vision
Our vision is to be the BEST business services provider on Vancouver Island.
mission
We provide values-based leadership and services to Vancouver Island businesses that embody an Indigenous worldview with respect and reverence.
Kaniikaniit Consulting is an Indigenous owned and family operated business which strives to Indigenize the corporate and governmental institutions around us. Kaniikaniit focuses on assisting First Nations communities gain the tools they need through legislation, funding proposals, and Indigenous organizational management. Our mission is to educate corporate and government entities on decolonization, reconciliation, and the Indigenization of current colonial practices.
Kaniikaniit Consulting will support your business to grow! We have a team of leaders who are dedicated to ensuring everything we do works towards your business goals. We live, work, and play on beautiful Vancouver Island, BC. We humbly and gratefully acknowledge the 50 First Nations of the Coast Salish, Nuu-Chah-nulth, and Kwakwaka'waka families who have been on this Island since time immemorial. We have a diverse team with all-star skills and talents. We will work with your organization to ensure that every little detail reflects your brand, values, and unique organization. We believe in integrity, listening, excellence, respect, community & collaboration, communication, empowerment & transformation.
OUR TEAM
Kathy Waddell
Senior Consultant & Owner
Kathy Waddell has more than 10 years experience as a senior executive and more than 30 in office administration. Kathy has many years experience in strategic and operational plan formation. She has facilitated many planning sessions at the staff level and executive level. Additionally, Kathy has public speaking and workshop experience.
Kathy’s life purpose is to create conditions that empower people and organizations to move forward in the world with confidence. She does this by listening and creating safe places for people to share thoughts and ideas. She enjoys looking at issues from a multidisciplinary lens. She believes that there are many ways to solve problems and that oftentimes, it is multiple solutions that will provide stability and a way forward. She is calm, respectful, and intuitive. Her unique skills are helping others to see things in different ways and being curious about why things are the way they are.
Nicolaus Waddell
Consultant & Content Specialist
Nicolaus Waddell is a Michif artist and business owner of Eagle Eye Digital. He specializes drone photography and musical composition operating under the pseudonym King Kael. Nicolaus provides all visual, web, and graphic design solutions to Kaniikaniit Consulting and is passionate about his position as a facilitator in a variety of workshops.
Nicolaus holds a Bachelor's of Journalism Degree, a Professional Project Administration Certificate, and Transport Canada Advanced RPAS Pilot Certification. Nicolaus is excited for his evolving and expanding position within Kaniikaniit Consulting while building his own business.
Nicolaus is neuro-divergent and a member of the LGBT community. He feels passionate about speaking up for oppressed voices in Canada while bringing opportunities to Indigenous community members and other cultures from around the world.
Crystal Jack
Consultant
For over a decade Crystal Jack has had the privilege of working alongside several Nuu-chah-nulth First Nations. Time spent in these communities has afforded her an understanding of the Nuu-chah-nulth principle of Hišuk ma c̕awak, or everything is one, that has been a core asset and influence in the holistic approach that Crystal takes in her work.
Her professional experience has been focused on the development and implementation of the Maa-nulth Treaty, as well as government-to-government relationships between First Nations and provincial and federal governments. Her experience also includes policy development, data and indicator analysis, fisheries and resource rights, and implementation of Bill C-92.
She lives in the beautiful territories of the Qualicum and Snaw-na-was First Nations. Crystal has a bachelor’s degree with Anthropology from Vancouver Island University and has recently started her own small business, Tiithluup Advisory Services.
Gaileen Flaman, PPA, CVA, CCP
Consultant
Gaileen Flaman (she/her) is Métis, of Plains Cree and Scottish ancestry on her mother’s side, mixed European ancestry on her father’s side, and is a grateful visitor on the ancestral lands of the Hul’qumi’num-speaking people. She is an authentic leader and “life doula” with highly developed organizational and interpersonal skills, driven to align with others to steward their potential and realize their dreams. Gaileen has decades of community development experience within municipal government, strategizing and co-creating a better world with equity-seeking groups including newcomers, older adults, Indigenous peoples, youth, and persons with disabilities. She especially enjoys infusing artistic, playful, experiential activities and rituals into her practice to recover, repair and reconcile relationships with oneself and beyond. She is a fierce 5Rythyms dancer, a savvy Spotify playlist-curator, a rewilding woods-walker, and has a cat familiar named Cleo.