About Natural Pod

Natural Pod is a learning solutions company, based within the traditional and unceded territories of the indigenous peoples of the area known by its settler name British Columbia, Canada. Our aim is for every student to learn and play in beautifully designed, healthy, durable and inspiring learning environments created from sustainable materials.

Our commitment to challenging the status quo of fast furniture and investing in sustainable materials and practices is fundamental to our support of children, community and planet. With every thoughtfully designed learning space created by Natural Pod’s deeply committed team, our global communities are moved closer toward education that nourishes not only the students and teachers, but also the local communities they are part of, and the global community of humanity that needs defenders and advocates of the natural world for generations to come.

An Engine for Purposeful Growth: Break Out of Normal Questioning Patterns
Limia Shunia & Jason Stanteford | Gensler

New approaches to questioning can spark new awareness of what is working and what is not. Changing how a question is asked could be the key to getting at the valuable information we look for, especially what's effective for our companies and industries.

Examining where we find ourselves is an essential task as we build preferable futures together and seek growth. Sometimes teams and companies get stuck finding ways to do so. Schedules, orthodoxies, or other obstacles prevent valuable insights from becoming visible that could advance your company's services, approaches, and offerings.

This workshop will use an approach that helps us ask differently what is working and what is not. In an easy, effective, and fun way, we will be able to identify pain points, rewards, and successes and even tap into drivers of behavior. We will use these insights to build tactics for getting to the desired shift you'd like to see. The goal is to leave you with increased clarity and generate new momentum in a relatively short time.

Unit Economics and Due Diligence Essentials
Bill Stoddart | 45 North Partners

This workshop will focus on some of the key elements of creating a financial blueprint for your business and developing a financial story for prospective funders. We will share some sample spreadsheets and will also provide an overview of due diligence considerations that business owners should be prepared to discuss.

Where Play Meets Purpose
Gagan Levy | Guru

As kids, we don’t know anything but play. The world is a game—a stage for make believe with an audience of fellow kids and adults who don’t have a choice but to play with us. Then we become adults with responsibilities and mondays and TGIF's and can't wait till the weekends. The majority of our week hijacked by that 4 letter word...work. What if I told you that this is a myth and that it's not only possible for your team to love their respective j-o-b, but that in that love, in that purpose they will also reach new heights of their individual and collective potential. Turns out that the panacea for brand movement building from the inside out is right at the nexus of purpose and play. In this PLAYshop, we will not only explore the purpose of play, but also how it's possible to play with purpose.

Shine Bright: The Art & Science of Heart-Centered Branding
Ivellisse Morales | Bombilla

Branding is more than just a logo, a flashy marketing campaign or slick graphic design. Branding, primarily, is about feelings, meaning-making and relationship-building. Great branding is memorable.

Your favorite brands make you feel. Feelings come from the heart. Think about the feeling you get unpacking a box from your favorite brand or the warm welcome by a friendly face at your favorite local restaurant. You feel love, acknowledgement, cared for, listened to, special, belonging. You feel great and because you feel great, your brain makes a positive association. This positive association helps build brand loyalty and lays the groundwork for customer satisfaction and success.

This is why branding is both an art and a science. It’s the intersection of data, design and delight. Data is needed to stay customer-centric, strategic and results-oriented. Design is needed to explore and experiment with the number of strategies and tactics to make a positive impression. Delight is the human and heart-centeredness in it all.

In this workshop, you will gain a deeper understanding of the art and science of heart-centered branding. We will explore how psychology, neuroscience, data and art all interplay as we intentionally build and manage brands. You will walk away with practical ways to start infusing more meaning into how you treat your staff, customers, vendors and community.

About nawalakw

Nawalakw is a social venture in the Kwakwaka̱’wa̱kw Territory of the Great Bear Rainforest of British Columbia. They are an ecotourism and wellness destination providing programming and provide local employment for surrounding Indigenous communities, as well as language revitalization and healing.

About Fresh Prep

Fresh Prep's mission is to deliver convenient and sustainable solutions to everyday food challenges. As a Certified B Corporation, it’s our responsibility to design a meal kit that is not only convenient for our customers, but also positively impacts the local community and environment.

We provide meals, snacks and sides to cook in homes across BC and Alberta that are delivered in reusable cooler bags rather than cardboard boxes, recyclable soft plastics, and with many of our kits packaged in our reusable meal kit container – the Fresh Prep Zero Waste Kit – we are Canada's most sustainable meal kit.

Fresh Prep was recognized as one of BC’s Top Employers in 2022 for its forward-thinking policies that enables employees to innovate and nurture the future, and ranked #38 in the Globe and Mail’s 2021 Canada's Top Growing Companies List.

Business: ReGen Impact Media
Presenter: Charlene SanJenko

Business: Frontline Doulas
Presenter: Khefri Riley

Business: Ondine Oceanfarm
Presenter: Bretton Hills

Leading Through Your Core Values
Chloe Gow-Jarrett | 3Fold Partners

Our personal core values shape our standards of behaviour. They are formed by our life experiences and are further crystallized by a variety of influences like family and culture. When our core values are clear, we can make choices grounded in what we care about most. When our core values are not clearly identified, we often have confusing and sometimes unproductive responses to situations that conflict with these unconscious values.

Leaders tend to be most effective and fulfilled when their outward actions are congruent with their inner values.

Join Chloe Gow-Jarrett for an interactive and reflective workshop where you will uncover your core values and define what they look like in action, in both your life and your leadership. Together we will move through a process that allows you to gain clarity about where you are currently honouring your values and where you have opportunities to make choices that are best aligned with the things you value most.

Returning to our Houses of Magic: Community as Capital Center
Aliko Weste | U Productions

Agile Strategy for the Social Venture
Mike Rowlands | Junxion Strategy

How do you translate ideas into impact? How do you hold to your values, while competition and opportunities try to push you off course? And how do you decide what's most important now—compared to what you thought was important during your last planning retreat?

Today, effective strategy integrates culture and brand, embraces the change that's all around us, and is captured in a living document that empowers leaders through change, growth, and organizational development.

In this session Mike Rowlands will share insights into Junxion's Turning Point™ approach, which blends Agile methodologies, Appreciative Inquiry, stakeholder engagement and systems thinking in an integrated model that's been implemented by many SVI alumni in their ventures—and a long list of visionary, social purpose organizations.

Simple Sales Strategy for Impact Entrepreneurs
Shannon Ward | Genus Capital

Inspiring your target market to take action is the key to your business having the impact you envision on the world.

Sales is essential, but struggle is optional.

This workshop will give you a framework and the knowledge you need to build a simple, effective sales plan for your business so you know who to approach, how to approach them, and what to say when you're in front of them! You'll also learn key psychological tips to help yourself stay motivated to take action when it comes to sales.