Setting Priorities: An Interview with Eva Havaris, Equine Canada's new CEO

No stranger to high performance sport, Havaris has a long history in high performance soccer, and more recently taekwondo, as the CEO of Taekwondo Canada.

Havaris is still feeling her way around the complexities of Equine Canada and the Canadian equestrian community, but she has already identified challenges and defined priorities and goals for the organization she now leads.

Your background is in high performance sport, so clearly you bring some very relevant skills to your job at EC. What experience from your past sport and work experience do you feel are most useful to your position at EC?

I think the fact that I have background in coaching is really helping right now. For one, as a coach you have to lead, and be prepared to be held accountable. You also have to stand up for your team and hold others accountable. Coaching, for me, is about effective communication and dialogue. That has been missing in this organization – not only in this office, but between stakeholder groups. Showing leadership and bouncing ideas off stakeholders to get feedback has been key to my first few months here.

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Another useful aspect of my background is my education. Through my undergrad and then masters degree, I focused on accountability in sport. Accountability runs two ways. It’s not just about the members getting information into the organization on time, but also about the office being accountable to its community. If that’s emphasized in terms of culture here, I think it would go a long way to moving Equine Canada toward being a top-tier sport organization.

You come originally from a team sport, soccer. How has that played a role in your vision for EC?

I’ve grown up in team sport environments since the age of 4. Regardless of which sport I’ve been involved with as an athlete, coach, or administrator, I place high value on ‘team’ in anything I do. Something that became apparent, even when I was going into the interview for this job, was that EC is trying to be all things to all people; that’s a huge challenge. In order to perform our role effectively, we need to work as a team. We need to lean on our equestrian partners and the core committees, such as discipline committees. It became clear to me that in order to be successful in this role, I will need a strong, high-performing team of individuals around me to help me move this organization forward, and when my time at EC is over, the day comes that I am gone, that’s the legacy I hope to leave behind. There are many very intelligent and passionate people in this community. I hope to re-engage them.

You came directly to EC from four years as the CEO of another national sport organization (NSO), taekwondo. What has been your approach as you took on your role with EC?

I’m starting with dialogue and communication, and not coming in with a heavy hand. I’ve sought to gather as much information and as many facts as I can before making a decision. This approach is fundamental to my decision-making process, as well as consulting with the appropriate individuals depending on the situation at hand. I’m here for the long run, and I’m not one to run from a challenge.

An effective leader at EC doesn’t necessarily need a horse background, but the horse industry – as you have likely already discovered – is very complex. Have you undertaken to learn more about specific aspects of the equestrian industry beyond the day-to-day working with and learning from the people at EC, as well as from the community’s many volunteer-driven groups?

To be honest, I’m still trying to understand how I can integrate myself better. I had my eyes opened at WEG, not only in terms of the magnitude of this sport, but also through various conversations with individuals involved with EC in other capacities such as industry and health and welfare. I’m learning – one conversation at a time, and one experience at a time. I’m relying on those who do have the background to point me in the right direction. I’m surrounded by many horse and equestrian enthusiasts who have a wealth of experience. I’ve been getting out into the field, to competitions, and at the same time I think it’s critical for me to stay quite focused. There is a lot that needs to be done; I won’t hide that fact. I need to stay focused and prioritize the improvements.

Have you been on a horse since you started with EC?

Yes! When we were in Normandy, we kept noticing groups of horses being ridden on the beach. On one of the days off from the competition, we went for an early morning ride on the beach.

Shortly after he started with EC, your predecessor, Jean-Christophe Gandubert, cited the relationships between staff and volunteers as a point of priority. He found that there were very muddy waters between the roles of staff and volunteers which interfered with the effectiveness and morale of the staff. How does one balance the input and influence of these complementary and sometimes conflicting groups?

The governance of this organization needs to be looked at and there seems to be an appetite among the volunteers to review its effectiveness in more detail. I don’t think this is news to anyone; however, I think it has become more of a priority within the organization, especially at the Board level. The organization has a new CEO with specific key performance indicators that are focused on the foundation of this organization, so there would be a fit, timing-wise. The volunteers are key to this organization, as is the staff; therefore, I would recommend starting with a review of the decision-making process and lines of authority within EC. I decided early on that I would not focus my attention on trying to influence the governance process within EC, but rather to focus on improving the national office processes and ultimately its performance. This is where I believe I can have the greatest influence and impact upon the organization at this point in time.

Another area of concern identified by Gandubert was the long-term problematic relations with provincial affiliates. What is your reading of that situation today, and what initiatives do you intend to apply?

This was another priority for me coming in, to sit down with the provincial representatives. I did that following the Canadian Interprovincial Equestrian Championships in order to get a better gauge of improvements that could be made to the relationship between EC and its provincial partners. It dawned on me that if the organization looks at the whole of the resources dedicated to bettering equestrian in Canada, we have upwards of 100 professional staff across the country. That is a tremendous asset, especially if we think of the opportunities to collaborate and better service the Canadian equestrian community. Each of us, EC and the provinces, has a role which is not the same, but should be complementary. Having met with them twice, I believe the provinces are hungry for partnership and want to work with EC. They want to move past the history.

Gandubert had said that in the relationship between EC and the provinces there was a preoccupation with what was being given in return for services, a ‘what’s in it for me if I do this for you’ attitude. He believed that until the culture of the relationship between EC and the provinces shifted from counting dollars to bigger goals, there could be no real progress.

Collectively, we need to ask where we are adding value for the Canadian equestrian community. We will be holding a workshop with the provinces on the 24th and 25th of November at the national office. Going forward from that meeting, I hope we will have established who is taking responsibility for which programs, why, and how we can collectively better service our members and our community. If we all do our jobs collectively well, we will retain our customers and make equestrianism more attractive to the general public. That should be our goal. I want this sport to be top-tier in Canada, similar to Tennis Canada, the Canadian Soccer Association, etc. Those NSOs have shaken out the dust, but they haven’t shut out the volunteers. We should be asking what kind of organization we want to be when we host the world at WEG in 2018.

You have not been in your position at EC very long, but have you identified key areas of change that are critical for EC to thrive in the future?

In terms of language, I’m focusing on improvement as opposed to change. The word ‘change,’ particularly in the context of this organization, brings with it a connotation of fear. It’s easier to maintain the status quo when you talk about change. Here is the way I’m trying to get the staff to think: ‘who doesn’t want to improve, and what organization wouldn’t strive to improve itself?’

Low morale has been cited as a problem in the office at EC. Is that what you found when you arrived?

There were 30 staff when I came in. I found that there was inattention to results and performance. Going back to my team sport experiences as an athlete and coach, it is critical to pay attention to individual performance and results within the team. What we as an organization need, and what the community needs from us, is to be a high-performing team. The commitment is here among the staff. Now we need to focus attention on performance and results. The organization should be run like a business, with investments tied to clear indicators of performance and added-value initiatives for our stakeholders, members, and partners. This is part of the foundation that needs to be put in place to drive future decision-making.

Canada is one of few of the top equestrian nations (perhaps the only one) with not a single employee position, never mind a department, dedicated to either high performance programs or fund-raising. Do you intend to address that situation?

What has definitely been lacking are functional areas tied to strategic priorities within the organization. A person going to the EC website sees a long list of personnel, but not a structure. We are reorganizing so that we have functional departments. High performance is a key addition to the structure. If you look at EC’s strategic plan, it does emphasize world-class sport performance. To achieve that, you have to have a dedicated department and team within the national office focusing on programs and services that provide for high performance achievement. This is also critical to how EC presents itself to our sport partners, such as the Canadian Olympic Committee, Own The Podium and Sport Canada – that we are leading, organized, and looking for efficiencies wherever possible. That’s the top end of EC’s business.

It takes resources to create new departments within an organization. Do you have a time frame for creating a high performance area within EC?

I have until November 30th to have a new structure to present to EC president Al Patterson and to the Executive Recruitment, Retention and Review Committee. I have been talking to people in OTP and other international federations with regard to the role of a director of High Performance. I hope to have the position in place in the new year. The sooner I can have the position filled, the better for the organization. That person will be my right hand, someone who will cascade our vision down through the staff. This will be the first opportunity for EC to have a director of High Performance, and I want to do it right.

The turnover of management, particularly CEOs, has been high over the past five years. Have you identified what you think is the root cause of this expensive trend? What do you believe is the solution?

Sometimes the process of a relationship not working can shed light on what’s needed. If I were the person doing the hiring, my thinking would be that there is a right person or a right fit at the right time. I would focus on that more than just the resumé. By all accounts, I am young relative to my counterparts in other NSOs, but I think there is something I’m bringing to the table that is the right fit for this organization at this moment in time. My goal is to make the best contribution that I can, not to secure my position long term. When I applied for the job at EC, I felt taekwondo was ready for someone new. That’s the life cycle of an organization.

When you began with EC in June, were there any things that surprised you?

I was very surprised at the amount of analysis that has been done on the organization. Building a case for improvement was one of the first things I had thought I would need to do when I started, but I found out early on that much had already been done. There has been a lot of good work, particularly the study conducted by Deloitte, which contains some very good information. That’s my starting point. There is a subset of that document which lays out some priorities for EC. In a meeting last week with the staff, some of that information was shared with them. Making them aware will help EC be a better organization.

Another thing that surprised me was the existence of the CET logo, which I saw within two weeks of being here when I was fitted for some clothing for Normandy. It immediately grabbed me. It’s a powerful logo and brand. To me, the CET logo is gold; it represents a long tradition and history in Canada, which not all other sports have. I have the logo on my computer’s desktop as a source of daily inspiration. I hope that we can also inspire the Canadian population to become a part of our sport and to re-engage our equestrian community.

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Profiles

Setting Priorities: An Interview with Eva Havaris, Equine Canada’s new CEO

Eva Havaris was hired in June 2014 as Equine Canada’s new CEO, six months after her predecessor, Jean-Christophe Gandubert, was terminated

Your background is in high performance sport, so clearly you bring some very relevant skills to your job at EC. What experience from your past sport and work experience do you feel are most useful to your position at EC?

You come originally from a team sport, soccer. How has that played a role in your vision for EC?

You came directly to EC from four years as the CEO of another national sport organization (NSO), taekwondo. What has been your approach as you took on your role with EC?

Have you been on a horse since you started with EC?

Another area of concern identified by Gandubert was the long-term problematic relations with provincial affiliates. What is your reading of that situation today, and what initiatives do you intend to apply?

You have not been in your position at EC very long, but have you identified key areas of change that are critical for EC to thrive in the future?

Low morale has been cited as a problem in the office at EC. Is that what you found when you arrived?

Canada is one of few of the top equestrian nations (perhaps the only one) with not a single employee position, never mind a department, dedicated to either high performance programs or fund-raising. Do you intend to address that situation?

It takes resources to create new departments within an organization. Do you have a time frame for creating a high performance area within EC?

The turnover of management, particularly CEOs, has been high over the past five years. Have you identified what you think is the root cause of this expensive trend? What do you believe is the solution?

When you began with EC in June, were there any things that surprised you?

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