Following the publication of Quebec's Sustainable Development Strategy, ministries and organizations are required to draw up and submit their Sustainable Development Action Plans (SDAPs). Ellio et ma petite boîte verte will pass on 7 strategic tips to ensure the success of your approach and meet the Quebec government's expectations.
With the publication of the Government Sustainable Development Strategy 2023-2028, the Ministère de l'Environnement, de la Lutte contre les changements climatiques, de la Faune et des Parcs is inviting all provincial ministries and organizations to draw up and submit a Sustainable Development Action Plan, commonly known as a SDAP , by September1, 2023. Your plan will need to define your organization's ambitions and also meet the Quebec government 's expectations on a number of topics, including sustainable mobility, GHG reduction, environmental performance of buildings, diversity and inclusion, sustainability analysis, etc. Since we've had the opportunity to support a number of organizations, including ministries and agencies, in the development and implementation of their PADDs, we thought it would be a good idea to share some of the lessons we've learned and recommendations we've made to ensure that your plan has real impact and reflects your ambitions.
Define your plan as the roadmap without which your activities would perform less well, socially, environmentally and in terms of governance. Each of your actions must be perfectly integrated into your departmental plans, otherwise your SDAP will be perceived as a piece of extra work, a tool whose content is steered by your SD manager but does not belong to them. Rather than being an operational plan, constituting a sub-point of your corporate strategy, it is intended to describe how your mission and vision will be achieved, to define the guiding principles that will frame the conduct of your operations, and to bring together the actions that will be implemented by each of the organization's divisions (e.g. procurement, HR, IT, etc.). The statements (vision, strategic axes and objectives) should be formulated in such a way as to inspire your teams, not be carbon copies of the government's Sustainable Development Strategy statements, which in any case do not apply as such to your activity.
The working committee set up to draw up the plan must be made up of representatives and decision-makers from your department or agency. As this is a strategic phase, it requires close collaboration with management. We recommend that the working committee include one or more members of the Executive Committee, including a committed sponsor. Reflection sessions, and not just presentation sessions, with the Management Committee are necessary to ensure that your Sustainable Development Action Plan is a strategic, cross-functional document, and to avoid it being perceived as a purely operational document for compliance with Quebec government requirements.
A few interviews with your key partners, whether they be your employees, suppliers, your lead ministry, a content partner, users of your services, unions, etc., are very useful for understanding their expectations, concerns and above all assessing how you can collaborate with them in implementing your Sustainable Development Plan. This will give you the legitimacy to make commitments and choose your areas of work. Stakeholders will be easier to mobilize when it comes to implementation, and more proactive when it comes to innovation.
You don't always have to assume all the costs and responsibilities of your PADD initiatives. In some cases, making a location available to one or more partners - by transforming it into a third-party space, for example - can enable you to let innovation emerge without you having to develop skills internally or invest the entire budget for the project. For example, premises to be refurbished can be transformed and occupied by a start-up incubator, a social innovation laboratory, an artists' group, etc.
Sustainable business models, green jobs, sustainability analysis and responsible purchasing are new objectives defined by the Quebec Sustainable Development Strategy. How to make sure you're meeting them: an excellent way to find out what other organizations you admire or that are similar to you are doing is to monitor their priorities and the actions they've put in place. Nothing is more enlightening than a direct conversation with the person in charge, or even a conference to present their approach to your entire working committee. Quebec is full of experts who can give you a basic grounding in the subjects that are relevant to you, whether in sustainable development, sustainable mobility, energy efficiency, impact measurement, responsible procurement, responsible events, etc. We also suggest that you always include in your Plan an initial skills development phase for the teams responsible for the actions, when launching a project on these more technical subjects (e.g.: training on life cycle analysis before choosing a floor covering or equipment that seems more eco-efficient in the short term).
Quebec's Sustainable Development Strategy aims to create an exemplary state that promotes innovation. Innovation requires an open and inquisitive attitude, a willingness to take risks and step out of one's comfort zone. As you develop your plan, you may find it relevant to consult with teams, prototype ideas with certain partners, make links with other internal projects, test a new technology, and so on. Seize these opportunities with openness, as they will amplify the impact of your plan and its chances of success. Innovation and collaboration can help solve existing problems and improve the way we do things. By encouraging innovation, we can build a brighter, more prosperous future for Quebec.
When projects can't be precisely identified within the timeframe of your PADD, the opportunity analysis stages can be written into the plan. We suggest describing your strategic objective, rather than the technical choice. For example, you could commit to "Implement solutions that reduce employee car-solo use", rather than a technical solution such as "Implement a car-sharing application ", if you haven't yet carried out an analysis of employee needs and disincentives, or a full benchmark of other companies' practices and existing solutions. You avoid the risk of not honoring your commitment if you ultimately decide that other solutions are more appropriate for achieving your strategic objective.
Our recommendations are based on our experience of supporting over 300 sustainable development plans, some of which have been implemented by provincial ministries and organizations as part of government strategies. Your questions are welcome here info@ellio.ca.
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