Story shared by Kyla Pascal  

What are we doing today for a better tomorrow? 

miyo-pimâtisiwin is a nehiyaw teaching that highlights the good way of living. It invites one to consider the relationship between the emotional, physical, mental, and spiritual parts of a being and how we can live in a way that supports the health of ourselves, our families, and our communities. When we consider the statistics that the average person spends about 1/3 of their life at work, we rarely consider the dynamic between our workplace and our well-being. With this dynamic in mind, it is important for us to reflect on how we can live miyo-pimâtisiwin in our businesses to support a better tomorrow for ourselves and our communities.  

Supporting a Decolonized Workplace Culture  

Decolonizing our workplace culture invites Indigenous ways of being into our businesses. Teachings that emphasize care, sustainability, respect and rest can help guide us in building workplace cultures that support the wellbeing of employees for years to come.   

A few tenets of decolonizing workplace culture include:  

1. Respect for Cultural Practices and Ways of Being – A healthy workplace is a place where everyone feels they belong and that their workplace supports their culture and practices. It invites cultural exchange and relationship building so that we all learn from each other, and it reminds us that we are part of a larger community.  

2. Wellness as a Shared Responsibility – Wellness is not just the role of Indigenous peoples, HR, or leadership. Wellness in our organizations is a responsibility for everyone. To detach ourselves from toxic workplace habits and to move towards building an organizational culture that emphasizes employee wellbeing takes communal effort. 

3. Promoting Work-Life Balance – Indigenous ways of being emphasize the importance of family, community, kinship and care. We must be able to support employees both outside and in the office to ensure that a holistic approach to well-being is realized.  

4. Community is Foundational – Our workplaces don’t exist in a vacuum. Recognizing the interrelationships between family, community, and culture is important to the wellbeing of the employees and the company. Employees are part of families and communities that also require care and well-being. Ensuring that our workplaces support community well-being is instrumental to a healthy workplace culture. 

Indigenous ways of being recognize that healing is shared. When we take care of each other it helps our entire community. The same can be said in the workplace. Ensuring that employees are supported through policies, benefit programs, and day-to-day operations can support a healthier workplace and the longevity of a company. 

Many of the practices around decolonizing workplace culture run counterintuitive to typical workplace culture that pushes urgency, excessive competition and results in stress and burnout. Together, we can support good business by supporting healthy workplace culture.  

Advancing Wellness in the Workplace  

Indigenous wellness in the workplace can be actualized through workplace policies and developing culturally informed practices. A few examples include: 

• Access to Elders/Knowledge Keepers for Indigenous staff 

• Flexible Work Hours 

• Remote-First Workplace 

• Ensuring all staff have taken mandatory cultural/Indigenous training  

• Creating opportunities for staff to be on the land 

• Effective Workload Management  

At Rise we support a healthy workplace through a number of policies and practices. The Rise Wellness Benefits Program supports expenses related to Honoria, protocol, supplements, medicines and ceremonial supplies that may be required in order for staff to adhere to their own cultural practices and norms. In addition, we support a work/life balance through flexible work hours and a remote-first workplace.  

More recently at Rise, we’ve been developing a bereavement policy that better reflects the kinship relationships of Indigenous people and approaches time needed for ceremony, community obligations, and grief with reverence, respect and compassion. 

We are raising the standards of wellness through decolonizing workplace policies and supporting Indigenous approaches to health through our benefits program. By recognizing the holistic needs of our employees we can better align our workplace culture with the goals of sustainability, reconciliation, and longevity.  

When we create a culture of care and wellness we push the boundaries of what workplace culture can be and begin to move towards a culture of miyo-pimâtisiwin in our business.