The Community Social Services Health and Safety Association of BC (CSSHSA) supports over 2,500 organizations across British Columbia’s social services sector. Its mission – to promote safe and healthy workplaces – is grounded in prevention, equity, and sector-wide collaboration.
Since 2022, Foxfire Collective has had the privilege of walking alongside CSSHSA as a learning partner, supporting their evolution through strategic planning, governance renewal, and cultural transformation. What began as a focused engagement has since grown into a multi-year collaboration rooted in relationship, trust, and a shared commitment to growth.
From the outset, CSSHSA’s leadership team signaled a desire to deepen learning and foster a culture of reflection and responsiveness. This meant not only creating structures for accountability and strategic alignment – but nurturing a values-based, inclusive, and adaptable organization that could meet the changing needs of the sector.
Foxfire’s work with CSSHSA has unfolded in phases, each one building on the last. In 2023, we facilitated a board governance workshop that helped the organization affirm its strategic direction and build tools for effective governance.
This included supporting the Board to reimagine its governance framework, weaving in reconciliation and EDI commitments, facilitating the Advisory Panel in defining its role as a sector voice and learning hub and designing practical tools to assess and support reflective governance.
In 2024 and 2025, this work deepened. The Board engaged in a reflective retreat focused on cultural safety, ethical leadership, and the integration of equity and reconciliation into every facet of governance. Work with the staff team will continue this through line - strengthening internal alignment, celebrating progress, and creating space for connection and transformation.
This journey has not been about ticking boxes, it has been about cultivating an organizational ecosystem where learning fuels action, and strategy is inseparable from culture and care.
Key outcomes include:
What distinguishes this work is not just the tools or frameworks – it is the relational, responsive, and iterative approach Foxfire brings.
This case study represents what is possible when organizations commit to learning as a practice, and when impact is measured not just by what gets done, but by how people feel doing it.