October 29th, 2021

In the spirit of transparency and candour, Kevin and Jill publish weeknotes reflecting on the what and why for their team.

Kevin's notes

Like a phoenix from the ashes, or something of the like; I'm back after my 3-week academic sabbatical, with much thanks to Jill for holding things down in my absence. It was an intense time, with two courses finishing up the bulk of my master's coursework (I will return for a victory lap residency in fall' 22). I was immersed in two seminars: Reconciliation and Regenerative Innovation and Governance Innovations for Sustainability. The residency format at RRU is team-centric, meaning lots of collaboration outside the structured hours. It's long days and competing priorities but a hugely enriching process. Time, space, and resources for further education is no small privilege, and I'm grateful for the opportunity. But now, back to work!

It was a packed [short] week of speeding up on all our varying initiatives. While three weeks away is a long stretch, it feels like it was during a time of relative sustainable stability, as much as you can find in the transformation game at least. Shoutout to everyone who carried the weight during my absence. It's a gift not to have an inbox on fire and projects in a good state upon return — the mark of a strong culture in which everyone takes accountability and is bought into the mission.

I started by attending the new Parks' team of teams' thrice-weekly standup, hearing the latest on the parallel/interconnected transformation work in flight at the org. The cadence is impressive — a full suite of complex impact projects rocking and rolling. While my role will be lesser involved than previous, I'm glad for the opportunity to continue contributing to these important puzzle pieces, driving towards a vastly improved service experience for the public with BC Parks for 2022. More on the details of all this in weeks to come.

Also, that same day I shared lunch with a gaggle of Parks folk. In real life! So nice to yarn over a meal. The synergy of time spent together in the physical world is not to be discounted. The office matters when it facilitates human connection — meetings are meetings, but the substance of casual serendipity shouldn’t be underestimated.

Wednesday, I attended a presentation from our Ministry Indigenous relations/reconciliation community of practice, learning of MIR/Parks' long relationship-building process with the Pacheedaht regarding land management in and around Juan de Fuca Provincial Park. How we as a colonial institution evolve our engagement (read: reconciliation) practices with Indigenous peoples is of keen interest to me, even though I experience very little of the direct 'work' in my role. But reconciliation is everyone's responsibility, and we need to think of the meta-practice which informs the fabric of our work. How is our everyday contributing to better futures for the Canadian idea? How might my intentions ripple across the organization, producing better outcomes for all? Glad for this COP and to learn from my colleagues.

Thursday, I attended a leadership panel on Diversity and Inclusion practice in the Natural Resource Ministries. Interconnected with our reconciliation practice, leadership-by-example D&I structuralization in both HR and project practices is a great thing to see on the rise. Big props to our ADM, James Mack, for speaking to recent work in our Ministry, which models good practice. It's due time for Gender-Based Analysis Plus (GBA+) to be the non-negotiable foundation of project work that it's intended to be. Too often, in the name of time and budget, we do not do our due diligence in applying GBA+ rigour to our recommendations. Love to see senior leadership as champions — this is how culture is crystallized.

Also Thursday, I met with GDX Service Design leadership to discuss how to conduct public user research on sensitive/confidential programs/services. There's precedent for this during the Covid era, and per always, I'm keen to replicate processes from across gov rather than reinvent the wheel. Public admission: I've leaned on GDX a lot since I've been back in gov. But I want to see our corporate services, often vanguard, become standard practice out in ministryland. Looping me in enables the rest of my ministry (possibly even sector) to leverage this precedent and move with greater velocity. Recent examples of this include PIA content, online consent forms, recruitment materials and logistics, research incentives, etc. This can be complex stuff to push through the bureaucracy and rarely does that pace align with your project. So big thanks Meg/Kelsey/team for the time spent in communication for me — the value amplifies once I'm armed with processes and templates to scale outward.

Friday, I caught up with the designers working on a discover scope for the Environmental Protection Division. It's been a process of goal re/definition and scoping down the work to achievable and impactful outcomes. Glad to have Disco on board for this work, with a division relatively new to designerly ways of learning/doing — experience counts when it comes to socializing the practice in the public sector.

Finally, we briefed our Deputy and the ADMs on the Service Transformation Branch's progress over the ~7 months we've been a unit. We've learned a lot in that time, delivering results, overcoming challenges, and figuring out the best ways to provide both short and long value as a nimble and experienced team. Our retro and vision were well received, and we feel validated in our approaches. Exciting work on the near horizon and so much to lean into across the sector. I'll be honest — this is pretty much my dream gig. And to work with Jill (and Sam and Harry!) is what makes it so special, to genuinely enjoy to company and candour of your colleagues, and to be able to count on support and encouragement that goes beyond just the work. Grateful, energized, inspired, and resolute — onward!

It basically didn't stop raining this week. Good thing the otter — I mean dog — loves a wet run in the forest as much as mum and dad.

Jill's notes

This week, a short set from me: it was a busy one filled with a lot of outside-of-work craziness. Grateful to have Kevin back! Here is the weekly run down all of which is either a knock-on to work we've talked about or will warrant a longer post down the road.

Environmental protection division

• The EPD concept case team is starting to form up. We've partnered with IIT's architecture team for some focused effort on the overall current state understanding of systems and identifying opportunities to apply common components and simplify.
• Michelle Douville, Dylan Hemsworth (Vivid) and the team met to pen a plan for the soil relocation from a public database. This one has been swirling a bit and causing a bit of frustration. It's a great reminder of two things for me: 1) building a tech solution while building policy and legislation is hard, and, 2) mature multi-disciplinary digital hybrid teams able to stitch these things together on demand would sure be nice.
• Kevin Netherington is continuing his deep dive on SITE & CATS, two legacy systems that will need an interim move off the BC Online tool being retired in the summer. He's got some great ideas and is in flight with some scripts to remove our dependencies and buy us time to more deeply understand the needs of users and staff.
• We scheduled two new EPD-focused half-day digital era leadership courses, really focused on why, competencies, and sharing lessons from across government. This builds on our digital strategy work in an attempt to listen to our users (aka live what we preach) and better define "what's in it for them."

Climate Action Secretariat

• As we grow our skillset and confidence we are looking to expand our support and lean into a new division more fully. This again is a great opportunity to live in the 'strategy is delivery' space with a motivated and high-performing group of staff, engaged ED's and a supportive ADM.
• I met with Jeremy Hewitt on Friday, before he heads to COP26 next week with the Minister. Lots to do on this front but I'm looking forward to learning more about CleanBC and how we can build on the great work that has been done across government to improve awareness.

The rest

• A good update with the DM on BC Parks work. I'm really excited to continue supporting the team and in particular the three incredible leaders in Jess, Leah, and Lisa. They are learning and growing and driving every day. It's certainly the high-powered future of leadership in the public service.
• As Kevin mentioned, great update to our executive leadership and lots of validation, recognition and reassurance that our experiment in service transformation capacity has more than proven its value.

Finally, a couple of quotes that stood out from a podcast rumon dropped in the learning channel this week — Brené Brown and Liz Wiseman on Impact Players.

“No one wants to be managed, they want to be led”

What behaviours do I engage in to stay being managed?

1. Take ownership but don't necessarily follow-through
2. Do your part but don't look at the bigger picture
3. Carry your weight on a team, but don't necessarily look for opportunities to help
4. Wait to be asked to do something before doing it
5. Identify problems but don't bring solutions

“Recognizing, this is not my job, but it’s the job that needs to be done”

As a manager, what is it that people do that you love?

1. Do things without being asked
2. Anticipate problems, have a plan
3. Help your teammates (be a deputy for me) — impact players get deputized
4. Do a little extra

What do people do that you really hate?

1. Give problems without a solution (I have some nuances to this but that is for another time).
2. Wait for them to tell you what to do
3. Make them chase you down and remind you
4. Send long meandering emails

“Problems don’t come neatly packaged for a department or person”

I was going to edit those down but they are too good to touch. Check out the full podcast for the details and many more examples. It was well worth the time.