NSBI brings five-year plan to Yarmouth

The new plan shifts from focusing on job creation to focusing on total client payroll, with a focus on securing not just jobs but higher-paying, higher-valued positions.

The agency’s new five-year target is to create and retain $800 million in total client payroll by 2012.

NSBI’s goal is to have its clients creating and retaining $1 billion in total payroll by 2013.

Officials are confident that the targets are reachable.

“We’re excited about the potential for Nova Scotia,” Pat Ryan, NSBI’s vice-president and chief operating officer, said during Wednesday’s event in Yarmouth.

In the five-year period that ended in March, 18,600 direct and spin-off jobs were created as a result of the activities of NSBI and its clients, surpassing NSBI’s first five-year target of 18,000 jobs in Nova Scotia, the agency reported.

By 2012 officials envisage 27,400 jobs to be in place as a direct result of NSBI initiatives in the first five years.

NSBI undertook a comprehensive consultation process with stakeholders provincewide to understand how the organization can best support and promote business growth over the next five years. The new plan, officials say, is reflective of the opportunities and issues identified by the stakeholders.

According to this week’s announcement, the agency will focus on five key areas as it strives to deliver results – regional growth, competitiveness, talent, leadership and collaboration.

“We know our model is working; our results speak for themselves,” said Steven Lund, NSBI’s president and chief executive officer, in a statement issued in conjunction with the release of the new five-year plan.

“We’ve set some big goals for business growth in Nova Scotia and I’m confident in our team’s ability to achieve them,” he said.