Niagara's Identity and the NPC

Niagara's Identity and the NPC

This academic project was conducted in a team of four across a period of three months. Our team focused on understanding Niagara's identity within the context of tourism and how it is influenced and shaped by the Niagara Parks Commission (NPC). The NPC is a self-financed agency of the Ontario Ministry of Tourism, Culture and Sport. It is responsible for maintaining the wide variety of natural attractions, restaurants, golf courses, shops and other facilities along a 56km stretch of the Niagara Parkway.

Role: Understanding/Mapping Systems
Completed: April 2023

The Challenge

Identifying the factors influencing Niagara's Identity and key areas of improvement.

As part of the "Understanding Systems" course at OCAD University (M.Des. SFI program), our initial challenge was to identify the problem or theme within the context of tourism in Niagara.

Based on our research and analysis, we found that Niagara lacks one strong identity, instead it comprises many identities which are disjointed in nature. With the NPC being the most significant player in influencing the identity, we further focussed on digging deeper into the organization to understand the root of the issue.

Reading the Map

An influence map is the foundation of this synthesis map. The influence map is a tool for locating patterns of influence in a complex system (Jones & Van Ael,2023). They assist in identifying root causes in problem mapping. The result of our influence map can be used by the NPC as a springboard for dialogue and iterative learning to develop future strategies and business decisions.

The plant and soil layers, and the corresponding maps, represent the relationship dynamics within Niagara Parks Commission offerings and internal staffing. In this metaphor, the plant symbolizes the Niagara Parks Commission in its entirety, and each layer explores the drivers and outcomes that influence NPC's identity, growth and integrity.

Readers have the option of exploring the map starting from the top and going down, starting from the bottom and going up, or analyzing a specific section and exploring the questions and key insights established there. We want the NPC to understand that an action or activity in one area of their organization ultimately impacts the surrounding areas in ways described in key insights. No area in the NPC acts in isolation and through analysis of the organization, we have come to understand specific inner workings and how they react to each other. They will also be encouraged to interrogate how business decisions align with their current drivers in their “DNA” and explore what other drivers are important to them as an organization and how they can make them more present in their organizational culture.

Flourishing Niagara Parks

Understanding the NPC and Sense of Place in Niagara

HOW IDENTITY IMPACTS TOURISM THROUGH SENSE OF PLACE:

Tourist satisfaction and intentional revisit are considered signals of success of a destination. These are directly influenced by the sense of place. When taken into consideration together, identity and sense of place can help us identify strengths and weaknesses of the NPC and overall we can conclude that NPC is a key player in Niagara's identity as a whole. NPC offers tourists and locals most if not all aspects of sense of place if they were to engage in our offerings.

IDENTITY & SENSE OF PLACE IN REGENERATIVE TOURISM:
Regenerative tourism efforts must be specific to a region’s identity and be responsive to its strengths and weaknesses. If we do not understand Niagara Parks Commission's role in Niagara and their impact on sense of place, we may implement initiatives that not only fail but also cause harm to the region as a whole and further disconnect the tourist experience.

OUR RESEARCH QUESTION
What, who and how is NPC protecting, preserving and inspiring? Further, what do these answers mean for NPC's future in Niagara?

LEVEL 1: STRATEGIC OUTCOMES

Niagara Parks Commission offers various services for local communities and tourists.
The services, although beneficial individually, lack cohesion and support for each other.
The pandemic caused a decrease in park visitation, resulting in a sharp decline in revenue.
To regain financial health, the agency aims to balance driving visitation to revenue-producing operations while fulfilling their role as environmental and cultural stewards of the Niagara River corridor.
This lack of cohesion and change in business plan creates tension between commercial success and natural/heritage preservation initiatives.

LEVEL 2: OUTCOMES

The traditional top-down management approach limits ownership, creativity, and collaboration within the NPC.
Decision-making is slow, disconnected, and executing a cohesive long-term strategy is challenging.
The current management structure prioritizes financial recovery and commercial interests.
Overcoming structural barriers is necessary to increase collaboration and cooperation between leadership and employees for implementing new projects.
Preserving the existing mode of operation hinders the development of a cohesive value system across the NPC.
The internal disconnectedness of the NPC affects its various roles in the Niagara community and its services and attractions for the local community and tourists.

LEVEL 3: ACTIVITY OUTPUTS

In this level, we dug deeper to understand what impacts outcomes in levels 1 and 2.

Lack of community inclusion, both of locals and Indigenous communities, is a major weakness within the NPC.
Emerging trends like reconciliation, decolonization, Indigenous tourism, and heritage tourism are influencing the NPC's initiatives. In response, NPC focuses on incorporating indigenous history in monuments, restoring historical sites, and hosting speaker series with marginalized communities. Efforts are also made to increase diversification in hiring processes and establish an online engagement center for community feedback.
However, there is little active or participatory involvement of the community in NPC projects, leading to band-aid solutions (as the ones mentioned above) with limited long-term value and eventual mistrust between NPC and these communities.

LEVEL 4: INFLUENCES

This level focuses on the influential factors affecting levels 1 to 3.

Cascading or short-term investments are identified as a major influential factor.
NPC's short-term vision prioritizes maintenance and management operations for immediate returns, neglecting R&D.
The lack of R&D hinders the development of new offerings and a cohesive experience for visitors.
This leads to increased disconnection between the region, community, and their attractions.

NPC’s DNA:

The NPC’s DNA is “Protect, Preserve, and Inspire”. The mission and vision they communicate to the public are that of preserving and protecting its history, heritage, and environment, and thus inspiring.

If the main purpose of the NPC is to protect and preserve its commercial, traditional, and colonial structures, it leaves no space to build a coherent system of values (based on its vision and mission) and deliver initiatives that respond to it.

The NPC can still achieve this cohesion of their values and tackle the disjointedness perceived in the first levels as well as within its own identity. To do so, changes have to be made starting with the NPC DNA and fifth level for it to impact, as a consequence, more superficial levels.

LEVEL 5: DEEPEST INFLUENCES
There are 3 key drivers in the NPC’s core identity, which inevitably affects how it operates, and as a consequence how it delivers its projects and initiatives.

Commercial Mindset
Traditional Ways of Working
Colonial Structures

These drivers indicate the root of the disjointedness and disconnection seen at level 1. If the NPC wants to promote changes in their disjointedness across all top levels, changes have to be made here.

Recommendations

Overall, the NPC never acts alone. Its actions and impacts are interwoven within Niagara, as evident in these main actors:

NPC's internal organization
Local and tourist community
The land itself

To cultivate and maintain identity and foster a healthy sense of place within Niagara, NPC must incorporate and acknowledge their initiatives' intent and impact on the above actors as best they can.

WE ENCOURAGE:
Building stronger relationships between actors and NPC initiatives to expand and enhance their self-awareness.

Shift the NPC's corporate identity to focus on community identity and learning in all areas of its work.

The questions and key insights listed in levels one to five are the results of our research. They aim to empower NPC's community knowledge, skill and confidence in building a cohesive identity.

NPC KEY FOCUS AREAS SHOULD BE:

Community building and collaboration in the development of NPC initiatives
Internal alignment and communication across all levels of NPC
Innovation and service design alongside existing digital initiatives

Learning and Takeaways

System research, analysis, and design have helped us understand systematic, complex, and abstract problems such as identity within a region and an organization. It gave us a broader overview of the problem, and the ability to dig deeper to further understand the roots of a rather big and engrained issue.
Systems gave us not only the tools to understand identity issues within the NPC, but gave us clear indicators of the complications that exist within the complex system of NPC’s organization. With this, the synthesis map gave us an appropriate diagnosis and idea of which tools and next steps should be taken to further better or alleviate any constraints within the broader system.
Throughout the process, we understood the strengths and limitations of different maps that we used. We especially understood the need to involve key stakeholders as participants in developing the maps to ensure that they are complete and accurate representation of the NPC. Maps will never be completely accurate, but especially so if they do not include direct participatory co-design with the community under analysis.