by Barbara King, Executive Director
I can honestly say I LOVE My job. How many people can say that about where they work? We have such a great team and workplace atmosphere here at Watersheds Canada… I wake up excited for my day. We actually have it backwards in the office and call it “Happy Monday” because we are all together and “Grumpy Friday” because we know we will miss our team and the great times we have together as we leave for the weekend. Now, don’t get me wrong, we actually DO work in between laughs. We are also like any non-profit organization – we have more work than we can handle on a given day.
Over the past year, we have been fortunate enough to receive a grant from MEC to spend the time to take a step back and really look at our organization for who we are, who we want to be and where we are going. This time has been so enlightening for our staff and board. We have taken the time to ask the hard questions, such as WHY do we do the work we do? Have you ever been asked WHY you do the work you do? We all know “how” and “what” we do, but to articulate to the story of WHY has been our recent challenge.
Through this process, we have all reached down to the core of who we are, why we work at Watersheds Canada and why our organization does the work it does. We have read from experts such as Simon Sinek, participated in storytelling workshops and found the best advice from people with great stories. When we asked the people we work with outside of our organization why they work with us and what they like about us, it wasn’t always straightforward. They said it was much more than our good work ethic; in fact, one of the things that stood out was how we treated people and the relationships we built. We even heard many stories of people liking to work with us because we are a lot of fun. (Now that gets back to the singing and laughter in the office I think.) The point is that we do our best when we have no pretenses about who we are or should be, and when we are honest, giving and genuine. That goes for everything we do in life.
What I have learned through all of this is that we are all just people and everyone responds to honest stories, whether we work in government, community organizations or industry. The way we communicate our work needs to change in order to inspire people to take action. I am inspired by people’s stories; I listen when I am told a great one. I do not respond well to being told what to do and how to do it (just ask my family!), but I will respond to a great WHY story from someone who genuinely cares about me and my beliefs. https://watersheds.ca/why-do-we-do-the-work-we-do/So our challenge at Watersheds Canada is to tell the story of our work in a way that makes people care and respond, and to continue to be honest and caring and to always do our best. Thank you for following our story so far – we have so much more to share with you!