Date: September 2, 1-2 PM ET
Cost: Free (Zoom Webinar)
*Please note, all registrants will be provided with a link to the recording and presentation slides following the sessions. The recording will be available for 60 days.
Join Nature Canada for a conversation on employment equity, inclusive hiring, and the importance of creating pathways for underrepresented communities in the NGO sector.
This webinar will share lessons from Nature Canada's recent experience responding to a complaint before the Quebec Human Rights Commission regarding our Work to Grow employment equity program. The Commission ultimately determined there were no grounds for a finding of discrimination, providing an important real-world example of how employment equity programs can be supported within Canada's human rights framework.
You will be introduced to Nature Canada’s Employment Equity Toolkit, a practical resource designed to support organizations in developing more equitable hiring practices. We will also discuss key lessons about employment equity programs, address common misconceptions about preferential hiring, and share how organizations can move from good intentions to meaningful action.
Our Presenters
Emily McMillan is the Executive Director of Nature Canada, where she leads the organization's mission to discover, defend, and restore nature. Since joining Nature Canada in 2019, Emily has brought more than 20 years of experience in environmental conservation, advocacy, and campaigning. Prior to her current role, she served as a senior political campaigner and was Director of the Sierra Club of Canada’s Atlantic Canada Chapter.
Andrew Cleland is a civil litigator at Delangie Cleland Limoges s.e.n.c. with over 12 years of experience assisting individuals, communities, and civil society groups with complex legal issues. He has worked with non-profits on strategic advocacy, awareness-raising, and legislative reform in the areas of human rights, employment equity, corporate accountability, and climate change. Andrew previously worked for the Permanent Mission of Canada to the UN Human Rights Council and the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights.
Hannah Dean is the Organizing Director at Nature Canada. With over a decade of experience in grassroots organizing, coalition-building, and campaign strategy, she has played a key role in mobilizing communities across the country to protect and restore nature. She is passionate about empowering local advocates, designing effective lobbying initiatives, and ensuring that nature remains a top priority for decision-makers. Originally from Ottawa, Hannah has lived and worked in Sweden, Ecuador, and western Canada, gaining a global perspective on environmental issues.
The DEFNP workshop series will offer tailored programming designed to match ENGOs on their decolonial (un)learning journeys. In Spring 2026 members of the ENGO sector will be able to choose one of three workshop tracks: Introduction to Decolonization in the ENGO Sector, Advanced Decolonial Theory and Application or For Indigenous Ears Only - A Space for Reflection and Action. Each series consists of four three-hour sessions.
Collectively, Decolonizing ENGO-First Nation Partnerships fosters:
Awareness of settler colonialism and the ways it potentially harnesses civil society;
Understanding about how Canadian law such as the Indian Act and the Income Tax Act has suppressed Indigenous governance systems;
Awareness that Indigenous peoples have unique inherent political and legal systems, with which ENGOs may want to form partnerships;
A better understanding about how to navigate partnerships with Indigenous communities that promote decolonial environmentalism;
A stronger sense about how to identify and explain individual and organization social locations (i.e. positionalities) as part of ethical partnership development;
Promoting the resurgence of Indigenous self-determination in the Canadian ENGO sector.
Cost: $100 (Register 2 spots, get the 3rd free)
70 participants max.
All registrants will be provided with a link to access the recordings and presentation slides for 60 days following each session.
Session 1: Settler Colonialism 101
Introduce ENGO representatives to the fact that colonization is a structure and not an event. Identifies key ways that colonialism moves through individuals and organizations.
Session 2: Positionality
ENGO representatives learn how to articulate their social location within a settler colonial state, and in relation to potential Indigenous partners.
Session 3: Inherent Indigenous Governance 101
Introduce the fact that Indigenous nations have their own sources of political authority that they can (and do) draw on when addressing environmental issues. Examples provided.
Session 4: Building Better Relations
ENGO representatives will road test ways they can implement previous workshop key points to re-imagine partnerships with Indigenous nations.
Cost: $100 (Register 2 spots, get the 3rd free)
All registrants will be provided with a link to access the recordings and presentation slides for 60 days following each session.
Session 1: Diagnosing Settler Colonialism in the Enviro Sector
Participants will be asked to share ways in which they have diagnosed and traced power in social justice movements and/or in the ENGO sector. This workshop will make space for discomfort as part of promoting decolonization.
Session 2: Inherent Indigenous Governance
A mix of advanced and introductory theory, this workshop delves into legal and political pluralism, naming the fact that Indigenous nations have their own sources of political authority that they can (and do) draw on when addressing environmental issues.
Session 3: The Nonprofit Industrial Complex
ENGO participants are introduced to theories and examples describing the Nonprofit Industrial Complex and the “Shadow State.” Purpose is to show how settler colonialism structures civil society.
Session 4: Decolonizing ENGO-First Nation Partnerships
This workshop delves deep into how ENGOs can partner with Indigenous nations beyond the Nonprofit Industrial Complex while promoting deference to inherent Indigenous political leaders.
Cost: Free
The Indigenous only space will be collaborative in nature but critical in approach. This track is a space for Indigenous folks within the ENGO sector to come together to discuss their experiences and work, with an eye to taking a position on what the sector might need to do in order to promote decolonization. Participants will use the first session to define our goals for the remaining three meetings. Therefore, session topics named here are proposals only.
Session 1: Naming the Cannibal: Settler Colonialism in the ENGO Sector
Session 2: Proposed topic: Reflections on working in the ENGO Sector
Session 3: Proposed topic: Centering Indigenous Thought in the ENGO Sector
Session 4: Proposed topic: Visioning a Decolonial Environmental Sector
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