Nanaimo Facilitator
Facilitated planning, leadership and team sessions for organizations in Nanaimo and across the central Island.
We create sessions that are greater than the sum of their parts, guided by award-winning facilitators.
- 110,000+people facilitated globally
- Award-winningfacilitators
- Mid-Island hubin person, virtual or hybrid
We design sessions that leave teams with shared clarity, specific commitments, and the momentum to follow through.
Trusted by teams across the public, private and non-profit sectors
Nanaimo & the central Island
Facilitation for Nanaimo teams
Positive Impact facilitates strategic planning, leadership development, team retreats, and change management for organizations in Nanaimo and across the central Island. Nanaimo sits where the Island's highway and its two mainland ferry routes meet, which makes it the one place on the Island that almost everybody can reach in a morning.
What we bring is the facilitation craft: someone neutral who owns the process so your people can own the content. Your team knows your organization and your community better than any visiting facilitator will. If your footprint runs the length of the Island, our Vancouver Island page covers that, and we have a separate page for Victoria.
What we do
The areas we're called in for most
Every engagement starts with your context. If your challenge isn't listed here, ask us anyway.
Strategic Planning
Nanaimo has grown quickly, and organizations that grew with it are often running on structures built when they were half the size. We facilitate the process that decides what to keep, what to formalize and what to let go.
Learn moreCommunication Training & COMS
Our own communication styles framework, giving teams a common language for how they each work. It earns its keep fastest on groups that have grown quickly and lost the shorthand they used to rely on.
Learn moreTeam Development & Team Building
Retreats, offsites and tailored sessions that build the trust and psychological safety strong teams depend on. Parksville, Qualicum and the lakes are all close enough for a genuine offsite without a full day of travel.
Culture & Engagement
From vision and values work to culture shifts, we help turn shared purpose into commitments people live by, including in organizations serving communities that have changed considerably in a decade.
Leadership Development & Executive Coaching
Hands-on coaching and development for managers and executives, often people promoted from within a growing organization who are now leading colleagues they used to work alongside.
Corporate Training
Participant-led training designed around your people, with tools that stay useful long after the session ends. Delivered in Nanaimo, or out to Parksville, Port Alberni and the Comox Valley.
Every engagement we run is shaped around your team. Share what you're working on and we'll build the right session around it.
Share what you're working onHow We Facilitate
Sessions that turn conversation into a plan your team can actually run with
There's no prepared script. We guide the process, your team brings the expertise, and together we build toward a plan your people helped shape and will actually use.
Here that often means a room where half the group drove an hour and the other half came off a ferry, and everyone is watching the clock for the trip home. Facilitator-guided, participant-led, and paced to respect the journey.
Get in Touch
Why work with us
Three ways teams here engage a facilitator
Every engagement is customizable, but most start in one of these shapes.
Quarterly or monthly
Ongoing Partnership
A facilitator who gets to know your team over time, so trust deepens and development compounds instead of starting fresh each session. Mostly virtual, anchored by one or two in-person days a year.
Best for: making development a habit rather than a one-off.
Ask about a partnershipMulti-day, immersive
Multi-Day Offsite
Extended session for strategic planning, leadership development or a culture shift. When we're flying east anyway, two days costs far less per day than one.
Best for: bigger decisions that need room to breathe.
Talk about an offsiteHalf-day to full-day
Single Workshop
A focused session built around one goal, whether that's a decision, a kickoff, or a skill like communications or building trust and psychological safety.
Best for: teams that know exactly what they need to work through.
Ask about a workshop
How we facilitate
A clear path from first call to follow-through
Each engagement follows a similar path, and includes the same care, from your first call to the work that carries on after we fly home.
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Discovery
A call to understand your context, your goals, and where your people are actually travelling from.
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Design
Customized session design, built around your team, not a template.
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Facilitation
An experienced facilitator in the room or online, and in the room the day before.
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Materials
Materials and tools your team can keep using afterward.
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Follow-up
A summary with commitments and clear next steps.
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Support
Optional support to help momentum carry past the session.
Why facilitation?
How a team works together shapes everything it creates.
$100 Million
is the yearly cost for big companies for staff being in pointless meetings.
65%
of senior managers say that meetings keep them from completing their own work.
58%
of Americans would rather go to a doctor's appointment than attend a work meeting.
75%
of decision-makers feel that collaboration needs to be improved in their companies.
Forrester Research, 2021
Outcomes
What your team walks away with
Better decisions, made together
Decisions the whole room actually gets behind, instead of quiet disagreement that surfaces later in the parking lot.
Real buy-in
Because people helped shape the outcome, they leave genuinely invested in it, not just told what was decided.
Stronger team connection
The kind of trust and psychological safety that lets a group that has grown fast say what it thinks about how it now works.
Action that sticks
Clear commitments and ownership that carry into Monday morning, not just good intentions on the day.
Fresh thinking and better ideas
Space for your team's best thinking to surface, including ideas that might never have come up otherwise.
A record everyone can point at
A written summary of what was decided, who owns it, and by when. Useful when half the group has to brief a site that wasn't in the room.
Client stories
Real teams, real outcomes
These aren't all central Island engagements, and we won't pretend otherwise. They're the kinds of sessions we run and the outcomes teams point to afterward.
What our clients say
It was a pleasure to work with Will and Positive Impact. I was both inspired and empowered to co-deliver a meaningful offsite. Their positive incite into leadership performance and emotional resilience gave me clear direction and tactical tools I could apply to my workplace right away. I thoroughly look forward to working with Will again.
- Haley Daniels
Olympian and Motivational Speaker
Thanks for your incredible support, kindness, professionalism, and realness.
It was my sincere pleasure and privilege to work with you on our event.
You are a unique and special human, and I’m grateful that our paths crossed on this project, and look forward to the next time.
- Shauna Grinke, MBA, CPHR
Vice President - People and CultureThe workshop was an incredibly valuable experience for our team — the facilitator created an open, engaging environment that encouraged honest discussion and collaboration. The content was thoughtfully tailored to our team’s specific goals, making the session both relevant and actionable. We’re excited to continue partnering with Positive Impact to build on the great momentum sparked in this session.
- Shannon Charbonneau
Account Director
Treetop Marketing and Promotion Inc.
I’m leaving our session with a sense of optimism that I haven’t had in a while. It was time extremely well spent! I am sure that we all feel much closer and more connected.
- Participant
MDA Geointelligence Engineering Leadership SummitThe environment that was created made me feel comfortable to participate and collaborate with my colleagues. It was very well organized. I liked the outcome of the brainstorm sessions and warmup activities.
- ParticipantThe level of engagement and pace of the training was excellent. Like the fact that this workshop was trainer-guided, but participants lead!
- ParticipantFantastic facilitating most importantly Will understood when to let us talk and when to corral us back on track. Excellent value this afternoon.
- Engagement Workshop Participant
100% Satisfaction Guarantee.
We stand behind the quality of our work with complete confidence. If you're not fully satisfied with the results, we'll make it right.
Your trust matters more to us, and our guarantee acknowledges our belief that you deserve to feel confident in every investment you make with us. That's a standard we hold ourselves to, every time.
Ready to talk about your team?
Get in TouchAround the central Island
Where sessions happen, and what usually fits
Nanaimo is the practical middle of Vancouver Island, which is why so many Island-wide groups end up meeting here even when nobody in them works here.
| Region | Organizations based there | Format that usually fits |
|---|---|---|
| Nanaimo and the harbour | Health and regional hospital services, post-secondary, municipal and regional district teams, marine and port, professional services | In person, and the easiest place on the Island to gather a group drawn from everywhere. Both mainland ferry routes land here. |
| Parksville, Qualicum and the lakes | Tourism and hospitality, health and seniors services, small and mid-size employers, municipal teams | Multi-day. Twenty to thirty minutes north and the natural choice for a genuine offsite without a real journey. |
| Ladysmith, Chemainus and the Cowichan Valley | Forestry and manufacturing, agriculture and wineries, First Nations governments and organizations, municipal and health teams | In person. Often the fair middle ground for a group split between the south Island and Nanaimo. |
| Port Alberni and the west coast | Forestry and marine, tourism operators in Tofino and Ucluelet, First Nations governments, health and municipal teams | In person, though the drive over the pass takes longer than the map suggests. Tourism operators are effectively unavailable through the summer. |
| The Comox Valley and Campbell River | Health and education, aquaculture and forestry, aviation and marine, municipal bodies, First Nations organizations | In person, about an hour and a half north. Comfortably combined with a Nanaimo session on the same trip. |
A local detail that matters
Nanaimo is where Island-wide groups actually meet
Both mainland ferry routes land here, the highway runs through, and the airport is fifteen minutes out. That makes Nanaimo the one point on Vancouver Island that people from the south Island, the north Island and the Lower Mainland can all reach in a morning without anyone giving up a full day.
It matters more than it sounds. Venue choice is never neutral: hold a provincial or regional session in Victoria and it belongs to Victoria, and the people who travelled arrive knowing they are guests at someone else's meeting. Nanaimo is the rare choice nobody has to concede anything to accept, which is worth a surprising amount before a word has been said.
The practical design follows from it. We build the day around sailings and the drive rather than around office hours, which usually means a 10:00 start and a finish that gets people home the same evening. That is a shorter working day than it looks on paper, so the agenda has to be tighter, and the parts that could be done on a call get moved off the day entirely. Nobody should travel two hours to receive an update.
Featured Workshops
Each of these runs in person, virtually, or as a hybrid, which matters when part of your group is coming off a ferry.
COMS Communication Styles
COMS is our own communication styles assessment, grounded in research and facilitated by our team. It gives your people a shared way to talk about how they each work, so different styles become an advantage instead of a source of friction.
It's particularly useful on teams that have grown quickly, which describes a good number of organizations here. When a group doubles, the shorthand that used to work stops working and nobody can point at when it broke.
Eight questions, one simple grid, and a reference the whole team can point at months later.
Learn more
Strategic Planning
This is where your team gets a real say in shaping and carrying out the organization's direction, landing on initiatives that actually move forward.
Organizations that grew with the region are often running on structures built when they were half the size. We facilitate the process that decides what to keep, what to formalize and what to let go, with the people who will have to live with it in the room.
A strategic plan is a living, breathing document. We stay involved as it plays out over the following months and years.
Learn more
5 Dysfunctions of a Team
This session takes a good team and helps make it excellent. We draw on Patrick Lencioni's well-known framework, approached through an appreciative inquiry lens that starts with what's already working.
It lands well with leadership groups that grew from a small team where everyone did everything, and now need to work as a group with defined roles. The five behaviours, trust, conflict, commitment, accountability and results, are all on the table.
Your people walk away with shared language for how they work together, and a plan for moving forward that they built themselves.
Learn more
Our Core Team
Great content is only made better by great facilitators
Will Chambers
Founder & Facilitator
Award-winning facilitator and Founder of Positive Impact, with sessions delivered to tens of thousands of people. Will focuses on strategy, leadership, team dynamics and communication, turning concepts into clear, committed action.
More about Will
Lindsay Davis
Coach & Strategist
Award-winning coach and entrepreneurial guide, with experience spanning rural entrepreneurs in Africa to multimillion-dollar companies. Helps leaders focus on what matters most and build the resilience to anticipate challenges and move through them.
More about LindsayMichael Lorsch
Facilitator & Learning Consultant
Brings facilitation and learning design from theatre stages to executive boardrooms, including in-house work with lululemon. Blends mindfulness, relationship systems and human-centred design to keep people at the centre of every session.
More about Michael
Jason Maraschiello
Coach & Facilitator
Certified life and corporate coach, mindfulness and meditation teacher. Uses mindfulness and effective communication to help people set manageable goals, find work-life balance and build the support to follow through.
More about Jason
For work on the central Island we assign one lead facilitator who travels for the session and stays with you through the follow-up, rather than handing you to a different person each time. Beyond the core team, we draw on a wider network of facilitators and subject-matter experts, matched to the goals, sector, and people of each engagement.
Before you book
Worth reading first
Six pieces that answer the questions most teams have before a first session.
- Wider footprint Facilitation across Vancouver Island Read the guide
- Market page Facilitation in Victoria Read the guide
- Getting ready How to prepare your team for a facilitated session Read the guide
- Honest advice When not to hire a facilitator, and what to do instead Read the guide
- Hybrid sessions Making mixed in-person and remote sessions work Read the guide
- Afterwards Keeping momentum after the session ends Read the guide
Frequently Asked Questions
Facilitation in Nanaimo
Are your facilitators based in Nanaimo?
We don't publish where our facilitators are based, and we'd rather be straightforward about that than vague. What matters for your engagement is that we work on the central Island regularly and that travel, where it applies, is quoted as a separate line item so you can see exactly what it adds before committing.
Why do so many Island-wide groups meet in Nanaimo?
Because it's the one place almost everybody can reach in a morning. Both mainland ferry routes land here, the highway runs through, and the airport is fifteen minutes out. Venue choice is never neutral: hold a regional session in Victoria and it belongs to Victoria, and the people who travelled arrive knowing they're guests at someone else's meeting. Nanaimo is the rare choice nobody has to concede anything to accept.
What time should the session start if people are travelling?
Later than you'd schedule an office meeting. We usually build around a 10:00 start and a finish that gets everyone home the same evening, which means the working day is shorter than it looks on paper. The agenda has to be correspondingly tighter, and anything that could be handled on a call gets moved off the day entirely. Nobody should travel two hours to receive an update.
Our organization has grown fast and the old way of working isn't holding. Can facilitation help?
Yes, and it's common here. Organizations that grew with the region are often running on structures built when they were half the size, where everyone did everything and nobody needed a process. We facilitate the session that decides what to keep, what to formalize and what to let go, with the people who'll have to live with the answer in the room rather than being told afterwards.
What kinds of organizations do you work with here?
Leadership teams, boards, and departments across public, private, and non-profit organizations. On the central Island that tends to mean health and regional hospital services, post-secondary, municipal and regional district teams, First Nations governments and organizations, forestry and marine, aquaculture, tourism and hospitality, and professional services firms. Group size ranges from an executive team of eight to a leadership summit of sixty.
Do you work north of Nanaimo and out to the west coast?
Yes. The Comox Valley and Campbell River are about an hour and a half north and combine comfortably with a Nanaimo session on the same trip. Port Alberni and the west coast take longer than the map suggests because of the pass, and tourism operators in Tofino and Ucluelet are effectively unavailable through the summer, so timing matters more out there than anywhere else on the Island.
Where should we go for a multi-day offsite?
Parksville, Qualicum or one of the lakes, most likely. Twenty to thirty minutes north of Nanaimo, which is far enough that people stop dropping into the office and close enough that nobody loses half a day getting there. For a two-night retreat that combination is hard to beat on the Island, and it costs considerably less than the equivalent on the mainland.
What does our team actually walk away with?
A written summary with the decisions made, the commitments people made out loud, and who owns what by when. Most sessions also produce something structural, such as a plan on a page, a set of priorities the group agreed to, or shared language for how the team communicates. The point is traction on Monday morning rather than a good feeling that fades by Wednesday. We can stay involved afterward if you want support keeping it alive.
Let's talk about your team
Tell us what you're working through and where your people are travelling from, and we'll tell you honestly whether facilitation is the right tool and what a session in Nanaimo would look like.
Get in Touch
