company within less
than two years in business and here we
are expanding out of Atlantic Canada
just prior to our fourth year in business,”
states Terry Hickey, President of e3 Office
Furniture. “With highly skilled representatives representing established brands to
existing customers in that marketplace,
the team is already contributing profits
to the company after just two months of
operations.”
NEW RESEARCH TO DETERMINE
LOW-RISK FROM HIGH-RISK
PROSTATE CANCER
Prostate Cancer Canada recently
announced a national research funding
initiative aimed at identifying prostate
cancer patients who need to be treated
aggressively and those who do not. Three
major research teams in Edmonton, Toronto and Sherbrooke will receive close
to $5 million for projects that will help
prevent the over-treatment of prostate
cancer. This funding is made possible due to the Movember Foundation.
“These grants will help to answer the
question of who to treat and who to monitor,” says Rocco Rossi, President and
CEO, Prostate Cancer Canada. “Within
the decade men will have access to these
tests and the knowledge they represent
to make decisions that will maximize
quality of life.”
PREMIERE SUITES EXTENDS
ITS PRODUCT LINE
Premiere Executive Suites recently
announced the launch of its more accessible product line, Premiere Essential Suites. “The interior of Premiere
Essential Suites will be designed to the
same four-star standard that you’ve
come to know and appreciate in our
“Executive” product,” says the company.
“They will simply be housed in more
affordable buildings with the amenities
that are ‘Essential’ to this segment of
the extended stay market.” Learn more
at www.premieresuites.com.
63 McQuade Lake Crescent,
Halifax, NS, B3S 1C4
BUSINESS VOICE
9
NEWSMAKERS
NEW CCEPA EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR
The Canadian Centre for Ethics
in Public Affairs (CCEPA) recently
announced that Chris Stover has been
promoted to the position of Executive
Director. Stover succeeds Susan Letson,
who has been Executive Director since
January, 2013. “Chris has been the General Manager of CCEPA and moves into
this position during a time of strategic
renewal,” says Valerie Payn, Chair of the
Board for CCEPA. “Chris is a passionate
and effective advocate for CCEPA’s mandate to provoke and promote curiosity,
insight and reflection on ethical issues in
public life, and will make a strong contribution to its future direction.”
NEW HIRES AT WIRED FLARE
Wired Flare is expanding. Heather
Gillis (online strategist) joined the team
in fall 2013 and Kris Booth (video marHeather
Gillis
keting director) in spring 2014. “Heather’s sociology and marketing background
has given her a passion for digging in to
find out ‘why people do what they do’,”
says President Frances Leary. “Kris is an
award-winning filmmaker who’s excited
to put his talents to work in the business
world. I’m very excited to have Heather
and Kris at Wired Flare. They’re both so
talented and exactly what we need in
order to grow. Exciting things are developing, so stay tuned.” Learn more at
www.wiredflare.com.
HIAA APPOINTS NEW VP OF HR
Mike Christie has been appointed Vice
President, Human Resources for Halifax International Airport Authority
(HIAA). In his new position, Christie’s
primary responsibilities will be employee
relations, labour relations, and organizational effectiveness and development for
HIAA. He will also oversee the administration of a broad range of organizational
and employee services including benefits
and salary administration, training and
development, recruitment, and employee
assistance programs. “It’s a pleasure to
welcome Mike to the HIAA team,” says
Joyce Carter, HIAA President & CEO.
“He brings a wealth of knowledge and
over 18 years of human resources experience, and will be a great addition to our
senior management group.”
PUROLATOR TACKLE HUNGER
RECEIVES HALL OF FAME AWARD
Purolator Inc. has received the Sponsorship Marketing Council Canada’s
(SMCC) first-ever Hall of Fame award,
recognizing the Purolator Tackle Hunger
(PTH) program. A three-time winner of a
Sponsorship Marketing Award, the PTH
program joins Kraft Hockeyville as the
first-ever Hall of Fame award recipients. “We are extremely honoured to be
among the first recipients of this prestigious Hall of Fame award,” said Ramsey
Mansour, Vice President of Marketing,
Purolator. “For us, this award is a true
testament to the hard work, dedication
and commitment of our employees, customers and partners, including the Canadian Football League and its fans. Their
continuous support and contributions in
tackling hunger in our communities are
what make this program successful year
after year.”
Photo: Contributed
Kris Booth
Photo: Contributed
10
JULY & AUGUST 2014
THOMPSON PROMOTED
AT SCOTIABANK
Craig Thompson has become the
first regional Scotiabank executive in
decades to be promoted to the region’s
top spot, Senior Vice President, Retail &
Small Business Banking, Atlantic Canada.
Thompson succeeds Islay McGlynn,
who recently moved to Toronto as SVP
Employee Experience. “We believe that
community and small business development are key to Atlantic Canada’s
prosperity and well-being,” he says. “My
job is to lead and support my team as we
strive to make Scotiabank an even-better
bank for our customers, communities
and employees. I want our attentions and
diligence to deepen our customers’ trust
in us so we can become Atlantic Canada’s
most-recommended bank.”
AMPLIFY MEDIA LAUNCHES NEW SITE
After five years of crafting websites
for their clients, the programmers and
designers at Amplify Media have
indulged themselves and launched a
newly redesigned website for their own
company. “Our old site design was still
serving us well and still generating new
business constantly,” says Amplify’s
Director of IT, Shawn Anderson. “But
the techniques and the technology that
we use had evolved since our original site
launch, and it’s important that our own
site reflects that evolution.” Amplify’s
new home on the web launched in midMay, and can be found at www.amplifymedia.ca.
SALLY HERRIOTT JOINS
CREATIVE WELLNESS SOLUTIONS
Sally Herriott has joined Creative
Wellness Solutions as Sales and
Marketing Director. “We are excited to
have Sally join our team as we continue
to grow the Evexia brand both nationally and internationally,” says President
of Creative Wellness Solutions, Lydia
Makrides. “Sally relocated from the U.K.
last summer, where she most recently
ran her own businesses. Prior to that, she
was Head of Sales and Marketing for a
leading supplier to Marks and Spencer
foods.” “I look forward to meeting new
clients locally and working with them
to improve wellness in the workplace,”
says Herriott.
NEWSMAKERS
Home Instead Senior Care Halifax
has launched a new program called
Making Home Safer for Seniors. “The
program offers a free home-safety checklist and an online safety assessment with
recommendations for inexpensive modifications that could ensure the well-being
of older loved ones,” says Jeanie Burke
of Home Instead Senior Care Halifax.
“Falls are the leading cause of injury hospitalizations for seniors across Canada
according to the Canadian Institute for
Health Information. Senior home-safety
experts recommend that adult children
of seniors take at least one day each year
to perform a thorough safety check of their
parents’ home.” Contact (902) 429-2273 or
visit www.makinghomesaferforseniors.ca
for more information.
TEA PARTY REBRANDS
AS FASHIONISTA FLING
Photo: © Amanda Keddy
Photography
Dress for Success Halifax has
re-branded their annual Tea Party. The
first Fashionista Fling was successfully
held on May 8, at Casino Nova Scotia.
Executive Director Brenda Saunders/
Todd says she could not be more proud of
2014 honourees Jan McColm (honored
client of DFSH) and Jessie Jollymore
of Hope Blooms (Woman of Spirit recipient). “They are two ordinary women,
who do extraordinary things in our community and Dress for Success Halifax is
a grass roots organization that endeavors
to continue to honor women like Jan &
Jessie.” For more information, please
contact [email protected]
or (902) 493-7377.
Jan McColm (L) and Jessie Jollymore (R) at
the Fashionist Fling.
Photo: Contributed
MAKING HOME SAFER FOR SENIORS
CANADA’S BEST PLACES TO WORK
TELUS MOBILE OFFICE VISITS HALIFAX
The TELUS Mobile Office recently
made a stop in Halifax, spending a day
parked at the Halifax Chamber of Commerce for the public to visit. The Mobile
Office tours the country and showcases
TELUS’ products for small business, including: mobile LTE connectivity; BYOD
(bring-your-own-device) solutions; new
smart phone applications; unified communications; video conferencing; M2M
solutions; digital signage; fleet tracking/
management; web collaboration; and
cloud-based service. For more information view the YouTube video at http://
bit.ly/1jjfghl.
Immigrant Settlement and Integration Services (ISIS) has been ranked
as one of the Best Workplaces in Canada
for 2014 by Great Place to Work Institute
Canada. The award is presented to the
50 Best Workplaces in Canada (medium
<1000 employees). “A workplace is only
as good as the people who work there
and this award is a recognition to the
board, employees and volunteers who,
every day, make ISIS such a great place
to work,” says Gerry Mills, Director of
Operations. Fellow Chamber member
T4G was also named to the list. View the
full list at www.greatplacetowork.ca.
Dianne Taylor-Gearing
NSCAD CHOOSES
DIANNE TAYLOR-GEARING
Professor Dianne Taylor-Gearing
has been appointed President of NSCAD
University. An art educator, fashion
designer and seasoned administrator,
Taylor-Gearing will step into the position
effective August 4, 2014. “We welcome
Prof. Taylor-Gearing to Halifax and to
NSCAD University,” says Grant Machum,
chair of NSCAD’s Board of Governors.
“She has substantial experience working
with independent arts institutions in the
U.K., United States and Canada and providing guidance through times of change.
A skilled leader and administrator, she’s
known for her team-building approach.”
The TELUS Mobile Office recently made a stop in Halifax.
Photo: Contributed
BUSINESS VOICE
To make a submission to Members in
the News please contact Jennifer Pierce,
Member Services Specialist, at jenn@
halifaxchamber.com or (902) 481-1227.
Deadline for submissions is six weeks before
publication, on the 15th of each month.
11
Achin’ for the bacon
By Jane Doucet | Photos: Paul Darrow
If you ask successful entrepreneurs at
what age their business spirit was first
sparked, you’ll often hear that in junior
high they juggled one or more paying
jobs. Perhaps they had a paper route or
pitched in at their family’s store. Or maybe
they mowed lawns, raked leaves or shovelled snow in their neighbourhood.
Mike Kennedy didn’t do any of
those things. But at age 31 he has already
launched two seasonal businesses on the
Halifax waterfront and has been chosen
Halifax Chamber of Commerce 2014 Person of the Year. In fact, his first job, at age
15, was as a bingo caller at Bonanza Bingo
at Cole Harbour Place, where he worked
part-time for a year.
“It was my first experience working
in front of a big crowd with a microphone,
and I liked the entertainment aspect,”
COVER STORY
he says. Through that gig, Kennedy also
realized that he enjoyed dealing directly
with people, which would serve him well
in his future forays into customer service
and hospitality.
Kennedy might have inherited his
bent toward business. Born in Kentville
and raised in Porter’s Lake, his father
worked in food sales and his mother
ran her own cleaning business. While
Kennedy was studying for a Bachelor of
Business Administration degree at Acadia University, which he earned in 2005,
he took an entrepreneurship course and
became Board Secretary for the Acadia
Centre for Small Business and Entrepreneurship. That was when the spark ignited,
but it would take moving out West, then
coming home again, before it caught and
spread.
From September of 2005 to June
of 2009, Kennedy worked as a Senior
Staff Accountant at Deloitte & Touche
LLP in Calgary. During the summers of
2006 and 2007, he studied for a Master’s
degree in accounting at the University of
Saskatchewan. In the summer of 2008,
he wrote the notoriously difficult chartered accounting Uniform Evaluation
“UFE” exam — and failed.
“It was awful,” says Kennedy. “I had
expected to pass, so it was pretty devastating. I had to do a lot of soul searching
to see if I wanted to carry on in that
direction.”
Kennedy chose to keep at it, passing
the UFE in 2008 and relocating to Deloitte’s Halifax office. The management
at Deloitte encouraged volunteerism, so
Kennedy, who plays guitar, banjo, drums
and mandolin, became Board Chair of
the East Coast Music Association.
“I knew it was very unlikely that I’d
ever win an ECMA, so I figured this was
the next best thing,” he says, laughing.
(Kennedy might not garner an ECMA
but he was a regional finalist for Canadian Idol.) He has also volunteered for
Acadia’s alumni association, the Dartmouth General Hospital and the Halifax
Running Club, among other notable
organizations.
BUSINESS VOICE
Running toward
a tasty idea
After working as Manager of Nova
Scotia’s Department of Health and Wellness’s Internal Audit Centre from 2011 to
2013, Kennedy was hired as a specialist in
Public Service Renewal by the Government
of Nova Scotia. In his LinkedIn profile,
he has listed this as the job description:
“Smashing silos and building bridges.”
(Kennedy clarifies that he has been tasked
with improving internal engagement).
Kennedy has shown a strong aptitude for
working across sectors, including his volunteer work and most recently, his efforts
to bring two exiting seasonal businesses to
the Halifax waterfront.
The idea for the first, Canadian
Bacon Cookhouse, was born in 2012
during a regular Sunday-morning outing
with the Halifax Running Club. “You
go for your run, then you get coffee and
bagels,” says Kennedy. “The whole time
13
COVER STORY
Canadian Bacon Cookhouse employees Odessa Cohen and Kyle MacGillivray with Mike Kennedy.
you’re running, you’re thinking about
food.” That day, Kennedy was running
alongside Louis Brill, the President and
CEO of the Lung Association of Nova
Scotia and a former navy cook; the pair
had met through the club two years
earlier. It came up in conversation that
both of them had eaten and enjoyed the
peameal-bacon sandwich at Carousel
Bakery in Toronto’s St. Lawrence Market.
“We decided that there was an achin’ for
the bacon on the East Coast that needed
satisfying,” says Kennedy.
Not long after, Halifax’s Waterfront
Development issued an RFP for a seasonal
kiosk on the boardwalk. Kennedy and
Brill spotted it at the same time and,
even though their bacon business hadn’t
moved beyond the idea phase, they
quickly pulled together a business plan
and submitted it. “I’m not so much a
great planner as a great scrambler,” says
Kennedy. “My philosophy is to bite off
more than you can chew, then chew as
fast as you can.”
In January of 2013, Kennedy and
Brill were told that their pitch had been
successful. At that point, the business
partners didn’t have any sandwich recipes, so the next step was to create and
test them, which they were still doing
two and a half weeks before they opened
Canadian Bacon Cookhouse in early
June. “Louis and I are both stubborn and
work well under tight deadlines,” says
Kennedy. “We came up with our feature
dessert: chocolate-covered bacon lollipops, two days before we opened.”
In late May, shortly before the kiosk
opened, Kennedy received the follow-
An awesome idea
Of all of his volunteer work, Mike Kennedy is most proud of co-founding Awesome Foundation Halifax in 2011. The community-based organization works with a
team of trustees across private, public and NGO sectors. Each month, the trustees
donate $1,000 from their own pockets to distribute a cash grant to a local individual
or group in support of an initiative or project that serves to further “awesomeness”
in HRM.
The trustees are members of such diverse companies, institutions and organizations as the IWK Health Centre, WHW Architects, Radian 6, Bishop’s Cellar,
Taste of Nova Scotia and Dalhousie University. Past grant recipients include the
Bedford Brass Quintet, which performed free concerts to those who took the Alderney ferry; the Little Fishers Club, which gave free fishing lessons to kids on the Bedford waterfront; and Tulipmania, a tulip-planting community-improvement project
in Dartmouth. “I believe in the healthy benefits of competition,” says Kennedy,
“especially when you can see that someone is driven to making something better.”
14
JULY & AUGUST 2014
ing devastating news: his mother, Judy,
had died in a car accident. “My mother
had instilled that spirit of creativity and
entrepreneurship in me, and also that it’s
important to give back to the community,” says Kennedy. “Her death helped
me decide to live my life even more fully
than I was, and to get more done.”
Kennedy took a month off his government job and immersed himself in
Canadian Bacon Cookhouse, which he
says was a good distraction while he was
grieving. He and Brill hired 10 students
to work at the kiosk for the summer; the
business partners worked there themselves on weekends and holidays and enjoyed interacting with staff and customers. “Both of us have a flair for hospitality
and entertainment,” says Kennedy.
Brill agrees with that assessment,
adding that both he and Kennedy said:
“Let’s do it” to their business idea
without thinking too much about it, and
that they’re both driven when they’re
passionate about something. “Mike has
a combination of smarts, creativity and
resourcefulness, plus he’s hard-working,”
says Brill. “We keep it fun, but we take
everything personally, so if customer
service isn’t great or people walk away
thinking that sandwich was small or it
wasn’t tasty, it reflects on us. We take a
fair amount of pride in what we do and
want to do things well.”
Driving into
the ocean
Canadian Bacon Cookhouse, which
was a finalist for the Halifax Chamber
of Commerce’s 2014 New Business of
the Year Award, is now heading into its
second season of operation. After ironing
out the kinks that cropped up during the
2013 pilot season — such as ordering 60
pounds of bacon without checking the
long-range forecast that called for a week
of rain which kept customers away —
things should run more smoothly. That
means Kennedy can turn his attention
to his latest Halifax-waterfront venture,
H20 Golf, which launched in late May.
H20 Golf is North America’s only
golf green that floats in the ocean; the
700-square-foot green that’s tethered 40
yards off the boardwalk by the Marriott
Harbourfront Hotel allows golf enthusiasts to show off their short game and
have the chance to win several prizes,
including a 2014 Subaru Impreza. The
COVER STORY
seed for this business germinated in
much the same way as Canadian Bacon
Cookhouse: through an informal brainstorming session with Kennedy’s buddy
Steve Dexter, after golf pros and brothers
Todd and Jeff Bishop submitted a pitch to
the Awesome Foundation.
For $10 for three balls, people can
practice their driving skill and receive a
coupon booklet worth $500 for Halifaxarea businesses, plus a chance to win the
Subaru. “It’s a unique idea to help draw
people to the waterfront,” says Kennedy,
who had golfed when he attended the
University of Saskatchewan. Environmentalists needn’t worry; a thorough
sustainability review was done as part
of the business plan to ensure that no
harm would be done to the ocean and its
inhabitants.
Some of the proceeds from this venture will be donated to the QEII Foundation. “I’m getting more deliberate about
my business ideas,” says Kennedy. “Because these two businesses are seasonal,
I can spend the off season thinking about
how to enhance them and also scheming
to come up with the next idea.”
Kennedy is also eager to support existing great ideas, such as Hope Blooms —
Halifax’s North End community garden,
greenhouse and youth herb-dressing
business that rocketed to national
attention earlier this year on Dragons’
Den — to which he’s offering some business mentoring. “That’s a case of a group
of people doing something to foster entrepreneurship in kids and boost both their
community and the economy, and they’re
achieving great results,” he says. “It just
goes to show that you don’t need to have a
business degree to start a business; you just
have to have a passion for something and
not give up. In the big picture, we need
more people to take risks like that and
to support those who do.”
Louis Brill is confident that Kennedy
will continue to be one of those people.
“Mike is a leader among leaders,” he
says. “He’s attracted to good ideas and
positive people, but he also creates that
environment wherever he goes. I think,
for Mike, the best is yet to come.” Kennedy’s response to being chosen Person of
the Year is indicative of the collaborator
he is: “I’m equal parts surprised, humbled and grateful. I’ve been very lucky
to meet and work with some incredible
people over the past 10 years, and view
this honour as a team effort and celebration of those who have been part of my
life journey to date.”
It just goes to show that you don’t need to have a business
degree to start a business; you just have to have a passion
for something and not give up. In the big picture, we need
more people to take risks like that and to support those
who do.” — Mike Kennedy
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15
Gottingen chic
Business revitalization draws creative class to
Gottingen Street
By Jon Tattrie
Photo: Anita MacPherson/AMacPhotography
A
ir Canada passengers who pick up the
spring issue of En Route, the airline’s inflight magazine, will be advised to have
breakfast at the Nook, visit the Parentheses Gallery, grab a drink in the Company
House, dine at EDNA and take in a live
show at the Marquee Ballroom.
If you’re visiting Halifax, flyers are
told, you have to come to Gottingen Street.
As it celebrates its 250th anniversary,
Gottingen Street is not just flourishing –
it’s become the trendiest area of the city.
“All these residential developments
are bringing new people into the area,”
says Patricia Cuttell Busby, Head of the
North End Business Association, pointing to the many new condominiums and
16
businesses that have sprung up. “Businesses saw the opportunity. The North
End has always been the centre of the
creative class.”
In May, Local Tasting Tours started
HFX North, a foodie’s walking tour of the
north end. The 2.5 hour tour stops includes
Gio on Market Street, Dee Dee’s Ice
Cream on Cornwallis Street, enVie — a
vegan kitchen on Charles Street, and FRED
café and hair salon at Agricola and North.
A wide range of factors are behind
the resurgence of Gottingen Street. Busby, who is also Vice-President of Agricola
Street’s Burst! Transformational Solutions, mentions trail-blazers like Fred
Connors of FRED and Michelle Strum of
JULY & AUGUST 2014
Halifax Backpackers Hostel and Alteregos Café & Catering. Both came to the
area more than a decade ago.
“Fred is fantastic at branding and
promoting his work,” Busby says. “It’s
helped set the tone.”
Strum helped start NEBA after
opening her business. “She became
actively engaged in the community,”
Busby says. “When you see communities
organize like that, they get a louder voice
and start to promote the area.”
It’s a long way from the street’s
humble beginnings. Halifax was founded
in 1749 to give the British a powerful hold
on what they called Nova Scotia and to
push the Acadians and Mi’kmaq off the
GOTTINGEN STREET - 250 YEARS
Check out the diversity
of Chamber members
on Gottingen Street:
Global TV
Vollick McKee Petersmann
& Associates Ltd.
Propeller
Norex
Brigadoon Children’s Camp
Society
G.M. Applied Technologies
Centennial Pool
Black Educators Association
Atlantic Council for
International Cooperation
North End Community
Health Centre
Micmac Native Friendship
Society
Music NS
Stepping Stone
jane’s
disputed territory. Fortress Halifax was
born in war and huddled behind the
palisades for its first few years.
But shiploads of the so-called Foreign Protestants arrived year after year,
seeking more land than Halifax proper
could provide. Most of the 3,000 new
settlers arriving in 1750-1751 were German, with a few Swiss and French mixed
in, nearly equaling the original English
population.
The Germans soon spilled over the
city walls and settled to the north of the
palisades. The economic immigrants and
religious refugees cut through the forest
to create paths littered with tree stumps.
People built and lived in “Dutch cottag-
Photo: The Chronicle Herald Archives
Photos:
LEFT: Gottingen Street, June 2014, with view of new apartment building, Edna,
and other businesses.
ABOVE: Gottingen Street circa 1940’s with view of Rubin’s, Isnors, Woolworth Co.,
and other businesses.
es,” modest one- or two-bedroom homes
nestled in the woods.
“The main motivation for development in that direction was the creation of
the naval dockyards at the foot of what’s
now Artz Street,” historian Paul Erickson
explains. “The dockyard was essentially
completed by 1760. There’s a lot of early
activity there.”
The area was known as Dutchtown, which was an English corruption
of Deutschtown, as in Germany. Some
called it Germantown.
Erickson describes many of the
colonists as indentured servants who
paid for their passage by building public
works in Halifax. He and his wife Dawn
excavated a Dutch cottage on Cornwallis
and Barrington streets as part of a SMU
project in the 1980s.
In 1753, many Germans were moved
to settle Lunenburg (which explains why
the UNESCO World Heritage Site looks
so much like early Halifax). But some
remained north of Halifax.
In 1756, the Dutchtown settlers
dragged a log home to the corner of
Brunswick and Gerrish. There they
paused before a common grave holding
the mortal remains of some 300 of their
brothers and sisters who died of typhus on
the crossing from Europe to Nova Scotia.
The building became their grave marker.
It was called St. George’s Church and
kept that name until St. George’s Round
Church opened in 1812, when it became
BUSINESS VOICE
known as the Little Dutch Church.
In 1764, the German settlers
successfully petitioned the Nova Scotia
government to change the name from
Germantown to Gottingen to honour
King George II, the German-born British
ruler who founded Göttingen University
and who had died in 1760.
Upper Water Street dead-ended at
the dockyards and Barrington Street
was just a stub, so Gottingen became the
street that grew and grew all the way to
Lady Hammond Road (that last stretch
was recently renamed Novalea Drive) to
get people off the peninsula. “It became a
transportation artery to the downtown,”
Erickson says.
By the late 1800s, Gottingen was a
commercial district. A look through the
digital version of Hopkins’ City Atlas of
Halifax (1878) shows a tobacco factory off
Brunswick Lane, a carriage factory near
St. George’s Church, and the North End
Market. It also housed institutions such as
the Military Hospital, the Deaf & Dumb Institute and the “Colored Baptist Church.”
In the 1900s, Brunswick Street was
Young Avenue of its day. “It was the residential address of distinction,” Erickson
says. In the post-war period, it became
more of a working class neighbourhood.
The destruction of Africville in the 1960s
drove many of the dislocated African
Nova Scotians to join the black Nova
Scotians already living in the residential
North End.
17
Today, the North End Business
Association is celebrating that 1764 name
change as Gottingen 250. Particular focus
is on the area’s German, Mi’kmaq and
African Nova Scotia identities.
The main celebrations run September 11 to 14. A music and heritage festival
(staring Jrdn) will offer a free, daylong
concert at 2183 Gottingen Street, an openair street market on Maitland Street, and
family festivities in the field next to St.
Patrick’s Alexandra. On Sunday, there’s a
free community barbeque and multi-denomination religious service. It’ll be a
return to roots, as one of the original
Little Dutch Church pastors spoke four
languages and preached to people from
different Christian traditions.
The area’s history will be explored
throughout the year at iMOVE, the Bus
Stop Theatre and the Co*Lab, with photo
collections, archival displays, and community stories on Gottingen Street and
online. Organizers also plan to develop a
history app that will use location tags to
pull out stories from the first 250 years for
a walking history tour.
“We’re going to project onto buildings how they looked through the years,”
Michelle Strum adds. “It’s a celebration
of Gottingen past, present, and where
we’re going.”
Part of the reason for Gottingen
250 is that there is Canadian Heritage
funding available for neighbourhoods
celebrating their 250th anniversary.
Strum’s hostel and café is one of the
many signs of growth in the area, along
with the Global News headquarters (in
the former Palooka’s site), Home Grown
Organics and more.
NEBA says the area economy is “excellent,” although businesspeople here
(and elsewhere in the downtown) want
to see business taxes reformed. It also
wants action on HRM’s Centre Plans so
development moves quicker.
Strum has owned her businesses for
13 years, and that makes her hostel one
of the longest-standing enterprises on
the street. “Gottingen Street is different
than downtown in that people tend to run
these life-long businesses,” she explains.
Owners retire, sell the spot, and a new
business take its place.
Photos:
Photo: Norwood/The Chronicle Herald Archives/1948-09-28
Photo: The Chronicle Herald Archives
TOP: Vogue Theatre on Gottingen Street. When this photo was taken in 1948, fans were lined up to see Blondie’s Holiday. Running boards
on cars were going out of style, as evidenced by the small car behind the sedan, and trolleys still travelled the streets.
MIDDLE: Gottingen Street with view of Klines Ltd., Forsyth’s Men’s Shop Ltd., Bank of Montreal, Simons and other businesses.
BOTTOM: Gottingen Street, June 2014, with view of Global, Theatre Lofts, Glubes Lofts and other businesses.
18
JULY & AUGUST 2014
Photo: F. Martin/The Chronicle Herald Archives/1966-01-28
Photo: Sullivan/The Chronicle Herald Archives/1962-11-15
“It has that rural business community feel,” she says. “Walk up and down
Gottingen Street and you’ll find the
owner behind the counter at almost every
business. It’s something really special we
have here.”
One of those owners is Jenna Mooers. She grew up on Gottingen and North,
then Creighton and North, in the 1990s.
Gottingen sprouted plenty of empty
buildings and vacant lots at that time.
She left for Montreal after high school
and had no reason to return.
But then her mother, Jane Wright,
closed Jane’s on the Common, and
bought 2053 Gottingen Street to operate Jane’s Catering and Events. Mooers
Photos:
L: Built in 1859, the School for the Deaf was situated where Uniacke Square is today
and was known as Brunswick Villa.
R: Construction is well underway of the $1,570,000 Uniacke Square low-rental project.
Located south of the former School for the Deaf property.
All these residential developments are bringing
new people into the area. Businesses saw the
opportunity. The North End has always been
the centre of the creative class.”
– Patricia Cuttell Busby, Head of the
North End Business Association
A step back in time
By Jon Tattrie
Gottingen Street conjures up images
of rural living in pastoral woods, the
sound of horse hooves clip-clopping on
dirt roads, and the smells of pine and
ocean. Well, it does if you’re Paul Erickson, professor of anthropology at Saint
Mary’s University and the author of
Historic North End Halifax.
Erickson lives in the north end and
has spent much of his life digging deep
into its roots. “That area from Gottingen
to the harbour is referred to as the old north
suburbs. It developed before the south
suburbs,” he says with a glint of pride.
Gottingen Street still has the community vibe it had in the early days, but
the pastoral woods and rural atmosphere
are long gone. So are the clip-clopping
horse hooves and tree-stumped dirt
roads. Some of it made it to World War II,
20
Saint George’s Round
Anglican Church,
Brunswick Street,
Halifax.
but almost all of the old world was bulldozed in the mania for urban renewal
that gripped Halifax post-war.
But hints of history remain. The Little Dutch Church still marks the old mass
grave. Stand at the corner of Cornwallis
and Barrington to take in the billboard
sitting on a green space. That’s where Paul
Erickson and his SMU team excavated (and
then reburied) an old Dutch cottage. Across
the street is the new Spice Condominiums.
They’re named for William Schwartz, the
son of German immigrants. He founded
Schwartz Spices in 1889 and operated a
spice factory on the site.
Walk up to the south-east corner of
Cornwallis and Brunswick (kitty-corner to the Round Church), turn left and
stroll past the beautifully ancient brown
home. It’s Akins Cottage, built in the
JULY & AUGUST 2014
Photo: The Chronicle
Herald Archives/1958
1790s and later home to Dr. Thomas B.
Akins, author of 1895’s History of Halifax
City. The original Dutch cottages looked
something like it.
Close your ears to modern traffic,
shut your eyes to the condos, and listen
to the echoes of horses trotting on dirt
roads. Smell the peaceful woods.
“That’s about as evocative as you
can get of 18th Century North End,” says
Erickson. “The rest you have to use your
imagination for.”
is
opened EDNA in the building in 2013. It’s
a restaurant named for the American poet
and playwright Edna St. Vincent Millay.
“I feel like I’m falling in love with
Halifax all over again,” Mooers says.
“Part of my vision was to be a neighbourhood restaurant and bar where people
could walk and get a locally sourced,
home-cooked meal and a glass of wine,
and not have to take their cars.”
Business is good, she says, but she
worries about development becoming
gentrification. “As long as small business
owners are invested in the community,
live and work and feel it, then I think it’s
a really positive thing,” says Mooers, who
does indeed live in the neighbourhood.
She put benches on the sidewalk
to add to the community spirit. “Public
seating is really neat,” she says. “It took
all of 30 seconds for somebody to come
by and sit on them. They’re pretty much
occupied all day long.”
Learn more at
Gottingen.ca
2&
Tuesday, November 4
11:30am - 1:30pm
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21
PROFILE
Working for stronger families
Halifax doctor launches organization helping families address mental health challenges By Heather Laura Clarke
Dr. Pat McGrath is a Clinical Child Psychologist, as well as the Integrated Vice President of Research and Innovation at
the IWK Health Centre and Capital Health, and a professor and Canada Research Chair at Dalhousie University.
W
hen a child is struggling and
professional help is a year away, many
parents have no idea how to cope. That’s
why Dr. Patrick McGrath decided to try
something radically different within the
healthcare system.
“The whole goal is to get the right
care to the right person at the right time,”
says McGrath, who is a Clinical Child
Psychologist, as well as the Integrated
Vice President of Research and Innovation at the IWK Health Centre and Capital Health, and a professor and Canada
Research Chair at Dalhousie University.
“One of the ways we can do that is by
delivering mental healthcare to kids and
their families at their own residence, at
times that are convenient for them.”
In 2012, he took the research from
trials at the IWK Health Centre — which
were supported by the Canadian Institute
of Health Research — and spun it into a
not-for-profit business in order to deliver
services across Canada. Supported by
22
the government of Nova Scotia, Strongest Families provides distance care to
children and their parents all across the
country.
McGrath provides the example of
a mother of two in a rural setting, who
is contending with her youngest child
being kicked out of daycare repeatedly
for misbehaving. If she expressed her
concerns to her family doctor and got
a referral to see a psychologist, it could
be an entire year before they secured an
appointment.
At that point, the mother would need
to take a day off from work each week, and
hire a babysitter for her other child, in order to get her youngest child to the weekly
sessions. McGrath says after a couple of
weeks, the family would most likely quit
the sessions because they couldn’t afford
to miss work, hire a babysitter, and travel
into the city so frequently.
But by consulting a family doctor
and being referred to Strongest Families,
JULY & AUGUST 2014
McGrath says they can be working on
their program within just two weeks.
“What we’ve developed is a way of
delivering that care in their own homes,
at a time that’s convenient for them,” says
McGrath. “We speak with them over the
phone and give them handbooks, DVDs,
or access to a secure website where they
can access a personalized system, so they
can figure out how to help their child.”
McGrath says the coaching includes
teaching parents how to notice their
child’s behaviours, how to manage whining and complaining, how to use “when/
then” statements, and how to collaborate
with the child’s daycare or school — anything they need to gain control over the
situation and help their child. There are
also ways to address children who don’t
want to participate in school activities,
have issues with bedwetting or Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder, are
fearful of large animals, or struggle with
separation anxiety.
PROFILE
“We’re not about blaming the parents, because sometimes kids can be very
difficult and will need specialized skills
to deal with them,” says McGrath. “Studies have shown that managing a difficult
child can increase parental depression,
and also that parental depression increases
the likelihood that you’ll have a child with
mental health problems.”
Strongest Families won the Ernest
C. Manning Foundation principal award
for social innovation in 2013. During the
same year, the group helped more than
2,000 families in Nova Scotia, Ontario, and Alberta. McGrath says they are
talking with partners overseas about
expanding, and have already franchised
the concept to a health system in British
Columbia.
“The feedback from families is just
amazing. They love it. It really is the
way of the health system of the future,”
says McGrath. “It’s focused on the best
It just goes to show
that research creates
jobs here in the province. The IWK Health
Centre and the QEII
Health Sciences
Centre bring in
between $35-$40
million each year in
external funding.”
science and the needs of the families;
not the needs of the providers.”
Dr. Patricia Pottie helped develop
the program, and now serves as President
and Chief Operating Officer of the Strongest Families Institute. She and McGrath
currently have a team of about 30 employees who work for Strongest Families.
The coaches are carefully trained to work
with the families, and come from a variety of educational backgrounds.
Dr. McGrath expects they will
continue to generate more jobs here in
Halifax as Strongest Families grows.
“We’re providing meaningful employment here in Nova Scotia, and we’re
talking about great jobs that pay far better
than the typical wage for a call centre,”
says McGrath. “It just goes to show
that research creates jobs here in the
province. The IWK Health Centre and
the QEII Health Sciences Centre bring
in between $35-$40 million each year in
external funding.”
“With research, you go where the
best minds are, and there are an incredible
number of things happening in Halifax.”
COMMERCIAL REAL ESTATE
OPPORTUNITIES
To place an ad call: 426-2811 ext 1163
BUSINESS VOICE
23
TRENDS
Be a great event attendee
Things to do before the event to win a planner’s heart
DRIVE
member prosperity
and value
MELISSA HAWKES
SENIOR EVENT MANAGER
HALIFAX CHAMBER
OF COMMERCE
I’ve been organizing events for many
years, and no matter how organized you
are or how much preparation you do, the
day of an event always brings both great
anxiety and excitement to a planner. You
must be on your toes to troubleshoot,
plan for last minute changes, and expect
the unexpected.
So as an event attendee, how can you
win the heart of a planner? Allow me to
share a few easy steps:
Book your tickets before registration
closes (ideally 72 hours in advance):
Venues require an event’s guest
guarantee 72 hours in advance with a percentage allocated for increase in numbers,
but with no option to decrease. Once a
planner sends the guarantee, the costs
associated with each guest are locked in.
Registration lists are also typically
prepared and printed the day prior to an
event as the planner must be on site for
set up and execution the day of. To ensure you officially make the list, registering in advance is the key. Having to hand
write names on a nicely printed, formal
list will make a planner cringe.
Send any special meal requirements
in advance to the planner or directly to
the venue:
Planners and venues are always
happy to accommodate special meal
requirements, but ideally should know
in advance so they can have the meal
prepared and ready to serve with the rest
of the guests. Always call the venue in
advance (minimum 48 hours) to report
special meal requirements or let the planner know, as they would be happy to pass
it along. It is no longer just a vegetarian
alternative to plan for, but gluten-free,
dairy-free, sugar-free, etc. and it takes
time for a kitchen to plan for so many
different “free” meals.
Bring your ticket (if one is provided):
Having a ticket means you don’t
have to check in at registration or wait in
line! Typically blank tickets are printed
and available on site to accommodate
for lost or misplaced tickets, but it is a
win-win situation when you can stroll
confidently into an event knowing you
have a ticket in hand.
If the event is not a ticketed event or
if you have forgotten your ticket, it is very
helpful to know what company you are
registered under to attend. If you’ve been
invited as a guest, be sure to ask what
company you should check in under when
you arrive. It will make the process much
smoother. Companies typically purchase
more than one ticket and don’t necessarily provide delegate names in advance,
so this will help aid in your entry.
Lastly, if you cannot attend an event,
be sure to give your ticket to a friend or
colleague.
So follow these three easy steps and
you will be on your way to winning the
hearts of planners everywhere. It will
also make for a more enjoyable attendee
experience for you as well.
Melissa Hawkes is the Senior Event
Manager at the Halifax Chamber of
Commerce. You can reach the Events
Department at (902) 468-7111. To see
all of the Chamber’s upcoming events,
please visit our calendar of events on
www.halifaxchamber.com.
24
JULY & AUGUST 2014
CITY DESK
Resurgent Gottingen Street
A lesson in faith in the community
To place an ad call: 426-2811 ext 1163
The story of Gottingen Street is in
many ways the story of Halifax — rich in
history, diverse in culture, and experiencing a period of rapid evolution.
As the Gottingen community marks
250 years since its settlement — first as
Germantown and later as Gottingen —
we celebrate its storied history and its
promising future.
Gottingen Street is a wonderful case
study in how we can build not simply a
bigger city, but also at better city. After
an extended period of decline, Gottingen
Street is experiencing resurgence with an
eclectic mix of coffee shops, restaurants,
galleries, microbreweries, a television
station, a food co-op, new condos and
apartments.
These colourful new threads are
woven into an already rich community
fabric that includes families whose names
extend back to the early days of Africville,
Nick Dimitropoulos and his Vogue menswear, the North End Community Health
Care Centre, the Mi’kmaq Friendship
Centre, the North Branch Library and
the Community Y.
Gottingen teaches us that politicians
and bureaucrats do not build great cities
so much as people build great cities. Our
role at City Hall is to create the conditions
in which people with big ideas are willing
and able to successfully invest in their
community.
This is not to abdicate the city’s
responsibility. Our land-use plans, our
permitting systems and development
approvals, provision of public services
such as transit and policing, and support
for civic events and culture certainly
contribute to the success of the Gottingen community and the city writ large.
MARKET
PLACE
MAYOR MIKE SAVAGE
Similarly, reconnecting our downtown areas with the demolition of the
Cogswell Interchange and the reinstatement of grade level streets will go
a long way to redressing past planning
mistakes, and removing physical, and
perhaps even psychological, barriers to
civic improvement.
But, at the heart of the success of
Gottingen is something I can best sum up
with one word: Faith.
By that I mean faith in all its forms:
faith in oneself and in one’s beliefs; faith
in other people; faith in the value of smart
investments and hard work. And, yes,
faith in Halifax, a city that is likewise
riding a refreshing wave of optimism.
Gottingen’s story has often been
difficult to tell — its decades’ long decline
attributable to a variety of factors, from
the advent of shopping malls to broader
social equity and socio-economic problems that we have yet to solve.
BUSINESS VOICE
And yet today, long after the closings
of movie theatres, department stores,
furniture stores, grocery stores, and
banks, people are putting their faith in
Gottingen Street and its surrounding
community. The result is a dynamic mix
of old and new, a community that has a
place for oldtimers and newcomers, for
different cultures, incomes and interests.
This is the neighbourhood where
Hope Blooms was born and is quickly
becoming a movement thanks to the
commitment of Jessie Jollymore and her
group of unstoppable kids, who taught all
of us what a community can grow when
the right seeds are planted.
As we celebrate 250 years of the
Gottingen neighbourhood, let’s ensure its
lessons of faith in community are shared
with everyone who is committed to building a stronger, better future for the entire
Halifax region.
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25
WHERE ARE THEY NOW?
Building a legacy
Wadih Fares still making his mark on Halifax skyline By Richard Woodbury
Photos: Joseph Robichaud
Over the years, Wadih Fares has col-
lected many awards and honours from a
diverse group of organizations, including
the Halifax Chamber of Commerce, Saint
Mary’s University, the Salvation Army
and Engineers Canada. Not long after
being named Business Person of the
Year at the 2012 Halifax Business Awards,
he received word he would be receiving
the Order of Canada.
According to the Governor General’s
website: “The Order of Canada is the
centrepiece of Canada’s honours system
and recognizes a lifetime of outstanding
achievement, dedication to the community and service to the nation.”
As somebody who wasn’t born in
Canada, the honour had special meaning for Fares. “I felt that I belonged as a
Canadian,” he says. As well, it confirmed
certain feelings he had about Canada. “It
is true, Canada is the land of opportunity
and everything is possible if you work
hard enough for it,” he says.
As always, Fares’ company, WM Fares
26
JULY & AUGUST 2014
Group, for which he serves as President
and CEO, is keeping busy. When Business
Voice spoke with Fares in May, the company was putting the finishing touches
on its St. Lawrence Place project, which
consists of two buildings on Joseph Howe
Drive.
The building closest to the street is a
five-storey retail and office development.
In fact, Fares moved his company’s office
to this location as it needed more space
and liked the new spot’s natural light and
central location.
In behind the commercial building is
a 13-floor residential development, which
has an unusual twist. The first five floors
are rentals, while floors six through 13
are condos. “That’s something new we’re
trying and it’s working out very good,”
says Fares.
One other project the company
is working on is Rockingham South, a
major subdivision off Dunbrack Street.
Infrastructure work is about to begin on
the 55-acre development.
WORKING FOR YOU
Our best long-term investment
Business community has a huge stake in education system
GROW
and nurture the
skilled workforce
MARK FRASER EXECUTIVE VICEPRESIDENT AT T4G and CHAIR,
GROW AND NURTURE SKILLED
WORKFORCE TASK-FORCE
A few months ago, the provincial
government launched a comprehensive
review of our education system, the first
of its kind in 25 years. The Minister’s Panel
on Education, led by the Hon. Myra Freeman, undertook a large consultation effort
this spring. Since education formed a
significant part of our 2013-2018 Strategic
Plan, the Chamber prepared a submission outlining the business community’s
thoughts on the education system.
This was largely new ground for the
Chamber. If you were to ask your average
business owner in Nova Scotia about
their most pressing issues, education
likely would not top the list. Taxes,
regulations, economic growth — those
are the day-to-day issues that occupy our
members’ minds. So why pay attention to
education? What does it have to do with
business? The Now or Never Report did
a wonderful job reminding all of us that
to succeed as a province we will need to
think long-term. Education is the foun-
dation of our collective prosperity and it
is one of the best long term investments
we can make. If we want to be a more
successful province two decades from
now, we need to pay close attention to the
education decisions we make today.
In many ways, Nova Scotia has a
good education system. We have many
passionate educators, parents place a
high priority on education, and we have
one of the highest graduation rates in
Canada. It would be easy to look at where
we are, shrug our shoulders, and say we
are doing a good job.
Yet recent evidence has made it
absolutely clear: good is just not good
enough anymore.
Nova Scotia’s school system is facing
two critical problems: demographics and
student achievement. The Organization
for Economic Co-operation and Development’s (OECD) 2012 Programme for
International Assessment demonstrated
that Nova Scotia’s academic achievement
has stagnated or declined in reading, science, and mathematics. The gap between
Nova Scotia students and top performing
students in Quebec, Alberta, and British
Columbia is increasingly worrying. The
most glaring example is the difference in
mathematics scores between Nova Scotia
and Quebec. The 39-point difference represents almost a year’s worth of learning,
according to the OECD, and is a major
cause for concern. This does not even
BUSINESS VOICE
take into consideration the even larger
gap between Nova Scotia and top-performing countries around the world.
On the demographic side, enrolment
in Nova Scotia public schools has been declining and there is no indication that this
trend will reverse itself. In the 2002-2003
school year, enrolment in Nova Scotia was
150,309. By 2016-2017, it is projected to
fall to 118,638, a decline of 21 per cent over
15 years. This continued decline will pose
serious challenges for school boards, especially those in rural parts of the province.
Given these challenges, it is clear
that our school system needs renewal.
While we do not have all the answers, we
believe that the following will help:
Allow our schools to be more innovative by focusing on the outcomes
students achieve rather than the
processes teachers use.
Enhance the curriculum to concentrate
on fundamental skills in math and science and to introduce entrepreneurship.
Remember that it is more important
to spend our money effectively than to
worry about how much we are spending overall.
Given its tremendous influence over
how our children grow and develop, education invokes passionate opinions. Yet
by embracing new ideas, the Panel has
the opportunity to lay the foundation for
our children’s success. It is a chance we
cannot afford to miss.

27
WORKING FOR YOU
Strategic Plan 2013-2018
We aim to be one of the top three highest
growth city economies in Canada by 2018
NEGATIVE IMPACTS ON BUSINESS
Access to Training
Red Tape
Commercial Taxes
Access to Training
Others
42%
21%
17%
11%
8%
WHAT THE CHAMBER IS DOING
01
02
03
04
WHAT WE HAVE HEARD
05
06
WŽƐƚʹ^ĞĐŽŶĚĂƌǇĚƵĐĂƟŽŶ
is crucial to business
Important Skills & Training
Strategic Taskforces
/ŶĨŽƌŵĂƟŽŶdĞĐŚŶŽůŽŐǇ
Assist with access to training and government procurement
Management & Leadership
WƌŽŵŽƟŶŐĞŶƚƌĞƉƌĞŶĞƵƌƐŚŝƉĂŶĚĐĞůĞďƌĂƚĞƐƵĐĐĞƐƐ
DĂƌŬĞƟŶŐΘ^ĂůĞƐ
ŶĐŽƵƌĂŐŝŶŐŐŽǀĞƌŶŵĞŶƚĂĐƟŽŶ
Keeping members up-to-date
Process Improvement
Engage students in the business community
Import / Export
dŚŝƐŝŶĨŽŐƌĂƉŚŝĐǁĂƐĐƌĞĂƚĞĚďǇE^ĚĞƐŝŐŶƐƚƵĚĞŶƚŶĮĂ>ŝŶ͕ŝŶĐŽŶƐƵůƚĂƟŽŶǁŝƚŚE^͛ƐKĸ
ĐĞŽĨhŶŝǀĞƌƐŝƚǇZĞůĂƟŽŶƐĂŶĚ>ŝŶĚƐĂǇĞƐƚ͕
DĂƌŬĞƟŶŐĂŶĚ^ƉŽŶƐŽƌƐŚŝƉ^ƉĞĐŝĂůŝƐƚĂƚƚŚĞ,ĂůŝĨĂǆŚĂŵďĞƌŽĨŽŵŵĞƌĐĞ͘
28
JULY & AUGUST 2014
WORKING FOR YOU
WHAT THE GOVERNMENT CAN DO
WHAT IS THE MOST URGENT
22%
Develop sensible
ƌĞŐƵůĂƟŽŶƐ
23%
15%
19%
21%
ŽŵƉĞƟƟǀĞƚĂǆĞƐ
Promote entrepreneurship
Reduce tax burden
͞KƉĞŶĨŽƌƵƐŝŶĞƐƐ͟
Culture
ŚĂŵƉŝŽŶĐŽŵŵŽŶͲƐĞŶƐĞƌĞŐƵůĂƟŽŶƐ
Capitalize on major projects
,ĞůƉďƵŝůĚĂǀŝďƌĂŶƚĚŽǁŶƚŽǁŶ
WƵďůŝĐĞĚƵĐĂƟŽŶƚŚĂƚ
prepares students for
EŽǀĂ^ĐŽƟĂ͛Ɛ&ƵƚƵƌĞ
WHAT YOU CAN DO
1
Mentor a
start–up
2
Innovate with
research
3
Expand to
new markets
4
Hire a new
grad
5
Invest in
business and
training
6
Hire an
immigrant
EŽƚĞ͗dŚŝƐŝŶĨŽƌŵĂƟŽŶǁĂƐĐŽůůĞĐƚĞĚĨƌŽŵ,ĂůŝĨĂǆŚĂŵďĞƌŽĨĞǀĞŶƚĂƩĞŶĚĞĞƐĂŶĚŽŶůŝŶĞƉŽůůƐ͘dŚŝƐŝƐŝŶƚĞŶĚĞĚƚŽďĞĂƐŶĂƉƐŚŽƚŽĨŵĞŵďĞƌŽƉŝŶŝŽŶƐĂŶĚǁĂƐ
ŶŽƚĐŽůůĞĐƚĞĚƵƐŝŶŐĂƐĐŝĞŶƟĮĐŵĞƚŚŽĚ͘
BUSINESS VOICE
29
SPECIAL FEATURE
CORPORATE GOVERNANCE
What you bring to the table
Governance isn’t “tick-the-box” compliance By Christian Buhagiar and Richard Powers
Photo: spotmatikphoto/1234RF
Every week, directors from some of
Canada’s leading companies gather at
top business schools around the country
for three days of lectures, case studies,
boardroom simulation and group discussions. Their focus? Creating value for the
companies that they serve.
This regular gathering is part of the
Directors Education Program (DEP),
jointly developed by the Institute of
Corporate Directors and University of
Toronto’s Rotman School of Management. It is a world-leading program for
directors in Canada, which takes place
over a period of 12 days. It is already
offered in Toronto, Montreal, Vancouver,
Edmonton and Calgary. In October, the
program will launch in Halifax, and then
in Winnipeg one month later to continue
the program’s expansion nationwide.
“Given increased public scrutiny
on boards and corporate accountability,
the need to stay ahead of the curve and
demonstrate good governance has never
been greater,” says Stan Magidson, president and CEO of the ICD and an instructor on merger and acquisition oversight
in the DEP. “But, governance isn’t about
‘tick-the-box’ compliance. It’s about
long-term and sustainable value creation,
leadership and sound judgment. That’s
what the DEP stands for.”
The DEP was first launched 10 years
ago and this year celebrates its 100th
course offering. There are more than
3,000 alumni of the program, which in30
clude, among others, prominent business
leaders from Atlantic Canada such as Jo
Mark Zurel, Chair of Atlantic Provinces
Economic Council and Newfoundland
Power; Steve Parker, Chairman and CEO
of CCL Group; Rob Sobey, Director of
Empire Company Limited; and Frank
Sobey, Chair of Crombie REIT.
The popularity of the DEP is in part
due to expectations from shareholders
and regulators that directors of a company have the knowledge and competency
to oversee strategy and guide management. In fact, the Canadian Securities
Administrators (CSA) requires that
education and orientation practices are
completely disclosed to investors every
year, with two sections in National Policy
58-201 referring to director education.
Issuers are also required to disclose whether they have adopted the guidelines.
Most organisations have internal
director education such as reading director
handouts and online materials, meeting
with management, and attending site
visits. However, these sessions focus on the
company and the industry in which it operates rather than broader principles of good
governance and director effectiveness.
Programs like the DEP are intended
to help directors go further in enhancing
their contribution in the boardroom by
asking the right questions to hold management accountable and ensuring that
the company’s and stakeholder’s interests
are represented.
JULY & AUGUST 2014
“A key part of being a director is
knowing how and when to ask the tough
questions,” says Cheryl Hodder, chair of
Film & Creative Industries Nova Scotia,
partner at McInnes Cooper in Halifax,
and an alumna of the DEP. “If you’re a
corporate director, you’re not immersed
in the business 24/7 like management is,
so you have to know which questions to
ask, when to ask them, how to ask them,
in order to get the information you need
to do your job effectively and responsibly.”
The perception of the boardroom
as an Old Boys Club with three-hour
lunches, whiskey and cigars is a thing of
the past. A typical board member now
dedicates over 300 hours to the company annually, which includes six to eight
meetings each year, more under special
circumstances; reading multiple board
documents, often a few hundred pages
long; and researching emerging issues
that can affect the director’s duties.
For many, being a corporate director
is a full-time career. And like any career,
it’s about what you bring to the table and
how you will continue to add value.
Christian Buhagiar is VicePresident, Education at the Institute
of Corporate Directors. Richard Powers
is National Academic Director of the
DEP at University of Toronto’s Rotman
School of Management.
SPECIAL FEATURE
SAFETY AND SECURITY
Iơ\[joǃ_hij
Security a vital part of any business operation By Tom Mason
Bill Brydon recalls a particular case
of business theft — a much simpler case
than many of the undercover operations,
drug enforcement stings and complex
business crimes he was involved with
over his 32 year career with the RCMP.
A road building company was leaving its
heavy machinery parked on the side of an
isolated country road every Friday afternoon. When they came back to work on
Monday the fuel had been drained from
every vehicle. What seemed like a petty
crime was devastating for the company
in question.
“Not only did they lose all that fuel,
but they had to deal with major down
time on Monday morning while they
waited for a fuel truck,” says Brydon.
“For a small company operating on tight
margins, a crime like that can be a tremendous hit to the bottom line.”
Today Brydon is Director of Operations with Commissionaires Nova Scotia.
As part of his job he helps companies
develop security strategies to protect
against those types of crimes. “Most
Investing in professional
advice in the beginning
can save a lot of money
over the long term.”
— Bill Brydon
people know us as the company with the
guards at the front gate, but that’s just
one small aspect of what we do,” he says.
“We’re actually the province’s largest
private security company. We offer a high
Your Security is our Business
Commissionaires Nova Scotia is the province’s
leading employer of veterans and offers
security solutions to protect your business,
employees, contractors and visitors.
tThreat Risk Assessments
tSecurity Guarding
tInvestigations
tPolice Clearances
tMobile Patrol
tBy-law Enforcement
tHome/Business Watch
tCustomized Security & Safety Training
tCommercial & ID Services
tLone Worker Monitoring
Serving all of Nova Scotia with offices in:
Halifax tKentville tSydney tTruro
commissionaires.ns.ca
1 877 322 6777
32
JULY & AUGUST 2014
CUSTOM MEDIA CONTENT
level of expertise in many areas including
access point security, mobile response to
alarms, investigative services, forensic
camera investigations and much more.”
It seems that workplace security
incidents have increased dramatically in
recent years; everything from violence
at the hands of disgruntled employees
to major cyber disasters like the recent
heart bleed computer virus have become
regular news headlines. “It’s no secret
that the security industry exploded after
9/11,” says Brydon. “A lot of companies
realized then that they needed security.
The problem was, a lot of them didn’t
know what they were trying to protect.
Was it their people? Their property? Their
information? All of those things are vital
to a company’s bottom line.”
Anything that compromises your
ability to perform your core function as
a business needs to be protected, says
Brydon. “You need a plan to protect those
things and you need to check on a regular
basis to make sure the systems that are in
place to protect those things are adequate.”
Maintaining a uniformed presence
at a company’s access point may look
impressive, but it may not be the most
effective use of limited security resources. Brydon says that a comprehensive
security assessment should be the
starting point for any business. It should
be carried out by a security professional;
someone trained to recognize potential
threat risks and security weak points. “A
business owner may be great at running a
manufacturing business, but that doesn’t
mean they’re going to be great at security.
Investing in professional advice in the
beginning can save a lot of money over
the long term.”
For a small business, investing in
up-to-date computer virus and backup
software and an alarm system may be
enough. There are three elements to a
good security system, elements that Brydon refers to as the Three E’s: education,
engineering and enforcement. Making
sure everyone sticks to the security plan
— the enforcement — can be the most
difficult part of that equation. “You can’t
have the employees following the security
policies and the management ignoring
them. It won’t work.”
WORKPLACE WELLNESS
SPECIAL FEATURE
Can’t stand to sit?
Include workplace wellness through movement
“We are built to move,” says Dannion
Smith, Director Ergonomic Initiatives —
Teknion Limited.
It’s a simple statement about the
human body with a surprisingly difficult
application while in the corporate office
landscape.
Today’s office worker needs to find a
way to embrace a work style that includes
wellness through movement in their daily
work activities or we will see a continued
downward trend toward risky lifestyle
choices.
Current research findings suggest:
1. Sitting is associated with an increased
risk of diabetes and heart disease.
2. When we sit, electrical activity in the
legs shuts down enzymes that break
down fat and calorie burning drops to
one per minute.
3. After two hours of sitting good cholesterol levels drop.
4. This sedentary behaviour increases
the risk of some forms of cancer and
blood clots, leading to health problems that include strokes and heart
attacks.
5. Reducing sitting to less than three
hours a day can increase life expectancy by two years.
Combatting this problem in the
workplace will not only protect employees but also pay economic benefits to
the employer in the form of improved
productivity and less health related
absenteeism.
Regular activity and ergonomic
solutions for workers are the main
preventative tools recommended to
employers. Active meetings, office laps,
BUSINESS VOICE
standing desks and simple exercises are
some of the options available to break up
a prolonged sitting routine.
Tim Duguay, Account Manager
for Ergoworks in Dartmouth, says that
business demand for standing desks has
increased considerably in recent months
as a result of the growing attention to this
important workplace health issue.
“Employers and employees alike are
looking for new alternatives. With negative pressures on productivity and health
insurance costs, companies are turning
to practical, cost-effective solutions.
Technology changes, work changes, your
body changes; shouldn’t your work space
be able to change too?”
For more information:
www.ergoworks.ca
33
SPECIAL FEATURE
WORKPLACE WELLNESS
Workplace wellness contagious
Positive health practices can encourage co-workers By Jane Doucet
Whether your business employs
1,000 people or a half-dozen, it’s obvious
that healthy employees are more productive than sick or stressed staff. Yet the
idea of a workplace-wellness program
remains a tough sell in many quarters.
Statistics from the recent Buffett National Wellness Survey reveal that despite
the sustained popularity of wellness-focused initiatives, few organizations are
taking an evidence-based approach to
assessing the impact of their initiatives,
or keeping track of how well the eventual
results match up with the anticipated
benefits. Only 21 per cent of respondents
indicated that they had measured the
health of their organization’s full-time
employees, with this proportion being
somewhat higher in Atlantic Canada (30
per cent) and in public-sector organizations (27 per cent).
Lydia Makrides, the founder and
CEO of Evexia and Tantallon, N.S.-based
Creative Wellness Solutions Inc. and the
Editor-in-Chief of the International Journal of Workplace Health Management, has
heard all of the arguments against.
“There’s a misconception that implementing a workplace wellness initiative is too costly for a small business,” she
says. “Many owners also say they don’t
have a human resources department, and
they don’t have time to organize and manage an initiative or program themselves.”
The good news is that they don’t
have to, thanks to online tools such as
Creative Wellness Solutions’s Evexia,
34
a multilingual global “wellness portal”
that integrates the delivery of health
risk assessments, customized wellness
interventions and challenges, expert
coaching, goal trackers, interactive
videos and live webinars through webbased platforms to employees anywhere,
anytime. “Evexia is self-managed by employees, and Creative Wellness Solutions
supports the model,” says Makrides. She
calculates that for a company with 50
employees, the approximate cost to the
business owner is a mere $2 per employee
per week. To put that into perspective,
workplace-wellness programs have proven to provide a return on investment of
between $3 and $6 for every $1 invested.
Evexia’s interactive meal planning,
cooking demonstrations, musculoskeletal-health anatomical videos and
exercise programs are unique components. Camaraderie and engagement
among employees are promoted through
social media, and regular reports provide
benchmark and performance data. This
fall Makrides plans to roll out the Great
Canadian Challenge – Nova Scotia, a
social media network where workplaces
compete against each other for better
health, whether it’s a challenge for
colleagues to quit smoking, lower blood
pressure or lose weight. “Social media
offers a ‘cheerleading’ community of
support,” she says. “Research has shown
that good health is contagious, and that
family, friends and coworkers may follow
someone else’s healthy behaviour.”
JULY & AUGUST 2014
As a small business owner with 25
employees, Makrides knows firsthand
the bottom-line impact of a healthy staff.
“If people are stressed, inactive, obese
and tired, they aren’t going to feel good
during or after their workday. If a small
team isn’t productive, it’s more detrimental to the company’s bottom line.
Everyone from the receptionist to the
CEO needs to be 100 per cent productive
in order to meet the demands of a small
business.”
The Buffett National Wellness Survey
found that work-related stress, mental
health, high blood pressure and smoking
continue to be identified as the top health
concerns affecting organizations. In Atlantic Canada, the top five organizational
health concerns are work-related stress,
high cholesterol, high blood pressure,
obesity and smoking.
The concern about work-related stress
presents an opportunity for organizations
to make a significant impact on employee
health with associated bottom-line outcomes. Stressed employees are more likely
to rate their health as poor, spend more
on prescription medications and drive up
absenteeism costs by up to 19 per cent,
disability costs by up to 30 per cent and
turnover costs by up to 40 per cent.
Other health issues include repetitive strain injuries in the neck, shoulders,
arms, hands, wrists, knees and lower
backs of employees who pack boxes, lift
heavy items, cut hair, massage people
or make products all week long. And research has deemed sitting all day at work
as “the new smoking” as it’s an unhealthy
trend. “You have to get up and move at
least every hour, even if it’s just to walk to
the washroom or the water cooler,” says
Makrides.
Regardless of a company’s size, it’s
the current and future employees who
will drive the demand for healthy workplaces, because the younger generation
is much more conscious of work-life
balance. Small business owners need to
begin implementing workplace wellness
now. “Start small and the long-term payoff is that your employees will be healthier, happier and more productive,” says
Makrides. “You’ll start seeing the benefits of your initiatives within a month.”
SPECIAL FEATURE
WORKPLACE WELLNESS
Corporate Wellness 2.0
Making social media a must-have component By Dr. Lydia Makrides
Connect your workplace
with fun team challenges
There is compelling evidence
demonstrating that corporate wellness
is the right thing to do for employees and
for the business bottom line. Despite this,
employers in Nova Scotia are still reluctant to invest in these programs.
Two reasons consistently given
include costs and employee participation.
It is well known that corporate wellness
brings a return on investment of at least
$3-$6 per dollar invested so that in essence,
wellness is cost-neutral paid out of savings.
The issue that needs to be addressed is
participation. Major employer surveys and
reports clearly state that social media is a
key emerging strategy that employers are
using to engage employees and reduce
health benefit costs. Social media is the
tool that links individuals in a social network to achieve a common purpose. Social
networking generates high participation
rates where employees are empowered to
engage each other. As research has shown,
good health is contagious. This means
that when individuals lose weight or quit
smoking, their friends and family are
more likely to do so as well. By creating a
social network in the workplace, employees come together and support each other
leveraging peer support.
This is why Corporate Wellness 2.0
social networking is the new frontier,
solidifying social media as a must-have
component. It is not hard to visualize the
success that social networking would
have in corporate wellness given how
often businesses and individuals use
Facebook and Twitter. That’s why
Corporate Wellness 2.0 is not only
about cholesterol and blood pressure but
also about how people feel about themselves, their workplace and their community and how they relate to each other.
With Evexia™, Creative Wellness
Solutions’ global wellness platform,
employees are able to create these kinds
of positive social networks through the
Unless Nova Scotia
companies begin to
realize the role their employees
play in their success and realize
that health goes hand-in-hand
with productivity, the provincial economy will continue to
struggle. This is particularly
relevant for small businesses,
which form the backbone of
the local economy.”
platform’s Community section. Employees can create their own challenges and
groups and recruit their coworkers, share
personal stories, post comments and
photos, compare notes and motivate each
other. The goal is to create camaraderie
and support around wellness in the workplace. Research has consistently shown
how support is crucial to making lifestyle
changes. Corporate wellness programs
need to harness this kind of peer mentorship and support so employees know they
are all working toward common goals.
This is just as important for smaller businesses as it is for large.
Another item that drives engagement is team challenges. Together, teams
can focus on specific wellness topics each
month, such as eating breakfast, getting
enough sleep, or more lengthy challenges
such as weight loss and physical activity.
Employees can virtually walk anywhere
in the world and see their team’s progress
on a map as well as get interesting facts
and tips along the way. Teams follow
their progress and compare with others
creating an atmosphere of friendly competition and camaraderie.
Interacting with health professional
coaches is another critical component
of Corporate Wellness 2.0. Through
Evexia™, employees interact with
health professional coaches, build their
own fitness programs and meal plans,
watch healthy cooking demonstrations,
get recommendations based on their
wellness interests and participate in
challenges from an extensive catalogue.
Champion companies are proud
to receive the designation of a “healthy
workplace”, creating a vibrant and productive work community. And this is the
recipe for business success. Unless Nova
Scotia companies begin to realize the
role their employees play in their success
and realize that health goes hand-inhand with productivity, the provincial
economy will continue to struggle. This
is particularly relevant for small businesses which form the backbone of the
local economy.
So, Corporate Wellness 2.0 is not
only about reducing costs but is also
about creating a workplace where employees are engaged and thriving. This is
the power of social networking and when
this happens your wellness program goes
viral and turns into a grassroots movement that spreads beyond the workplace
into the community and in turn strengthens the provincial economy.
Dr. Lydia Makrides, Founder and CEO Evexia | Creative Wellness Solutions Inc.
[email protected] | 902-820-3096 | www.evexia.ca
36
JULY & AUGUST 2014
MESSAGE FROM THE CHAIR AND VICE-CHAIR
Lower taxes grow our economy
Meaningful action necessary to move province forward
FRANCIS FARES
BOARD CHAIR
ROB BATHERSON
BOARD VICE-CHAIR
Last year the Halifax Chamber of Com-
merce board of directors approved a fiveyear strategic plan. The goal of our plan
is clear — to help increase the prosperity
of Halifax Chamber members by speaking out for changes that will see Halifax
become one of the top three economic
growth cities in Canada by 2018.
One of the ways we’ll achieve this
goal is by creating a positive business
environment. Board member Darren
Nantes is chairing a task force of Cham-
ber members whose job is to see that
we do everything possible to see a more
positive business environment in Halifax.
As business owner/operators, we
know that you can’t have a more positive
business environment — in Halifax and
across Nova Scotia — without lower taxes.
That’s the message your Halifax
Chamber delivered in May to Laurel Broten, a former Ontario Cabinet
minister who was appointed by Finance
and Treasury Board Minister Diana
Whalen to conduct a tax, regulatory and
fee review — a welcome promise made
by Premier Stephen McNeil in last fall’s
election, and a longstanding Chamber
request of successive governments.
Nova Scotia’s high tax story has been
told often, but until meaningful action
is taken, we need to remind ourselves
— and our governments — of this sad
reality:
Scotia is tied with Prince Edward
Nova
Island for the highest corporate income tax rates in the country;
Scotia has the most punitive
Nova
small business tax rate threshold;
Scotia has among the highest per Nova
sonal income tax rates in Canada; and
Nova Scotia has the highest sales tax in
Canada.
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38
With the heavy tax burden that Nova
Scotia businesses, families and individuals carry, is it any wonder our province
has been at the bottom of GDP growth
over the last 20 years?
Compare Nova Scotia’s situation
with what has happened in the rest of
Canada. The independent Parliamentary Budget Officer (www.pbo-dpg.gc.ca)
recently released a report showing that
federal tax relief from 2005 to 2013 has
JULY & AUGUST 2014
put more than $30 billion back into the
pockets of Canadian taxpayers. The
analysis showed that federal tax relief — in
terms of personal income tax and GST/
HST reductions — helped increase provincial tax revenues by $1.5 billion due primarily to increased consumer spending.
Unfortunately, Nova Scotia would have
lost some of the benefit of these federal
tax breaks with the increase to the HST
in 2010 from 13 per cent to 15 per cent.
Keep in mind that the Parliamentary Budget Officer’s analysis does not
account for corporate income tax relief,
so the full benefit of lower taxes at the
federal level is likely higher. Considering Canada’s strong economic performance in the face of the global economic
meltdown of 2008-2009, it’s hard not to
conclude that lower taxes haven’t played
an important part in our resilience as a
country.
As the One Nova Scotia Commission
led by Ray Ivany challenged us earlier
this year, it’s time for some “game changers” to jumpstart our economy.
Here are some game changers your
Halifax Chamber recently advanced to
the provincial tax, regulatory and fee
review:
the difficult, but necessary,
Make
spending reductions to balance the
budget for 2015-2016 (two years ahead
of the government’s current schedule)
and beyond;
the budget is balanced, commit
Once
to broad based tax relief, starting with
personal and corporate income taxes;
modernizing of the regulatory and
Any
fee system must not add to the costs
faced by businesses (or the individuals
who are customers of those businesses).
On your behalf, the Halifax Chamber of Commerce will support any government that is prepared to reduce the
tax burden, while being fiscally responsible, no matter how tough the spending
decisions are. Some ask how we can
afford to lower taxes? Based on the Nova
Scotia reality of sky-high taxes and in
the basement economic growth, the real
question we should be asking is: how can
we afford not to lower taxes?