Organizational Review

Dear Craft Nova Scotia Members,

Throughout this past year Craft Nova Scotia has embarked on a comprehensive organizational review. This review was designed to assist us in preparing for the future, by reflecting on past practices, and listening to the community, and exploring leading practices in the community and beyond, and carefully considering the current environment.

This review was designed to assist us in preparing for the future, by reflecting on past practices, carefully considering the current environment, and exploring leading practices in our community and beyond.

Craft Nova Scotia engaged a third-party consultancy, Strategic Moves, to facilitate the research and community engagement process.  

This process included a review of our organizational structures, governance and programming to identify and reduce systemic barriers to the full and equitable participation of craft makers from across Nova Scotia’s diverse communities.

Strategic Moves also identified some of the external trends, challenges and opportunities, including how the arts sector at large is working toward recovery and resiliency, the digital transformation of society and trends in retail.

We engaged Members and the public throughout the process through online surveys, community information sessions, as well as a number of focused discussions.

We felt it very important to ensure that members were actively engaged in the process and as a result formed a Planning Group consisting of 10 community members, our Board of Directors and Staff. The Planning Group was actively involved in sharing concerns and suggestions for improvement and helping to review and shape the recommendations to be included within the report.

Craft Nova Scotia is pleased to share a copy of the Organizational and Program Review Findings and Recommendations for your information.

The Board of Directors has reviewed the report and there is general agreement in principle with the recommendations.

You will be pleased to note that we have already taken steps to address some of the recommendations identified within the report, such as updating the organizational bylaws (to be presented at the AGM on September 15^th, 2022), and hosting respectful workplace and anti- oppression training with our board and staff teams, as well as some community information sessions.

The recommendations identified in the report will inform our planning as an organization, as we move forward with the development of a 3-5 year Strategic Plan for Craft Nova Scotia. It is important to note that some of the recommendations may take some time to fully achieve due to our limited financial resources and staffing capacity.

Please forward any questions you might have through the link below and we will be happy to follow-up with you
https://www.cognitoforms.com/CraftNovaScotia/CraftNovaScotiaReviewQuestions

Sincerely,

Deborah Wheeler
President, Board of Directors                                

Kelly Jerrott
Executive Director

Background information About Strategic Moves

Strategic Moves, founded by Inga Petri in Ottawa in 2007, is now located in Whitehorse, Yukon on the Traditional Territories of the Ta’an Kwäch’än Council and Kwanlin Dün First Nation. These are self-governing nations that negotiated modern treaties (2002; 2005) under the Umbrella Final Agreement between the 14 Yukon First Nations and the Governments of Canada and Yukon. 

Strategic Moves operates at the crossroads of research, strategy and marketing. Their success in working with organizations in the public and private sectors, is the result of designing highly dynamic, collaborative approaches that guarantee the purposeful, ongoing participation of clients and stakeholders backed by data-driven research and analysis. Since 2007 they have gained a national reputation through large-scale national studies, and major research and strategy assignments at the national, provincial/territorial and regional levels. Strategic Moves maintains a strong focus on the arts and cultural sectors in every province and territory in Canada, including in Nova Scotia and the Atlantic Region.

Past Organizational Review communications can be viewed here.