PAUL GRISS

Paul Griss, President of Boldon Group Incorporated, has worked at a senior level on conservation and environmental protection issues in Canada for over 25 years. The breadth, depth and currency of Paul's experience enable him to provide leading edge support integrating information from a wide range of disciplines and issues. He has an extensive network of senior contacts in government, business, academia and NGOs and is a trusted broker among them. Paul has a pragmatic approach to issues and believes in finding solutions that can be implemented "on-the-ground". Paul spent eleven years in senior management with two major nongovernmental organizations prior to setting out on his own. He understands the challenges faced by leaders and managers both in formulating and implementing new approaches at an operational level and in changing the culture or policies of an organization.

In 1986, Paul was selected to be Executive Director of the Canadian Nature Federation (now Nature Canada).Since that time, Paul has been actively engaged on a wide range of issues across Canada and internationally including: energy resource development,; sustainable forest policy and management; water policy; biodiversity conservation; protected areas establishment and management; climate change and carbon offsets; and ecosystem services.  He continues to work at a very senior level with federal and provincial government agencies, conservation and environmental NGOs, and with leading companies in the energy, forest, mining and agricultural sectors.

Paul’s service with the Canadian Nature Federation coincided with the first wave of interest in sustainable development initiated by the Brundtland Commission report, Our Common Future.  Paul saw the recognition of this new paradigm within governments and among business leaders as a major opportunity to advance issues in conservation and environmental protection by opening the doors to a more cooperative or even collaborative approach to finding solutions to issues.  He was an early adopter of this strategy.  Paul was a founding member of the New Directions Group which brought together leaders of Canada’s business and environmental communities to find common ground on divisive issues.

Upon leaving the Canadian Nature Federation in 1992, Paul continued to work independently on the issues of interest to him, with a strong focus over the first decade on both sustainable forest management and policy and innovation in environmental governance.  Paul is not interested in policy in the abstract sense.  His pragmatic approach leads him to want to ground truth his activities and he makes a concerted effort to vertically integrate his work.  For example, on sustainable forest management issues, Paul worked simultaneously on: international forest policy; the development of Canada’s national forest strategy; the revision of provincial forest policy and legislation; the development, testing and implementation of standards, certification programs and indicators; and the design and implementation of forest management audits.

Paul has served on a wide range of boards of directors, technical committees and advisory bodies addressing issues as diverse as climate change, trade and the environment, endangered species, the development of a national forest sector strategy, forestry research, and the administration of the US National Wildlife Refuge System.  Paul served on the Board of Directors of Alberta’s Climate Change Central from 2000-2013 and served a term as chair of its Governance Committee.  Paul also helped to found Canada Land Resource Innovations and the Biosphere Institute of the Bow Valley.  He has served as chairman of the Canmore Economic Development Authority.

Paul is the author of the best-selling The Daily Planet: A Hands-on Guide to a Greener Environment (Key Porter Books, 1990), and is an experienced writer, public speaker and commentator on sustainability issues.  He was a recipient of the Alberta Centennial Medal for contributions to the province.

Paul’s professional interests evolve according to the issues of the day.  His preference is to be at the cutting edge of an issue helping to shape policy and find solutions.  He is particularly interested in working with leaders, or organizations that wish to be leaders, on these issues.