Village Green Bakery keeps focus on classic quality, kindness, fun in Victoria Beach

VICTORIA BEACH — They’re not carved into stone tablets — they’re reminders and not commandments, after all — but behind one of the display cases at Village Green Bakery is a laminated sheet of letter-size paper with a list of statements outlining how owner Jen Leslie wants staffers to approach their work.

Fittingly, there’s a baker’s dozen of them.

One is aimed specifically at a stoic teen who’s worked at the bakery since it opened in summer 2022 — “Smile, Brody,” it says — while the other 12 are meant for all 17 employees at the seasonal business, which is open annually from May long weekend until Thanksgiving.

“Smile and enjoy the ride,” is the first reminder, followed by, “The summer is short, so make it a good one,” “always take the high road” and “you are awesome.”

Foreign workers at Manitoba hotel are owed $138K in unpaid wages and fees, labour board rules

BRANDON — The Manitoba Labour Board has ordered the Western Star All Suites Hotel to pay nearly $138,000 in unpaid wages and administrative fees after it dismissed the appeals involving three foreign workers employed by the company.

In a decision dated Aug. 25, the board ordered 6692452 Manitoba Ltd. (doing business as Western Star All Suites Hotel), 1638185 Alberta Ltd. and company director P.X. to pay a total of $137,915.79 to the Employment Standards Branch for wages owed to foreign workers S.J., J.B. and G.R.

The decision was edited to protect the personal information of the employees, who worked at a hotel, reportedly in Melita, at different times and also lived there during their employment.

The board stated the employees were owed wages after hearing evidence about long working hours, irregular payments, inadequate employment records and working conditions.

Welcoming Creekside Tree Farm and Nursery

The local horticulture industry in Manitoba is a close-knit, supportive community, in which wholesale growers and retail garden centre owners know each other well. Many are long-standing, multi-generational family businesses.

If a local grower decides to expand greenhouse operations or a garden centre changes ownership, it’s big news that ripples throughout Manitoba’s entire horticulture industry, including the gardening community.

So, when a brand-new, independent wholesale nursery and garden retailer sets up business on 236 acres just 35 minutes north of Winnipeg, it merits considerable interest. A new startup in an industry with very few new players stands out.

Creekside Tree Farm & Nursery, a retail and wholesale nursery, is located at 165 Tom Prince Dr. in Petersfield, Man., just down the road from Chesley’s Resort and Campground. The owner, Mikkel Grabinski, is 28. He purchased the site for his nursery in 2019. The past few years, he has worked quietly around the clock to grow his operation by planting thousands of trees, build relationships with wholesale suppliers, and hire a workforce.

Assurer la continuité bilingue

À la suite de la nomination cet été de Glenn Joyal à la Cour suprême, l’Association des juristes d’expression française du Manitoba (AJEFM) a adressé une lettre à l’intention de Mark Carney.

Dans cette dernière, L’AJEFM demande au premier ministre du Canada de nommer un juge en chef bilingue pour remplacer Glenn Joyal qui occupait ce rôle à la Cour du Banc du Roi du Manitoba depuis 2011.

En préambule, l’association de juristes francophones souligne les contributions de Glenn Joyal pour faire progresser l’accès à la justice en français et insiste sur le fait que la prochaine nomination doit absolument s’inscrire dans la continuité du travail réalisé par Glenn Joyal, mais aussi celui de Marc Monnin, juge en chef de la Cour du Banc du Roi du Manitoba de 2003 à 2011.

Tarik Daoudi, directeur général de l’AJEFM met de l’avant la fierté d’avoir eu des Franco-Manitobains pour remplir ce rôle mais il indique également que cela va au-delà des sentiments.

We can’t control the economy, we can control how we treat people

There is a lot happening in the world right now that can leave Canadians feeling unsettled.

Our nation’s relationship with the United States feels less predictable, trade relationships are changing and businesses are trying to understand what tariffs, economic uncertainty and political decisions could mean for them. Employees are also wondering what all of this might mean for their jobs, families and financial security.

The difficult part is most of us have very little control over these bigger issues. Most business owners cannot influence international trade policy, and employees certainly cannot. We can pay attention, plan where we can and make good decisions based on the information available to us, but ultimately there are many things happening around us that are outside our control.

That can be an uncomfortable place to be. It can also be a good reminder to focus our energy on the things we can influence, particularly how we treat the people around us.

At the city’s busiest fire and paramedic hall, first responders face a relentless workload

As a soft rain begins to fall between the concrete walls of “Hope Alley,” little feels further away than the place’s namesake.

Winnipeg Fire Paramedic Service crews have been called to the narrow downtown passage, named by Al Wiebe, a formerly homeless man turned advocate. People regularly pass through here, moving between the shelters, drop-ins and resource centres clustered around Main Street between Logan and Higgins avenues.

Against a wall, as the sky switches into night mode, a man sits bleeding from his nose, seemingly unaware of how he ended up with blood running down his T-shirt.

His situation has already set Winnipeg’s emergency response network in motion.

Meetings accomplish something that an email never could while respecting people’s time, building relationships

There are few workplace experiences that unite employees quite like complaining about meetings. Ask almost anyone what frustrates them at work, and somewhere on the list will be the meeting that could have been an email. We’ve all been there. Thirty minutes scheduled for a simple update somehow turns into an hour. Half the attendees don’t need to be there. Someone shares their screen for ten minutes trying to find the right document. The meeting ends with everyone wondering what was actually decided.

It’s no surprise that organizations are looking for ways to reduce meeting fatigue. Every hour spent in a meeting is an hour that isn’t spent serving customers, solving problems, writing reports, or completing projects. As calendars become increasingly crowded, employees often find themselves working longer days simply to catch up on the work they couldn’t accomplish because they were in meetings.

The obvious solution seems simple: hold fewer meetings. In many cases, that’s exactly the right answer. Routine updates, policy reminders, project status reports, and information that doesn’t require discussion can often be shared through email and chat platforms. Not every piece of information deserves everyone’s calendar.

But eliminating meetings altogether would create a different problem, especially as more organizations embrace hybrid and remote work.

It’s been a winding journey to the pros for PWHL’s first Manitoban bench boss

Christine Bumstead has never been one to spend much time wondering what might be on the horizon.

The Winnipegger has made a habit of focusing on the task at hand, leading to a wide variety of experiences behind the bench, culminating with her promotion to head coach of the PWHL’s Seattle Torrent in early June.

“I truthfully never look at things in (terms) of what is next or shooting for the next thing. I’ve never been someone with a five-year plan or anything,” Bumstead said during a recent telephone interview.

“I kind of laugh, five years ago I was in a classroom in Morden, Manitoba, teaching. So a lot can happen in five years that you can never really expect.”

Watching while we work

For many employees, the idea that their employer might be tracking how long they spend at their keyboard, how often they move their mouse, or whether they are actively working throughout the day feels unsettling. For many employers, however, workplace surveillance is increasingly viewed as another management tool, particularly as hybrid and remote work become more common. The recent news that TD plans to monitor certain employees’ activity during the workday has reignited a conversation that has been quietly growing for several years: where is the line between legitimate oversight and excessive monitoring?

The reality is that workplace surveillance is nothing new. Employers have long monitored attendance, reviewed security camera footage, tracked company vehicles using GPS, audited expense reports, and reviewed internet usage on company-owned devices. What has changed is the sophistication of the technology. Today’s software can record login times, monitor application usage, track keystrokes, capture screenshots, analyze email activity, and even generate reports ranking employees based on their perceived productivity.

This naturally raises an important question. Does increased surveillance actually make people work harder?

The answer is not nearly as straightforward as many organizations hope.

Temporary foreign workers rally to stay

Close to 100 temporary foreign workers, mainly from China, whose time in Canada is running out, rallied on the steps of the Manitoba legislature Tuesday to raise awareness of their situation.

They arrived in Manitoba before the federal government cut immigration levels — when international students and temporary foreign workers had a shot at becoming permanent residents if they met the requirements to stay, said Ruby Lu.

“We come here for a few years and we work for a few years, pay taxes. Some of us are already bought a house,” said Lu, whose work permit expires at the end of the year.

“So if our (permit) expires, we don’t know what to do,” she said in front of demonstrators holding signs with messages including “we love Manitoba” and “bring back TPP” — the temporary public policy used by the Manitoba provincial nominee program to support open work permits and prioritize permanent residency for select candidates.

Manitoba Innovates seeks to pump up in-person networking as artificial intelligence-created resumés become norm

The average job seeker has a resumé ghost writer: artificial intelligence.

Many Manitoba businesses are flooded by AI-generated resumés and, in turn, use AI to filter the tide. In response, Manitoba Innovates — a startup incubator — is launching an initiative to lead more in-person networking.

“We’re still looking for authenticity in people,” said Ron Cantiveros, manager of the incubator’s new career catalyst program.

“We’re looking for innovative ways to … attract talent, but also verify and qualify talent.”

‘Bright’ future: RCAF chief says spike in defence spending is boosting flight times

OTTAWA - One year into her new job as commander of the Royal Canadian Air Force, Lt.-Gen. Jamie Speiser-Blanchet said she could see an immediate effect of the federal government's defence spending boost: RCAF pilots are spending more time in the air.

In a recent interview with The Canadian Press, Speiser-Blanchet also acknowledged that preparing the entire service for what she described as a rapid and "giant transformation" — rebuilding the whole plane while it's flying, so to speak — sometimes gives her pause.

"It's that pace of change sometimes that worries me a little," she said.

She said while she’s "very comfortable" with the decisions made preparing for modernization, it's "the thought that there's something we should be doing now to make sure that we're set up for success in the future and that we're missing it" that keeps her up at night.

Great workplace shorts debate: time to free knees

We’ve reached the point where employers need to reconsider what “professional appearance” means. Spoiler alert: it has very little to do with the amount of fabric covering your shins.

Cleanup squad makes positive waves across city

The period after the snow melts isn’t when Winnipeg is at its most attractive.

As months of hidden trash and accumulated waste emerge, streets and sidewalks across the city quickly become covered in litter.

But Take Pride Winnipeg’s latest litter index has found the city looks cleaner than it did earlier this spring. Every area of Winnipeg showed improvement.

The organization’s overall litter index score dropped from 5.92 after the snow melted to 3.47 in its latest assessment. The index measures litter levels on a scale of one to 10, with one representing a perfectly clean area and 10 representing the worst levels of litter.

Ethics isn’t about big scandals — it’s about little decisions made each day

As an HR consultant, I spend a surprising amount of time talking about ethics. Not because organizations are filled with bad people, but because good people sometimes make poor decisions when they are stressed, feel misplaced entitlement or are convinced “everyone else does it.”

How great managers adapt without playing favourites

One of the most common pieces of leadership advice is also one of the most misunderstood: “Give each employee what they need to perform at their best.”

It sounds simple enough, until you become a manager and discover the minute you treat people differently, someone inevitably says, “Why does she get that?” or “How come he gets special treatment?”

Middle managers often find themselves caught, well, in the middle. Senior leaders expect them to bring out the best in every employee, while employees expect everyone to be treated the same. Those two expectations can feel completely at odds.

The truth is good management has never been about treating everyone identically. It has always been about treating everyone fairly.

FIFA World Cup, youth job gains gave the labour market a lift in June

OTTAWA - The FIFA World Cup and a better summer jobs market for young workers appeared to drive steady gains in Canada's labour market last month.

Employers added 18,000 jobs in June, Statistics Canada said Friday, mostly in part-time and private sector work.

That pushed the unemployment rate down a tenth of a point to 6.5 per cent, back to where it stood in January.

Employment gains narrowly topped economists’ expectations heading into the release but mark a slowdown from the 88,000 jobs added in May.

While the rest of us sleep in …

There is something a little unfair about waking up early on a statutory holiday.

The alarm goes off. You briefly forget what day it is. Then it hits you. Everyone else is sleeping in, planning a barbecue, packing the kids into the car for a trip to the beach or deciding whether they should mow the lawn today or put it off until tomorrow.

You, on the other hand, are putting on a uniform and trying to convince yourself coffee really can solve anything.

If you’ve ever worked retail, health care, emergency services, hospitality, public transit, utilities, manufacturing, airports, long-term care, broadcasting, customer service or any of the countless jobs that keep our communities running, you know exactly what I mean.

Eight Winnipeg teens leave high school with hopes, dreams and an uncertain, AI-flavoured future

Same as the gen-Zers who came before them, this year’s Grade 12 graduates were raised online and offline.

What sets the Class of 2026 apart is how it has been forced to reckon with the post-pandemic panic about student screen time.

In middle school, these students were told they could socialize only on digital playgrounds. After COVID-19 restrictions eased, a school cellphone ban was brought in. On their way out, they were assured future Manitoba children wouldn’t be able to access the same social media and artificial intelligence-powered chatbots they grew up with.

This group, born into an era of tech optimism, is the first to have had access to AI chatbots in all four years of high school.

Versatile violinist goes with the bow, from Bach to the Beatles and beyond

Can you hear the drums Fernando? How about the violin?

It’s Friday night at the Stadium Kitchen + Bar, 2935 Pembina Hwy. After delivering spot-on renditions of Neil Diamond’s Sweet Caroline and the Righteous Brothers’ Unchained Melody, solo violinist Allan Palmer polls a small yet enthusiastic audience, asking what they would like to hear next. A couple celebrating a birthday calls out for “some ABBA,” causing Palmer to launch into a medley of Gimme! Gimme! Gimme! (A Man After Midnight) and Fernando, two of the Swedish pop group’s biggest hits.

Moving freely around the room, the 26-year-old, stylishly attired in a black buttoned shirt, dark trousers and polished leather shoes, follows that up with a hip-swaying version of Madonna’s La Isla Bonita before segueing into La Vie en Rose, a plaintive melody popularized 90 years ago by French singer Edith Piaf.

Later, during a short break, Palmer reports that his vast repertoire covers everything from Bach to the Beatles, a major reason why he gets booked regularly for gatherings such as weddings and charity events, not to mention the odd lounge date.

Questions about resume gaps are expected. Here’s how job seekers can address them

NEW YORK (AP) — When Monique Di Liberto began looking for a paying job after putting her career on pause to parent full-time, she felt paralyzed by self-doubt.

“Who do you think you are trying this after 17 years?" Di Liberto recalled asking herself. "You have no business doing this.”

The fear and uncertainty she felt is familiar to many people seeking work after an absence from the job market. Whether they lost a position during mass layoffs or needed to leave one to care for an ill loved one, job applicants can expect questions about employment history lapses to surface during screenings and interviews.

“You have to address it honestly and directly,” said Andy Decker, CEO of Goodwin Recruiting, a candidate recruitment and placement firm. “Make sure that you’ve included anything you did during that time. Did you get certifications? Did you volunteer?”

Eager to work, teens find a frustrating summer job search

NEW YORK (AP) — Jaelyn Chester will wait your tables or stock your shelves. She’ll wash your dishes or scrub your toilets. If only someone would give the 17-year-old a chance.

“I’ve been looking everywhere,” says Chester, an A+ student, high school basketball star and aspiring engineer who has blanketed her community with dozens of applications. “I’m not unemployed because I’m incompetent. I’m unemployed because nobody’s hiring.”

The summer job, a rite-of-passage for generations of American teenagers, isn’t so easy to come by.

About one-third of 16- to 19-year-olds in the U.S. were employed last summer, federal data show, down from a peak of about 60% in the late 1970s. Experts’ pessimistic forecasts are combining with reports from frustrated jobless young people around the country to form a seasonal outlook far from bathed in sunshine.