Diversity, Equity and Inclusion

LearnSphere was honoured to have received an Employers of Diversity award from Atlantic Business Magazine. Their inaugural award winners were announced in July 2022.

LearnSphere’s staff is 100% female with a gender diverse board. They offer programming designed to support businesses led by Indigenous people, women, LGBTQ2S+, newcomers to Canada, and members of official language minority communities, among other under-represented groups. ~ Atlantic Business Magazine

DEI at LearnSphere

LearnSphere exists to help organizations prosper, building their capacity with relevant skills, knowledge and tools.

We are committed to diversity, equity and inclusion in all facets of our work. We recognize that businesses and non-profits flourish when they embrace varying perspectives and experiences. We also recognize that economies and communities are strengthened when all people are enabled and empowered to start and run successful organizations.

We are proud to offer programming designed to support businesses led by Indigenous peoples, women, LGBTQ2S+, newcomers to Canada, and members of official language minority communities, among other under-represented groups.

We have developed numerous programs focusing on equity deserving groups such as:

  • Direct support for women entrepreneurs since 2000 through our business management capacity development program, ProfitLearn
  • Supporting the success of women and girls through vocational and technical training in Cameroon
  • Building capacity in New Brunswick’s Immigrant Serving Agencies to more effectively serve newcomers and measure their results
  • Increasing awareness and education around workspace sexual harassment with a focus on LGBTQ2S+

Want to know more?  Here are some examples …

Prof­itLearn and Train­ing for the Non-Prof­it Sec­tor (TNPS)

Build­ing capac­i­ty of busi­ness­es and non-prof­its among equi­ty-deserv­ing groups 

Prof­itLearn and TNPS deliv­er capac­i­ty devel­op­ment for small and medi­um size enter­pris­es and non-prof­its. While the pro­grams them­selves are designed to meet the needs of all small and medi­um sized enter­pris­es or non-prof­its, we fre­quent­ly work with part­ners to deliv­er these two pro­grams to meet the learn­ing needs with­in spe­cif­ic equi­ty-deserv­ing groups. For exam­ple, we have deliv­ered busi­ness skills train­ing for women entre­pre­neurs in part­ner­ship with Women in Busi­ness NB and busi­ness start-up incu­ba­tors / accel­er­a­tors for Indige­nous entre­pre­neurs in part­ner­ship with the Joint Eco­nom­ic Devel­op­ment Ini­tia­tive (JEDI).

Women on Boards Work­shop Series

Empow­er­ing women to become effec­tive board members 

With the goal of increas­ing the lev­el of women’s par­tic­i­pa­tion in both for-prof­it and non-prof­it boards, Learn­Sphere offered a work­shop series in part­ner­ship with the New Brunswick Asso­ci­a­tion of CBD­Cs, and the Women’s Equal­i­ty Branch of the New Brunswick government. 

Designed by women for women, and facil­i­tat­ed by three of LearnSphere’s female asso­ciates with exten­sive exper­tise and first-hand expe­ri­ence on boards, the series offered rel­e­vant con­tent and prac­ti­cal tools over a span of three years. 

A total of 428 par­tic­i­pants took part in 25 offer­ings of the work­shops to learn the fun­da­men­tals of what to know about join­ing a board, what is expect­ed once you become a board mem­ber, and how serv­ing can pos­i­tive­ly impact a women’s career and com­mu­ni­ty. Fund­ing was pro­vid­ed by the Atlantic Cana­da Oppor­tu­ni­ties Agency (ACOA) and the Province of New Brunswick through the Train­ing for the Non-Prof­it Sec­tor Program. 

Accent™ Pro­gram

Sup­port­ing access to ser­vices among offi­cial lan­guage minor­i­ty com­mu­ni­ties

Work­ing with ACOA NB, we devel­oped inno­v­a­tive train­ing aimed at help­ing small and medi­um sized busi­ness­es in NB under­stand the ben­e­fits of serv­ing their cus­tomers in both offi­cial lan­guages. Dur­ing deliv­ery of this pro­gram in 2011 – 2013 we helped busi­ness­es under­stand the ben­e­fits of active offer. We also pro­vid­ed tools and resources, mak­ing it eas­i­er for SMEs to meet the needs of the minor­i­ty lan­guage com­mu­ni­ty in their region. 

In 2017 – 2018 we deliv­ered sim­i­lar pro­gram­ming for Employ­ment Cen­tres across NS, to help ensure that all Nova Sco­tians have access to employ­ment sup­port, in the offi­cial lan­guage of their choice. 

We have fur­ther tai­lored the pro­gram, and are cur­rent­ly offer­ing it to over 700 man­agers in the Hori­zon Health Net­work (2021−2023). This most recent ver­sion of the pro­gram will help ensure that all patients can access their health care ser­vices in the offi­cial lan­guage of their choice. 

Sup­ply Chain 1−2−3

Sup­port­ing SMEs from equi­ty-deserv­ing groups to sell into com­plex sup­ply chains 

Designed to help SMEs learn how to sell into large, com­plex sup­ply chains, our high­ly reviewed Sup­ply Chain 1−2−3 pro­gram is aimed at growth-ori­ent­ed small and medi­um enter­pris­es (SMEs).

Through class­room learn­ing and one-on-one coach­ing, it gives busi­ness­es the skills and tools to become a trust­ed sup­pli­er in a spe­cif­ic sec­tor. Each pro­gram clos­es with the pop­u­lar ​“Meet the Buy­er” event, where par­tic­i­pants meet first-hand with buy­ers with­in the sector.

The pro­gram received high praise from ini­tial par­tic­i­pants in British Colum­bia, Que­bec and the four Atlantic provinces.

In ear­ly March 2020, LearnSphere’s ener­gy sec­tor experts deliv­ered the pro­gram in St. John’s NL, for Indige­nous SMEs and First Nations in the Atlantic region, and saw 15 Indige­nous busi­ness­es and orga­ni­za­tions participate. 

In 2022 to 2025 the pro­gram is expand­ing to all parts of Cana­da, includ­ing the ter­ri­to­ries. Addi­tion­al con­tent and new sec­tors will be intro­duced under the expan­sion, and Learn­Sphere will focus on increas­ing par­tic­i­pa­tion among busi­ness­es led by equi­ty deserv­ing groups includ­ing women, Indige­nous peo­ple, new­com­ers, among others.

At a glance...