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Pond Inlet

Pond Inlet (Mittimatalik) is a small, predominantly Inuit community in the Qikiqtaaluk Region of Nunavut, Canada, located on northern Baffin Island. To the Inuit the name of the place "is and always has been Mittimatalik." The Scottish explorer Sir John Ross had named an arm of the sea that separates Bylot Island from Baffin Island as Pond's Bay, and the hamlet now shares that name. On 29 August 1921, the Hudson's Bay Company opened its trading post near the Inuit camp and named it Pond Inlet, marking the expansion of its trading empire into the High Arctic.

At the 2021 Canadian census the population, which is predominantly Inuit, was 1,555, a decrease of 3.7% from the 2016 census

Pond Inlet, the largest community in northern Baffin Island—part of the Arctic Cordillera—with mountains visible from all sides, is called the "Jewel of the North". At the ice flow edge there is an abundance of wildlife, including polar bears, caribou, wolves, Arctic foxes, ringed seal, and narwhals. It attracts hundreds of visitors each year, who travel by air or by cruise ship. The Nattinnak Visitors Centre on Tasiujaq (Eclipse Sound) which overlooks Bylot Island, showcases Pond Inlet artists. The Sirmilik National Park on Bylot Island, the Tamaarvik Territorial Park, and the Qilaukat Thule site are near the hamlet.

Geography
Mittimatalik, which literally means "the place where the landing place is" —known in English as Pond Inlet—is located on the northerly tip of Baffin Island in the Lancaster Sound region on the east side of Eclipse Sound.

The region has one of Canada's most inhospitable climates—with long, dark winters and temperatures averaging -35 C. By 2021, Pond Inlet with a population of 1,555, along with Clyde River with 1,181 and Qikiqtarjuaq with 593, comprised the population of the Arctic Cordillera—about 3,300 people. Most of the people who live in the region survive by hunting, fishing, and trapping.

Significant geographic features near Pond Inlet include its ice edge which attracts a diversity of wildlife, particularly ringed seals, Arctic cod, murres and some other sea birds that thrive there, because of its "greater access to preferred foods".

A 30 km wide arm of the sea separates Pond Inlet from Bylot Island, a large uninhabited island of 11067 km2. The waterways between Bylot Island and Baffin Island are Navy Board Inlet, which opens into Lancaster Sound and Tasiujaq, which opens to Baffin Bay. Navy Board Inlet is the entrance to the Northwest Passage. Tasiujaq separates Pond Inlet from Bylot Island and has a series of deeply cut inlets west of Pond Inlet, including Milne Inlet, a small inlet, flows south from Navy Board Inlet at the confluence of Tasiujaq. The Pond Inlet region, including Bylot Island, is covered by the Arctic Cordillera, a terrestrial ecozone in Canada, characterized by a vast, deeply dissected chain of mountain ranges. There are mountains visible from all sides of Pond Inlet. From the summit of Mount Herodier at 765 m, which is 15 km east of the hamlet, the entire area is visible. Inuit from Pond Inlet travel to the Island regularly and its mountains form a backdrop to the hamlet's landscape.

Bylot Island along with Sirmilik National Park, is a protected area. The Bylot Island Migratory Bird Sanctuary, which is across Tasiujaq from Pond Inlet, has been a federally protected area since 1962 and is the second largest Migratory Bird Sanctuary (MBS). It was created to protect the nesting grounds of thick-billed murre, black-legged kittiwake and greater snow goose.

In 2016, an Elder and a youth from Pond Inlet joined Parks Canada's archaeologists to excavate one of the sod houses at the Thule site, known as Qaiqsut, in Bylot Island's Sirmilik National Park—one of Canada's most northerly parks. The site, which still has a handful of sod houses, had been used by the ancestors of Inuit for centuries, and had also been used by Scottish whalers 200 years ago.

Mary River, with its fresh water lake, which is about 160 km south of Pond Inlet—where caribou graze in the summer season—was an annual meeting place for the semi-nomadic Inuit for hundreds of years.

Pond Inlet Inuit have names for about 150 geographic features in the area immediately surrounding the hamlet that have been added to detailed maps in a collaboration between the Inuit Heritage Trust Incorporated (IHTI) and Canada-Nunavut Geoscience Office (CNGO). The sound which forms the entrance to the open sea west of the hamlet is called Tursukattak, or ᑐᕐᓱᑲᑦᑕᒃ in Inuktitut syllabics, —"heading west from a narrow passage to a large opening" as it resembles the narrow entrance of an igloo. One of the place names refers to Captain James Bannerman, a Scottish whaler of the 1875 British Arctic Expedition, whose great-grandson is a resident of Pond Inlet.

Demographics
In the 2021 Canadian census conducted by Statistics Canada, Pond Inlet had a population of 1,555 living in 365 of its 466 total private dwellings, a change of NaN% from its 2016 population of 1,617. With a land area of 170.83 km2, it had a population density of in 2021.

Of the total population in 2021, about 49.8% were female and 50.2% male. There were 1,345 Indigenous peoples (1,335 Inuit and 10 First Nations) and 110 non-Indigenous people. Compared to the rest of Canada, Pond Inlet's population is fairly young with 36.7% of the population being under 15 compared to 16.3% for Canada as a whole. The average age of people in Pond Inlet is 26.6, compared to Nunavut at 28.3 and the general Canadian population at 41.9.

According to the Qikiqtani Truth Commission, in 2013, 1,549 people—92% of them Inuit—lived in Pond Inlet.

Pond Inlet's population in 1976 was 504 people, and within a 400 km radius, of what was to become the Mary River Mine, there were 2,209 people. By the 2021 census there were 6,670 people in the same area.

Wildlife
By 2011, many Inuit continued to live off the land in the Pond Inlet area. Wildlife in the region includes caribou, polar bears, Arctic foxes, ermines, lemmings, and Arctic hares. The coastal waters have walrus, seals, beluga whales (white whale), and narwhals. A report on community histories, said that an important part of the traditional diet in Pond Inlet came from ringed seals.

A 1982 article in the journal Arctic based on 1979 studies of the Pond Inlet ice edge, observed the behaviours of northern fulmars (Fulmarus glacialis), black-legged kittiwakes (Rissa tridactyla), thick-billed murres (Uria lomvia), and black guillemots (Cepphus grylle), narwhals (Monodon monoceros), beluga whales (Delphinapterus leucas), Arctic cod (Boreogadus saida), and ringed seals (Pusa hispida). Researchers found that both ringed seals and Arctic cod preferred land fast ice and that the Arctic cod that remained close to the undersurface of land fast ice, were larger and older than those offshore.

The variety of wildlife so close to the hamlet is one of its tourist attractions.

Mittimatalik Hunters and Trappers Organization
Pond Inlet's Mittimatalik Hunters and Trappers Organization (MHTO) have been actively participating in discussions regarding Baffinland's Phase 2 Proposal for expansion of the Mary River project by submitting presentations to the Qikiqtani Inuit Association's (QIA). The Nunavut Impact Review Board was criticized for rushing through the process by limiting the number of questions each party could ask Baffinland. MHTO board member, elder and hunter Elijah Panipakoocho expressed frustration with the process. The MHTO and the Hamlet of Pond Inlet said that the NIRB process was not supporting Inuit interests. Panipakoocho said that now the caribou are gone, and the seal that they used to hunt in Milne Inlet during the fall freeze-up are no longer abundant. MHTO chairperson, Eric Ootoovak, said that "This project deserves and needs more work, and more attention, and that is what we bring to the table. More questions, not less, are absolutely necessary...Instead of developing more questions based on what we've heard, our technical advisor has spent two days trying to find ways to cut corners and limit our incredibly important questions." Milne Inlet, where Baffinalnd have their port, is a "small inlet" that "opens into Eclipse Sound, a primary summering area for Nunavut's largest population of narwhal. After years of negotiations, communities say they still haven't been given a clear picture of how the mine will impact Inuit land use and hunting rights for themselves and following generations."

Place name
To the Inuit, the place "is and always has been Mittimatalik." The hamlet shares its name with an arm of the sea that separates Bylot Island from Baffin Island. The place name for the body of water, an arm of the ocean that separates Baffin Island from Bylot Island to the north – Pond's Bay – was chosen by the explorer John Ross in 1818 in honour of the English astronomer John Pond, at the time the sixth Astronomer Royal. The hamlet shares that English name, Pond Inlet, used by the early Scottish whalers and traders, the Sikaatsi. On 29 August 1921, when the Hudson's Bay Company opened its trading post near an Inuit camp called Pond's Inlet, they named the HBC post, Pond Inlet. Scottish explorer John Ross (1777–1856) with naming the body of water and arm of the sea between Bylot Island and Baffin Island—Pond Inlet—in his failed exploratory 1818 expedition organized by the British Admiralty to find the Northwest passage. There was no hamlet until the trading companies arrived much later in the 2oth century. In an Arctic whaling ship, the Isabella Ross produced a detailed map of the western coast of Greenland and the eastern coast of Baffin Island, naming dozens of capes, mountains, islands, and other geographical features after Scottish and English people and places. He named Pond Inlet after John Pond, a leading English astronomer who was Astronomer Royal from 1811 to 1835. During this first expedition to find the Passage, Ross became confused by a mirage of apparent mountains, at what he thought was the end of Lancaster Sound—a range he called "Croker Mountains"—and decided to turn back, much to the discouragement of Lieutenant William Edward Parry, who was the captain of the second ship in the 1818 expedition, the Alexander. Parry returned the next year and continued beyond the "Croker Hills" mountain mirage, and discovered the main axis of the Northwest Passage.More

Pond Inlet community histories
According to the 2013 Qikiqtani Truth Commission, the people of the region around Pond Inlet are known as Tununirmiut—"people of the shaded place" or Mittimatalingmiut—people of Mittimatalik."

Archaeologists have identified the four thousand years of land use—hunting and fishing on land, sea, and ice—in the Pond Inlet area as pre-Dorset people, Dorset, Thule, and modern Inuit.

Many Inuit in "present-day Pond Inlet are related to families in Igloolik". The Igloolik Inuit, are part of the Amitturmiut groups of Inuit—the historic Inuit groups that occupied the coast of northern Foxe Basin—encountered Scottish whalers and British explorers searching for the Northwest Passage in the 1820s. The Amitturmiut were semi-nomadic, travelled great distances on foot and by dog sled on traditional routes to follow the caribou and sea mammals, from hunting caribou to fishing spots.

The settlement that was later named Pond Inlet "grew along a shoreline inhabited as long as any other part of Eclipse Sound— Tasiujaq. Tasiujaq—which has several arms—is a natural Qikiqtaaluk Region waterway through the Arctic Archipelago that separates Bylot Island from Baffin Island.

Starting in 1903, Scottish entrepreneurs had set up a small whaling station at Igarjuaq. Other non-Inuit (Qallunaat) traders established trading posts in the area. There was some contact with Inuit during the short annual whaling season. By 1903, the whaling industry was declining and the year-round station closed down. The area used by non-Inuit traders at that time "extended 65 kilometres from Button Point on Bylot Island to Salmon River, which was near Mittimatalik.

During the 1920s, the Hudson's Bay Company (HBC) trading post, Anglican and Catholic mission stations, the Royal Canadian Mounted Police post were established. In 1922, the RCMP built a detachment at Pond Inlet. The Commission reported on community histories, explaining how an important part of the traditional diet in Pond Inlet came from ringed seals. The report also noted that preserved cultural objects provided archaeological evidence of a "rich material and intangible culture" in the area. Among these were two "superb" angakkuq (shamans) Dorset period masks from Button Point, that had been carved c. 500-1000 CE and are now in the permanent collection of the Canadian Museum of History.

The angakkuq masks were originally collected by Guy Mary-Rousselière, a French-Canadian anthropologist, missionary Catholic priest, who spent 56 years in the Canadian Arctic including 36 years in Mittimatalik, from 1958 until his 23 April 1994 death there at the age of 81. Father Mary, as he was known, "died in a fire at the Catholic mission in Pond Inlet"—a "wise and somewhat eccentric elder of the church".

In 1923, Nuqallaq, following Inuit customary law killed a fur trader Robert Janes, originally from Newfoundland, in Pond Inlet following the communities collective decision to sanction Janes for his dangerous behaviour. Janes had "reportedly threatened the Inuit and their valuable sled dogs". Nuqallaq was tried according to Canadian law and his wife's testimony in his defence was recorded by Father Mary-Rousselière. Nuqallaq was found guilty and sentenced to ten years of hard labour in the Stony Mountain Penitentiary. In her 2002 non-fiction, Arctic Justice: On Trial for Murder, Pond Inlet, 1923, Shelagh Grant said that the trial and sentence were motivated by "Canada's international political concerns for establishing sovereignty over the Arctic." In his 2017 non-fiction Thou Shalt Do No Murder: Inuit, Injustice, and the Canadian Arctic, Kenn Harper said that the trial "marked a collision of two cultures with vastly different conceptions of justice and conflict resolution...It hastened the end of the Inuit traditional way of life and ushered in an era in which Inuit autonomy was supplanted by dependence on traders and police, and later missionaries".

When the first hospital was built in 1962, in what is now Nunavut—the Baffin Regional Hospital in Iqaluit—pregnant Inuit women were sent there to deliver their babies.

In 1964, the Cape Dorset (now Kinngait) art studio manager, Terrence Ryan, travelled to several communities in North Baffin, provided drawing materials, commissioned and collected drawings from local Inuit Pond Inlet, Clyde River, Arctic Bay and Igloolik, which resulted in a collection of approximately 1,860 sheets of drawings — drawn by 159 local residents. It was a time of "social, economic and spiritual upheaval" and the images recorded and reflected that experience in the northern hamlets. The drawings were digitized and published online by the Agnes Etherington Art Centre.

Inuit youth from Pond Inlet were taken from their families and sent to the Churchill Vocational School in Manitoba, which operated from 9 September 1964 to 30 June 1973. The students were housed in hostels that were segregated based on the students' religious affiliation—Roman Catholic or Anglican. According to the final report of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission of Canada (2008 to 2015), organized by the parties of the Indian Residential Schools Settlement Agreement, the Churchill Vocational Centre in northern Manitoba, housed Inuit youth from Pond Inlet and about 16 other remote hamlets—all at that time still part of the Northwest Territories—Nunavut was created in 1999. Some of the students at the Indigenous residential school at Churchill travelled "staggering" distances with some Inuit communities separated by as much as 2,200 km. Over the years, the Churchill Vocational Centre had "provided academic and vocational training to about 1,000 to 1,200 Inuit youth". The September 2007 landmark compensation deal, the federal government-approved agreement amounted to nearly $2 billion in compensation to former students who had attended 130 schools. By 2008, different levels of government, including Tununiq MLA James Arvaluk and Nunavut Tunngavik Incorporated, worked with some former Churchill residential school students, as the school records had not been properly maintained, and many former students were not able to receive adequate and fair compensation. While at Churchill, the young Inuit met other young people from different regions and they discussed common problems and considered political change. The new organizations they founded upon returning to the Arctic, included the Inuit Tapiriit Kanatami (formerly the Inuit Tapirisat of Canada or ITK) in the eastern Arctic in 1971.

By the 1970s, Inuit had gradually "moved, or been moved, from land-based hunting and trapping camps to new settlements", like Pond Inlet, that had been developed in the eastern Arctic, and over the years, attempts had been made by the federal government, to integrate Inuit into a "modern industrial economy".

By the 1970s, the three main sections in Pond Inlet were the area around the cliff called Qaiqsuarjuk, the beach area known as Mittimatalik, and the upper hill area called Qaqqarmiut.

In the 1990s, in response to one of the recommendations of the 1992 Royal Commission on Aboriginal Peoples, three generations of Pond Inlet women participated in a project with author and researcher Nancy Wachowich to record and publish their stories. Apphia Agalakti Awa was born on the land in the Eastern High Arctic in 1931, for four decades lived the semi-nomadic life style travelling "across tundra and sea ice, between hunting camps, fishing spots, and trading posts." Mandatory federal day schools opened in Pond Inlet in 1960 and for families that lived on the land, the government built hostels in Igloolik, where even young children—like 8-year old Rhoda Kaukjak Katsak—were housed. Sandra Pikujak Katsak, was born in the regional hospital in Iqaluit as Pond Inlet did not have the hospital facilities. She grew up in Pond Inlet.

By the 2000s, the Aboriginal Healing Foundation through the Saluqat Committee's Mittimatalik Healing project in Pond Inlet were providing on-the-land healing camps where elders and residential school survivors addressed many issues related to the aftermath of the residential schools experience.

Mixed economy: wage-based and traditional subsistence
Pond Inlet's economy is mixed—including both traditional subsistence and wage-based activities. The wildlife economy, "including hunting, fishing, trapping and gathering...continues to play an important role in Pond Inlet and contributes to the foundation of Inuit culture and economy". As part of the decentralization process that was adopted by the new Nunavut government as a job creation strategy, Pond Inlet became the Qikiqtani regional centre for Nunavut's Department of Economic Development and Transportation. Growth sectors in Nunavut include arts and crafts and wildlife harvesting for future economic development.

When Nunavut was established, its government adopted a decentralized strategy for job creation. As part of the decentralization process, Pond Inlet became the Qikiqtani regional centre for Nunavut's Department of Economic Development and Transportation. The government is now the largest employer in Pond Inlet. Growth sectors in Nunavut include small businesses, usually related to serving the community, tourism, arts and crafts and wildlife harvesting.

Employment areas include sales and service, social science, education, "government service and religion occupations, business finance and administration, trades, transport and equipment operators."

Pond Inlet has a higher unemployment rates than most of Nunavut.

When announcing lay-offs in November 2019, Baffinland said that 586 contract employees were affected, which included 96 Inuit.

Tourism
As a tourist destination, Pond Inlet is considered one of Canada's "Jewels of the North". It is one of the most picturesque communities with mountain ranges visible in all directions. Icebergs are most often accessible from the community within walking distance or a short snowmobile ride in winter. Pond Inlet boasts a nearby floe edge, several dozen glaciers, explorable ice caves, and many grand and picturesque inlets. Barren-ground caribou, ringed seal, narwhals and polar bears are just some of the wildlife that can be encountered while travelling out on the land. The area is also home to Sirmilik National Park (Inuktitut: "the place of glaciers" ), name for the glaciers that can be observed there.

By 1999, Pond Inlet was receiving about 1,500 visitors from six to eight cruise ships with tours usually organized around the hamlet's newly built Nattinnak Visitor Centre and the Rebecca P. Idlout Public Library and archives. The Nattinnak Centre offers a variety of on-shore programs, which may include a walking tour of the hamlet, a visit to the Qilaukat Thule site near Salmon River, and/or a cultural performance—with a focus on the creation of Nunavut. Pond Inlet carvers, artists, performers, and others benefit from this "locally-generated economic activity." In 1996, the Rebecca P. Idlout library was moved to its current location in the building it shares with the Nattinnak centre. The building, which is on the waterfront, overlooks Tasiujaq and Bylot Island. The library, which first opened in November 1988, was named after Idlout, who was a graduate of the Nunavut Teacher Education Program and was very involved in young people's education in Nunavut.

Tununiq Sauniq Co-op
The Tununiq Sauniq Co-operative, a member of Arctic Co-operatives Limited, was incorporated in 1968. In Pond Inlet, businesses include a retail store, convenience store, hotel, fuel delivery, Yamaha snowmobile and ATV repair shop, cable television services and property rentals. It serves the community by managing contracts and delivering goods and services to the citizens of Pond Inlet. Some of the services the Co-op provides are: school bus services, Canadian North airline agents, Qilaut heavy equipment rentals and services, construction contracts, TV cable services, a grocery and department store, Yamaha snowmobile and ATV repair shop, and others. It also has the largest hotel in the community, the Sauniq Inns North Hotel.

Inuit land use and occupation
The Inuit Tapiriit Kanatami (ITK) initiated the 1973 Inuit Land Use and Occupancy Project (ILUOP). The ILUOP "presented a detailed, comprehensive, and verifiable basis for the claim that Inuit used and occupied an area in excess of 2.8 million square kilometres at the time the ILUOP was completed in the Northwest Territories and northeast Yukon". Hugh Brody (1943–), who was an anthropologist, associated with the Scott Polar Research Institute, operated by the University of Cambridge, and a Canada Research Chair at the University of the Fraser Valley in British Columbia. did extensive field work in Pond Inlet in the 1970s, as a research officer with the Northern Science Research Group. In 1976–78 he coordinated the land use mapping in the North Baffin region for the Inuit Land Use and Occupancy Project and assembled accounts of Inuit perceptions of land occupancy across the Arctic which were included in the Project's final publications.

In the mid-1980s there were two "longitudinal surveys of local economic changes in Pond Inlet" undertaken and more data was gathered in 1997. At that time, job opportunities remained limited. There was some expectation for increased employment with the creation of the new Nunavut government.

In Pond Inlet in 2006, the Mary River Inuit Knowledge Study (MRIKS) began with a series of workshops and interviews that were also undertaken in Arctic Bay, Clyde River, Sanirajak (Hall Beach), and Igloolik from 2007 and 2010. MRIKS, which was informed by the 1976 ILAOP, asked participants about "Inuit use and understanding of the land, caribou, marine mammals, fish, birds and other land mammals." Participants were asked about the "names for the major land and water features and thirty-six key words were recorded. The study included Inuit Heritage Trust place names. The Qikiqtani Inuit Association had outstanding concerns about the interpretation of MRIKS data and impacts, and how traditional knowledge from MRIKS will be integrated into the Final Environmental Impact Statement.

In June 2019, at a Baffinland Iron Mines Corporation's Mary River Mine technical review meeting in Pond Inlet as part of the Nunavut Impact Review Board (NIRB) process, the Qikiqtani Inuit Association presented their study that they had compiled with residents of the nearest community to Mary River Mine—Pond Inlet. Pond Inlet had raised concerns Baffinland contracted article that seemed to "reduce traditional knowledge or Inuit Qaujimajatuqangit (IQ) to static data". QIA conducted interviews with 35 Pond Inlet residents on "how they live their daily life, including where they hunt, fish and just enjoy the outdoors" and used Google Earth mapping to "mark hunting routes, burial sites and other areas of importance to the community".

The creation of Nunavut
In 1976, the nonprofit organization, the Inuit Tapirisat of Canada (ITC), now known as the Inuit Tapiriit Kanatami—who represent all Canadian Inuit—submitted its first Inuit land claims proposal, calling for the creation of a new territory.

In 1999, Nunavut was established, brought about by the 1993 Nunavut Land Claims Agreement—the largest and most all-encompassing land claims and self-determination agreement in Canadian history.

Mineral development projects
Two large mineral development projects that were located close to Pond Inlet included Nanisivik Mine which operated from 1976 until 2002. and Baffinland Iron Mine Corporation's open-pit iron ore mine—the Mary River Mine has been operational since 2014 and is now seeking major expansion which includes a railway and a dramatic increase in shipping.

In a 2000 article in the journal Arctic, co-authors reported that "[m]any of the obstacles to development...identified in 1987 still persist"—"lack of infrastructure, insufficient local control of economic forces, and sometimes inappropriate development models". Much of the literature on northern development was "triggered" by potential mega-project hydrocarbon and mineral development where discussions focused on comparisons of the "relative merits of the new 'formal' economy and the traditional...informal economy". According to a 2013 Inuit Studies journal article based on archival records of the Department of Indian Affairs and Northern Development and the Department of Energy, Mines, and Resources, the decision-making process surrounding development in the eastern Arctic was flawed. The researchers examined the "relationship between Inuit as hunters and Inuit as wage earners" with reference to "contemporary mining development in Nunavut".

Baffinland Iron Mine Corporation's Mary River Mine
In 2014, after years of negotiations, the Baffinland Iron Mine Corporation opened its open-pit iron ore mine—the Mary River Mine—located 160 km south-southwest of Pond Inlet, the nearest community. In 2011, the Luxembourg-based ArcelorMittal SA—the largest steel maker in the world—and an American hedge fund, had jointly purchased the Baffinland Iron Mine Corporation. Their plans included a proposed northern railway that would carry the iron ore to tidewater. The mine has been the source of much debate over cultural and environmental issues.

In Baffinland's 2019 annual report, Pond Inlet reported that in 2018 there were 49 people employed by Baffinland in Pond Inlet and the number was decreasing. Concerns were raised for hunters - the lack of animals was noticeable. There were concerns about sound pollution and ships in summer affecting wildlife as there are fewer seals and narwhals. It was also noted that QIA received the royalties not the affected communities.

The mine has attracted international attention for its planned phase two expansion, that would see a dramatic increase in shipping from its Milne Inlet port in Tasiujaq, near Pond Inlet, through a narwhal habitat in the waters near Greenland. Milne Inlet is a "small inlet" that "opens into Eclipse Sound, a primary summering area for Nunavut's largest population of narwhal". Ships from Baffinland's port in Milne Inlet will have to enter and exit Tallurutiup Imanga National Marine Conservation Area—a national marine conservation area. In a 2021 letter to the Nunavut Impact Review Board, the mayor of Pond Inlet, Joshua Arreak, said that the hamlet would not support the phase two project unless Baffinland agreed to slow down their increase in production to yearly increments of 1.5 million tonnes per year."

The Kingdom of Denmark, concerned by the environmental impacts of the next phase of Baffinland's Mary River Mine on nearby Greenland, an autonomous territory of Denmark, has been included by the Canadian government in the Nunavut Impact Review Board assessment process for the planned expansion. The iron ore shipping lanes, which go through a narwhal habitat, will threaten this population which is just beginning to return after a hundred years. The two weeks of Nunavut Impact Review Board environmental hearings regarding the Mary River Mine ended on 6 February. By 6 February peaceful protesters from Pond Inlet and Arctic Bay were blockading the Mary River Aerodrome and trucking road at Mary River Mine. They are concerned that expansion would result in an "increase the number of ore carriers that visit during the ice free season". The expansion would double output from 6 to 12 million tonnes a year and would include a railway. It would increase shipping through its port at Milne Inlet and impact a crucial habitat for narwhal in the Canadian Arctic. Elder and hunter Elijah Panipakoocho, who is a Pond Inlet's Mittimatalik Hunters and Trappers Organization board member, "participated in early wildlife research" undertaken before the mine opened in 2014.

Nunavut communities had serious concerns about the mine's proposed expansion and were engaged in protests and public hearings. On 4 February 2021, as the two-week long scheduled Nunavut Impact Review Board review on the Baffinland expansion was nearing its end, eight hunters from Pond Inlet and Arctic Bay, set up a peaceful blockade at Mary River project's tote road and airstrip. The communities of Pond Inlet and Arctic Bay are nearest the mine site. The hunters feel their wildlife economy is threatened—protesting the expansion and the review process itself. The protesters have formed a line of snowmobiles, their gear-laden wooden sleds, and their tent. The hunters are asking other protesters to not destroy Baffinland's equipment. Dozens of Baffinland's Inuit employees are being paid to stay home to avoid bringing COVID-19 into the small communities. The vast majority of mine workers are non-Inuit who are flown into the work camps.

A concern is the dust from the tote road. Pond Inlet residents are worried that the water and the food chain will be contaminated with trace metals. An added concern is that the water and the food chain will be contaminated with trace metals. Baffinland had built a tote road to carry truckloads of iron ore from Mary River Mine to Milne Inlet instead of the special cold-weather railway and a new port, Steensby Inlet, planned in 2011 and proposed in 2008. With a global decrease in the price of iron ore, Baffinland said that the railway and Steensby Inlet port was too expensive an option. The bulk carrier Federal Tiber departed from Milne Inlet on 8 August 2015, with the first shipment of ore from the mine. In 2021, Baffinland said that the "railway and a new indoor crushing facility will decrease dust."

Geological Survey
In 2017 and 2018, researchers from the Geological Survey of Canada and the Département des sciences de la Terre et de l’atmosphère, at the Université du Québec à Montréal conducted extensive fieldwork for the "bedrock mapping for the GEM-2 North Baffin project" in the area around Pond Inlet and part of Sirmilik National Park which is situated on Bylot Island, as well as in the area bordering Steensby Inlet and the Barnes Ice Cap, including included the Baffinland Iron Mines Corporation's Mary River iron mine.

Environmental concerns
In 1991, the Northern Contaminants Program (NCP) began monitoring the levels of contaminants in wildlife species that continued to be an important part of the traditional diet of Inuit, such as beluga, ringed seals, and arctic char. Their third assessment focused on persistent organic pollutants (POP)s. In Pond Inlet a specific focus was placed on sea run Arctic char.

Transportation
Pond Inlet is most readily accessible by aircraft through a connection in Iqaluit, Nunavut's capital, to Pond Inlet Airport. The ocean is ice free for as long as three and a half months when cruise ships bring tourists to visit and goods can be transported to the community by sealift cargo carrying ships. Fresh foods such as fruits, vegetables and milk are flown from Montreal to Pond Inlet several times a week, a distance of about 3000 km.

Because of such great distances the cost of food and other materials such as construction supplies can be much higher than that of southern Canada. Milk is approximately $3.75/L, and carbonated drinks can be as much as $4.50/can.

Although the community is not more than 2.5 km long, snowmobiles and ATV four-wheelers are the main modes of transportation. With the decentralization of the Nunavut government and increased economic opportunities in the community, the number of vehicles has been increasing.

Education
Ulaajuk Elementary School and Nasivvik High School together teach kindergarten through grade 12 to approximately 450 students. Nunavut Arctic College hosts a variety of programs for adult learners. Pond Inlet is also the headquarters of the Qikiqtani School Operations which runs schools throughout the Qikiqtaaluk Region. Nunavut uses the Alberta curriculum, which may not be appropriate for high schools in Nunavut.

Broadband communications
The community has been served by the Qiniq network since 2005. Qiniq is a fixed wireless service to homes and businesses, connecting to the outside world via a satellite backbone. The Qiniq network is designed and operated by SSi Canada. In 2017, the network was upgraded to 4G LTE technology, and 2G-GSM for mobile voice.

Climate
Pond Inlet has a polar arctic climate (ET) with long cold winters and short cool summers. Pond Inlet's average high for the year is -11.1 C while the average low for the year is -18.0 C. The daily mean for the coldest month, February, is −34.7 C. The daily mean for the warmest month, July, is 6.6 C. The record high for Pond Inlet is 22.0 C on 11 July 1991. The record low for Pond Inlet is -53.9 C on 12 February 1979.

Notable people associated with Pond Inlet

 * Siku Allooloo, an Inuk/Haitian Taíno writer, artist, facilitator and land-based educator from Denendeh ("the Land of the People"), Northwest Territories and Pond Inlet
 * Titus Allooloo, a business man and former territorial level politician
 * Sheila Burnford, a Scottish writer who wrote One Woman's Arctic (1973) about her two summers in Pond Inlet
 * Joe Enook, an Inuk politician who was elected to represent the district of Tununiq in the Legislative Assembly of Nunavut
 * Elijah Erkloo, a former territorial level politician
 * Joseph Idlout, an Inuk featured on the former Canadian two-dollar bill
 * Ruben Komangapik, an Inuk artist primarily known for his mixed media sculptures
 * Jobie Nutarak, an Inuk politician who was elected to represent the district of Tununiq in the Legislative Assembly of Nunavut
 * Karen Nutarak, an Inuk politician who was elected to represent the district of Tununiq in the Legislative Assembly of Nunavut
 * Elisapee Ootoova, an Inuk elder who preserved and promoted Inuit traditional knowledge
 * Katharine Scherman, an American author who wrote Spring on an Arctic Island (1956) about a research trip to Bylot Island in 1954

title: Pond Inlet


text:
Middle management

Middle management is the intermediate management level of a hierarchical organization that is subordinate to the executive management and responsible for "team leading" line managers and/or "specialist" line managers. Middle management is indirectly (through line management) responsible for junior staff performance and productivity.

Unlike line management, middle management is considered to be a senior (or semi-executive) position as middle managers are authorised to speak and act on behalf of the organisation to line managers, junior staff and customers. Included in this level of management are division, plant and department managers.

A 2023 study in the American Journal of Sociology found that middle management has increased over time and that the role of middle management increasingly revolves around the task of collaboration rather than supervision.

Functions of a middle manager
A middle manager is a link between the senior management and the lower (junior) levels of the organization. Due to involvement into day-to-day running of a business, middle managers have the opportunity to report valuable information and suggestions from the inside of an organization. They are in charge of putting into practice guidelines established previously in the strategic plans by top level managers. Moreover, the middle manager is a channel of communication within the organization, as they pass on major decisions of executives and the main goals of an organization to lower levels of employees. This contributes to better coordination between workers and makes a company more united.

The primary responsibility of a middle manager is to implement a strategy, created by the executive level, in the most efficient way possible. In order to reach the target goals, a manager may adjust and interpret the initial plan. Other functions can be divided into three main categories: Middle managers are in charge of facilitating any changes needed in an organization and creating an effective working environment. They administer day-to-day routines, monitor performance and make sure everything is done in compliance with organization's needs. One of the most important functions of a middle manager is motivating, leading and inspiring their subordinates. This also includes building a team and supporting any team member when necessary. Strategic functions involve analyzing a subordinate group in terms of productivity and financial effectiveness, creating a strategy of improving the current situation and reporting to the executive management in the form of attending a boardroom meeting or a discussion.
 * Technical
 * Human resources
 * Strategic

Competencies
A number of competencies are critical to become an effective middle manager.
 * Leadership. The most important competency that consists of many skills. As an inherent leader, middle managers have to possess sense-making and persuading skills. They must be able to motivate, influence and guide their subordinates, become a role model for them, demonstrate the quality and the level of work contribution necessary for the organization and engage in continuous self-development and learning.
 * Decision-making. Ability to quickly solve the problems, make decisions under pressure and take responsibility for the outcome.
 * Creativity & Visioning. Managers should have a clear vision of the strategy implementation and be creative in overcoming the possible difficulties.
 * Performance management. Involves managing the performance of subordinates and, specifically, the line managers, effectively, by setting clear and measurable objectives for them and provide coaching. Middle managers must be also skilled in presenting, persuading and influencing people.

Middle manager vs. line manager
A middle management position is often mistakenly described as a similar to the line management one. However, there are some differences:
 * Middle manager is a semi-executive position – line managers are promoted to become middle managers. Thus, middle managers enjoy greater salary, benefits and a closer position to a boardroom.
 * System of subordination – line managers are subordinate to middle managers. Middle managers are responsible for large teams and are unable to control performance of every single individual. Thus, direct or line manager measures the team performance and reports to the middle manager.
 * Set of duties – unlike line managers, who have a clear procedure of work and set of duties, middle managers have only target goals. The way of achieving those goals is decided by the manager independently.

Criticism
The role of middle management is subjected to a number of criticisms. This position is often seen as unnecessary and middle managers are blamed for holding back the organization from achieving its full potential and using the influence for their own purposes.

Influence
Middle management is often accused of possessing too much influence. Their central position in an organization allows them to influence strategy and actions in "both upward and downward direction". When supplying information to the executive level, middle managers interpret it subjectively and may insinuate it with their own opinion and evaluation. Further, proximity to the boardroom makes it easy for the manager to promote their own interests, by "synthesizing" the information and presenting data from a certain strategic perspective. The same level of influence can be exploited by a middle manager towards the lower staff.

Resistance
Middle managers' reluctance to lose control in their teams and satisfaction with a settled situation could lead to their resistance in any changes in the strategy or direction of an organization. Usually, the resistance does not take an aggressive form such as refusal to carry out tasks or unconcealed confrontation, but result in a lack of support and eagerness to convey only those tasks, impact of which is clearly visible to the top management. This creates barriers to a growth of a company and lags the overall working process.

Necessity
The overall necessity of middle managers in an organization is questioned. They are said to be too costly, non-effective and constantly under-performing employees. It has been stated that middle managers do not carry out their main duties of linking the organization and reporting effectively, which leads to a block of communication between different levels of staff. Thus, as rapid growth of globalization put pressures on businesses in terms of cost effectiveness and speed of information flow within the organization, middle management make companies less flexible and competitive.

Future
Development of information technology enabled an increase in the span of control and reduced the need for middle management. Moreover, an increasingly large number of modern organizations become flatter and downsized in the pursuit of flexibility, higher competitiveness and innovation. According to David Williams, flat organizations promote greater intercommunication and efficiency of the workers. As a result, many organizations are being restructured, middle management is being reduced and their roles are thought to be out-dated and unnecessary.

At the same time, there is still a need in a middle manager as an employee and they continue playing a significant role in organizations, specifically in setting an overall strategy and targets. Changes in the global market forced them to become more flexible, stress-resistant, acquire new skills.

license: Creative Commons - Attribution Share-Alike - https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/

title: Middle management


text:
Hiawatha National Forest

Hiawatha National Forest is a 894836 acre National Forest in the Upper Peninsula of the state of Michigan in the United States. Commercial logging is conducted in some areas. The United States Forest Service administers this National Forest; it is physically divided into two subunits, commonly called the Eastside 46.23333°N, -84.83333°W and Westside 46.13333°N, -86.66667°W.

Etymology
According to the forest service, it was "named after the Mohawk chief, Hiawatha, who brought about the confederation known as the Five Nations of the Iroquois. He was also the hero of Longfellow's poem, 'Hiawatha'."

Geography
In descending order of land area it lies in parts of Chippewa, Delta, Mackinac, Alger, Schoolcraft, and Marquette counties. Chippewa and Mackinac counties are in the East Unit, whereas the rest are in the West Unit. The smaller East Unit contains about 44% of the forest's area, whereas the larger West Unit has about 56%. Forest headquarters are located in Gladstone, Michigan. East Unit ranger district offices are located in Sault Ste. Marie and St. Ignace, while West Unit offices are in Manistique, Munising, and Rapid River.

The East Unit was a large infertile sandy area that was never homesteaded or developed. It was designated Marquette National Forest by President Theodore Roosevelt in 1909. This land was administered with Huron National Forest as the Michigan National Forest from 1918 until 1962, when it was transferred to Hiawatha. The forest was authorized to buy an additional 307000 acre in 1925 and 50000 acre in 1935. The government began purchasing land for the West Unit in 1928, this land and was designated Hiawatha National Forest in 1931. This unit was extensively replanted by the Civilian Conservation Corps.

The Hiawatha National Forest contains six designated wilderness areas:
 * Big Island Lake Wilderness
 * Delirium Wilderness
 * Horseshoe Bay Wilderness
 * Mackinac Wilderness
 * Rock River Canyon Wilderness
 * Round Island Wilderness

There are five National Wild and Scenic Rivers in the Forest: Carp River, Indian River, Sturgeon River, Tahquamenon River (East Branch), Whitefish River.

Ecology
Many wildlife species roam in this forest including timber wolves, white-tailed deer, golden eagles, black bears, moose, coyotes, bobcats, bald eagles, beavers, red foxes, river otters, Canadian lynxes, hawks, muskrats, weasels, sandhill cranes, minks, cougars, and wild turkeys.

The forest has over 100 mi of shoreline. Both units have shoreline on both Lake Superior and Lake Michigan; the east unit also has shoreline on Lake Huron and includes Round Island and its lighthouse. The West Unit borders Pictured Rocks National Lakeshore, which is administered by the National Park Service, and the Grand Island National Recreation Area, which is separately administered by the U.S. Forest Service.

Activities
Several lighthouses are located along the shores. The Point Iroquois Light is operated as a museum.

Hiking
A section of the 4,600 mi North Country Trail passes through the forest.

Camping
Hiawatha National Forest has many popular areas for camping tourism. Some of the campgrounds include the following:

 * AuTrain
 * Bay Furnace
 * Bay View, a 24-campsite campground located near Brimley on Lake Superior. It offers a secluded beach that many visitors enjoy.
 * Brevoort Lake
 * Camp 7 Lake
 * Carp River, 44 campsites located near the Mackinac Bridge; fishing is possible here.
 * Collwell Lake
 * Corner Lake
 * Flowing Well
 * Indian River
 * Island Lake
 * Lake Michigan: 35 campsites on Lake Michigan located near the Mackinaw Bridge
 * Little Bass Lake
 * Little Bay De Noc
 * Monocle Lake Campground, a 39-site campground located near Brimley near Lake Superior; it is a popular destination for RV camping.
 * Petes Lake Campground
 * Soldiers Lake Recreation Area
 * Three Lakes Campground
 * Widewaters Campground

title: Hiawatha National Forest


text:
Program management

Program management is the process of managing several related projects, often with the intention of improving an organization's performance. It is distinct from project management.

In practice and in its aims, program management is often closely related to systems engineering, industrial engineering, change management, and business transformation. In the defense sector, it is the dominant approach to managing large projects. Because major defense programs entail working with contractors, it is also called acquisition management, indicating that the government buyer acquires goods and services by means of contractors.

The program manager has oversight of the purpose and status of the projects in a program and can use this oversight to support project-level activity to ensure the program goals are met by providing a decision-making capacity that cannot be achieved at project level or by providing the project manager with a program perspective when required, or as a sounding board for ideas and approaches to solving project issues that have program impacts. The program manager may be well-placed to provide this insight by actively seeking out such information from the project managers, although in large and/or complex projects, a specific role may be required. However this insight arises, the program manager needs this in order to be comfortable that the overall program goals are achievable.

Overview and definition
Many programs focus on delivering a capability to change and are normally designed to deliver the organization's strategy or business transformation. Program management also emphasizes the coordinating and prioritizing of resources across projects, managing links between the projects and the overall costs and risks of the program.

The Project Management Institute, an American nonprofit professional association for project management, thusly summarizes: "a Program is a group of related projects managed in a coordinated manner to obtain benefits and control NOT available from managing them individually. Programs may include elements of related work outside of the scope of the discrete projects in the program... Some projects within a program can deliver useful incremental benefits to the organization before the program itself has completed."

In public sector work in Europe, the term normally refers to multiple change projects: projects that are designed to deliver benefits to the host organization, for example, the Office of Government Commerce for the UK government.

Many organizations only run one program at a time in the form of an overarching program containing all their projects. In Project Management Institute terminology, this is more likely to be a project portfolio than a program. Some larger organizations may have multiple programs each designed to deliver a range of improvements. Some organizations use the concept of systems engineering where others use program management.

Standards

 * Since 1999: MSP from AXELOS
 * Since 2007: PgMP from Project Management Institute

Key factors

 * Benefits: The key difference between a project and a program is that benefits are delivered within the program lifecycle compared to a project when they are delivered after the project has finished.
 * Governance: The structure, process, and procedure to control internal operations and changes to performance objectives. Governance must include a set of metrics to indicate the health and progress of the program in the most vital areas.
 * Alignment: The program must support a higher-level vision, goals, and objectives. These are set out in the program vision and blueprint, which defines the future state for the organization, sector or community that will be significantly changed.
 * Transformation: A program will deliver major change, whether it is within an organization, a sector or a community. As such, the management of change and transition is a key characteristic of a program, not just the building a major capability.
 * Assurance: Verify and validate the program, ensuring adherence to standards and alignment with the vision. Programs should always have an assurance strategy.
 * Management: Ensure accountability through regular reviews, and that management of projects, stakeholders and suppliers is in place.
 * Integration: Ensure that component parts fit together properly to make the intended whole. Optimize performance across the program value chain, functionally and technically.
 * Finances: Track basic costs together with wider costs of administering the program and also the costs of change and transition to achieve benefits.
 * Infrastructure: Allocation of resources influences the cost and success of the program. Infrastructure might cover offices, version control, and IT.
 * Planning: Develop the plan bringing together the information on projects, resources, timescales, monitoring, and control.
 * Improvement: Continuously assess performance; research and develop new capabilities, and systemically apply learning and knowledge to the program.

Comparison with project management
There are two different views of how programs differ from projects. In one view, projects deliver outputs, discrete parcels or "chunks" of change; programs create outcomes. In this view, a project might deliver a new factory, hospital or IT system. By combining these projects with other deliverables and changes, their programs might deliver increased income from a new product, shorter waiting lists at the hospital or reduced operating costs due to improved technology. The other view is that a program is nothing more than either a large project or a set (or portfolio) of projects. In this second view, the point of having a program is to exploit economies of scale and to reduce coordination costs and risks. The project manager's job is to ensure that the project succeeds. The program manager, on the other hand, is concerned with the aggregate outcome(s) or end-state result(s) of the collection of projects in a particular program. For example, in a financial institution, a program may include one project that is designed to take advantage of a rising market and another that is designed to protect against the downside of a falling market. The former seeks to leverage the potential upside; the latter to limit the possible downside. A simple analogy is Fix-a-Flat: this highly pressurized aerosol product injects a leak sealant into a punctured tire to stop the outflow of air (project A) and concurrently re-inflates the tire (project B), resulting together in the outcome that a tire that is once again functional (the program comprised projects A and B).

According to the view that "programs deliver outcomes, but projects deliver outputs," program management is concerned with doing the right projects. The program manager has been described as 'playing chess' and keeping the overview in mind, with the pieces to be used or sacrificed being the projects. In contrast, project management is about doing projects right. In other words, a successful project delivers on time, to budget, and to specification, whereas a successful program delivers long-term improvements to an organization. An organization should select the group of programs that most take it towards its strategic aims while remaining within its capacity to deliver the changes. On the other hand, the view that programs are simply large projects or sets of projects allows for when a program may need to deliver tangible benefits quickly.

According to one source, the key difference between a program and a project is the finite nature of a project – a project must always have a specific end date, else it is an ongoing program.

One view of the differences between a program and a project in business is that:
 * 1) A project is unique and is of definite duration. A program is ongoing and implemented within a business to consistently achieve certain results for the business.
 * 2) A project is designed to deliver an output or deliverable and its success will be in terms of delivering the right output at the right time and to the right cost.
 * 3) Program management includes management of projects which, together, improve the performance of the organization. A program's success will be measured in terms of benefits.
 * 4) Benefits are the measures of improvement of an organization and might include increased income, increased profits, decreased costs, improved market position (ability to compete), reduced wastage or environmental damage, more satisfied customers. In central or local government organizations, benefits might include providing a better service to the community.
 * 5) In the course of achieving required results, business programs will normally understand related business constraints and determine the processes required to achieve results based on resources allocated.  Improvement of processes is a continuous operation that very much contrasts a program from a project.
 * 6) In the course of achieving required results, business programs will normally understand related business constraints and determine the processes required to achieve results based on resources allocated.  Improvement of processes is a continuous operation that is in contrast to the temporary nature of a project.
 * 7) At the lowest level project managers coordinate individual projects. They are overseen by the program manager who accounts to the program sponsor (or board).
 * 8) There will normally be a process to change the predetermined scope of a project. Programs often have to react to changes in strategy and changes in the environment in which the organization changes.

Another view and another successful way of managing does not see any of the factors listed above as distinguishing projects from programs, but rather sees the program as being about portfolio management. On this view, program management is about selecting projects, adjusting the speed at which they run, and adjusting their scope, in order to the maximize the value of the portfolio as a whole, and as economic or other external conditions change. Still, some emphasize that whereas a portfolio consists of independent projects, a program is a collection of interdependent projects, adding a dimension of complexity to the management task.

Yet another view is that a program management is nothing more than a large, complex project, where the integration aspect of project management is more important than in smaller projects. Integration management is a key feature of the Project Management Institute's approach to project management. Yet again, some accept there is a distinction related to interdependencies between the elements of a project and a program. In this view, a program is a comparably loosely coupled system, whereas large, complex projects are tightly coupled. This difference makes the project program a more ambiguous task to manage, with more uncertainty, reflecting a higher degree of freedom and a management task more open to exploit opportunities as they arise or the program management becomes aware of them.

In practice, it is not clear that there is a clear-cut distinction. Projects (or programs) vary from small and simple to large and complex; what needs to be managed as a program in one culture or organization may be managed as a project in another.

title: Program management


text:
Management consulting

Management consulting is the practice of providing consulting services to organizations to improve their performance or in any how to assist in achieving organizational objectives. Organizations may draw upon the services of management consultants for a number of reasons, including gaining external (and presumably objective) advice and accessing consultants' specialized expertise regarding concerns that call for additional oversight.

As a result of their exposure and relationships with numerous organizations, consulting firms are typically aware of industry "best practices". However, the specific nature of situations under consideration may limit the ability or appropriateness of transferring such practices from one organization to another. Management consulting is an additional service to internal management functions and, for various legal and practical reasons, may not be seen as a replacement for internal management. Unlike interim management, management consultants do not become part of the organization to which they provide services.

Consultancies provide organizational change management assistance, development of coaching skills, process analysis, technology implementation, strategy development, or operational improvement services. Management consultants often bring their own proprietary methodologies or frameworks to guide the identification of problems and to serve as the basis for recommendations with a view to more effective or efficient ways of performing work tasks.

The economic function of management consulting firms is in general to help and facilitate the development, rationalization and optimization of the various markets pertaining to the geographic areas and jurisdictions in which they operate. However, the exact nature of the value of such a service model may vary greatly across markets and its description is therefore contingent.

History
Management consulting grew with the rise of management, as a unique field of study. One of the first management consulting firms was Arthur D. Little Inc., founded in 1886 as a partnership, and later incorporated in 1909. Although Arthur D. Little later became a general management consultancy, it originally specialized in technical research.

As Arthur D. Little focused on technical research for the first few years, the first management consultancy was that of Frederick Winslow Taylor, who in 1893 opened an independent consulting practice in Philadelphia. His business card read "Consulting Engineer – Systematizing Shop Management and Manufacturing Costs a Specialty". By inventing Scientific Management, also known as Taylor's method, Frederick Winslow Taylor invented the first method of organizing work, spawning the careers of many more management consultants. For example, one of Taylor's early collaborators, Morris Llewellyn Cooke, opened his own management consultancy in 1905. Taylor's method was used worldwide until industry switched to a method invented by W. Edwards Deming.

The initial period of growth in the consulting industry was triggered by the Glass–Steagall Banking Act in the 1930s, and was driven by demand for advice on finance, strategy and organization. From the 1950s onwards, consultancies expanded their activities considerably in the United States, and also opened offices in Europe and later in Asia and South America.

The management consulting firms Stern Stewart, Marakon Associates, and Alcar pioneered value-based management (VBM), or "managing for value", in the 1980s based on the academic work of Joel Stern, Bill Alberts, and Professor Alfred Rappaport. Other consulting firms including McKinsey and BCG developed VBM approaches. Value-based management became prominent during the late 1980s and 1990s.

The industry experienced significant growth in the 1980s and 1990s, gaining considerable importance in relation to national gross domestic product.

A period of significant growth in the early 1980s was driven by demand for strategy and organization consultancies. The wave of growth in the 1990s was driven by both strategy and information technology advice. In the second half of the 1980s, the big accounting firms entered the IT consulting segment. The then Big Eight, now Big Four, accounting firms (PricewaterhouseCoopers, KPMG, Ernst & Young and Deloitte Touche Tohmatsu) had always offered advice in addition to their traditional services, but after the late 1980s these activities became increasingly important in relation to the maturing market of accounting and auditing. By the mid-1990s these firms had outgrown those service providers focusing on corporate strategy and organization. While three of the Big Four legally divided the different service lines after the Enron scandal and the ensuing breakdown of Arthur Andersen, they are now back in the consulting business. In 2000, Andersen Consulting broke off from Arthur Andersen and announced their new name Accenture. The name change was effective starting January 1, 2001, and Accenture is currently the largest consulting firm in the world in employee headcount. They are publicly traded on the NYSE with ticker ACN.

The industry stagnated in 2001 before recovering after 2003 and then enjoying a period of sustained double-digit annual revenue growth until the financial crisis of 2007–2008. As financial services and government were two of the largest spenders on consulting services, the financial crash and the resulting public sector austerity drives hit consulting revenues hard. In some markets such as the UK there was a recession in the consulting industry, something which had never happened before or since. There has been a gradual recovery in the consulting industry's growth rate in the intervening years, with a current trend towards a clearer segmentation of management consulting firms. In recent years, management consulting firms actively recruit top graduates from Ivy League universities, Rhodes Scholars, and students from top MBA programs.

In more recent times, traditional management consulting firms have had to face increasing challenges from disruptive online marketplaces that are aiming to cater to the increasing number of freelance management consulting professionals.

Function
The functions of consulting services are commonly broken down into eight task categories. Consultants can function as bridges for information and knowledge, and external consultants can provide these bridging services more economically than client firms themselves. Consultants can be engaged proactively, without significant external enforcement, and reactively, with external pressure. Proactive consultant engagement is engaged mainly with aim to find hidden weak spots and improve performance, while the reactive consultant engagement is mostly aimed at solving problems identified by external stakeholders.

Marvin Bower, McKinsey's long-term director, has mentioned the benefits of a consultant's externality, that they have varied experience outside the client company.

Management consulting could be classified into two categories:
 * General management consulting, which concerns strategy, corporate finance, organization, environmental social and corporate governance, risk and compliance, and so forth. It entails questions that are relevant to the entirety of the client organization as a whole, on a management level.
 * Specialized management consulting, which concerns questions that are specific to a certain function or subset of the client organization, such as legal management consulting, financial management consulting, digital management consulting, technology management consulting, operations management consulting, and Executive search.

Management consulting often involves a mix of both of these categories. In the modern economic environment, management consulting firms are typically classified under the umbrella term of corporate service providers.

Consultants have specialized skills on tasks that would involve high internal coordination costs for clients, such as organization-wide changes or the implementation of information technology. In addition, because of economies of scale, consultants' focus on and experience in gathering information across markets and industries enables a higher cost-efficiency than if clients were to perform research themselves.

Big Three management consultancies
Three consulting firms are widely regarded as the Big Three or MBB:
 * McKinsey & Company
 * Boston Consulting Group
 * Bain & Company

Big Four accounting firms in the management consulting market
The Big Four audit firms (Deloitte, KPMG, PwC, Ernst & Young) have been working in the strategy consulting market since 2010. In 2013, Deloitte acquired Monitor Group—now Monitor Deloitte—while PwC acquired PRTM in 2011 and Booz & Company in 2013—now Strategy&. From 2010 to 2013, several Big Four firms have tried to acquire Roland Berger. EY followed the trend, with acquisitions of The Parthenon Group in 2014, and both the BeNeLux and French businesses of OC&C in 2016 and 2017, with all now under the EY-Parthenon brand. OC&C Strategy Consultants still independently operates 14 offices in over 10 countries, and is commonly referenced as a top consulting firm.

Deloitte has been named as the largest consulting firm for six years running as per Gartner's annual consulting report. Deloitte Consulting is broken up into five practices: Strategy, Analytics and M&A, Customer & Marketing, Core Business Operations, Human Capital, Enterprise Technology & Performance. They have been ranked #4 on Vault's 2020, 2019, 2018, 2017 and 2016 rankings for consulting firms.

Trends
In 2013, an article in Harvard Business Review discussed the prevalent trends within the consulting industry to evolve. The authors noted that with knowledge being democratized and information becoming more and more accessible to anyone, the role of management consultants is rapidly changing. Moreover, with more online platforms that connect business executives to relevant consultants, the role of the traditional 'firm' is being questioned.

Large management consulting firms and professional networks have adopted a structure of industry-specific branches, with one branch per industry or market segment served. As such, the firms utilize their ability to serve as knowledge brokers within each market segment and industry addressed.

United Kingdom
In the UK, the use of external management consultants within government has sometimes been contentious due to perceptions of variable value for money. For instance, from 1997 to 2006, the UK government reportedly spent £20 billion on management consultants, raising questions in the House of Commons as to the returns upon such investment.

The UK has also experimented with providing longer-term use of management consultancy techniques provided internally, particularly to the high-demand consultancy arenas of local government and the National Health Service; the Local Government Association's Improvement and Development Agency and the public health national support teams; both generated positive feedback at cost levels considered a fraction of what external commercial consultancy input would have incurred.

Romania
In 2011, the Romanian management consulting industry began to re-initiate growth after a period of economic stagnation. At the end of 2010, a majority of Romania's management consultancies had experienced declining profits and by the end of 2011 about 70% of them had noted shrinking bottom lines. The years 2010 and 2011 represented an important test for many Romanian consulting firms according to a European Federation of Management Consultancies Associations (FEACO) study.

In 2015, Romanian management consulting had a turnover of 350 Mln. € and an export of 10% of the overall turnover, 75% within the EU and 25% outside. The local leader of the Romanian management consulting market is Ensight Management Consulting.

New South Wales government
In 1988, the newly elected Greiner State Government commissioned a report into the State Rail Authority by Booz Allen Hamilton. The resulting report recommended up to 8,000 job losses, including the withdrawal of staff from 94 country railway stations, withdrawing services on the Nyngan- Bourke line, Queanbeyan – Cooma line and Glen Innes- Wallangarra line, the discontinuation of several country passenger services (the Canberra XPT, the Silver City Comet to Broken Hill and various diesel locomotive hauled services) and the removal of sleeper trains from services to Brisbane and Melbourne. The report also recommended the removal of all country passenger services and small freight operations, but the government did not consider this to be politically feasible. The SRA was divided into business units – CityRail, responsible for urban railways; CountryLink, responsible for country passenger services; Freight Rail, responsible for freight services; and Rail Estate, responsible for rail property.

Federal government
PwC's biggest Australian client was the Australian federal government, the firm has been awarded more than AUD$537 million in Commonwealth contracts in the past two years to June 2023.

In June 2023, PwC announced a new Australian chief executive and confirmed it would divest itself of all government work in Australia by spinning off a new company for $1 after an Australian Senate committee found that had engaged in a "calculated" breach of trust by using confidential government information to help clients avoid tax. A senior PwC partner used secret information about government plans to tax multinational companies, worked out a way to get around them and sold the plan to those companies, making millions of dollars in fees. PwC responded by sacking 8 senior partners and replacing their Australian chief executive.

Australian Treasurer Jim Chalmers called the revelations a "shocking breach of trust".

A former KPMG partner urged the Australian government to consider a royal commission into the consulting industry and to formally ban firms that breach legal and ethical standards.

New Zealand
In New Zealand, the government has historically greater role in providing some infrastructure and services than in some other countries. Contributing reasons included insufficient scale in the private sector, smaller capital markets and historic political support for government service provision. Current infrastructure investment plans are open to a range of public/private partnerships. New Zealand governments hire in expertise to complement the advice of professional public servants. While management consultants contribute to policy and to strategy development, the Government tends to use management consultants for strategic review and for strategy execution. There is a distinction between management consultants (who generally provide advice and fixed deliverables, often for a fixed fee) and professional contractors (who work for an hourly or daily rate providing specialist services). Official figures from 2007 to 2009 show annual expenditure of about NZ$150 to NZ$180 Million by the New Zealand Government on consultants, but this may be understated. While multinational consultancy firms provide advice on major projects and in specialist areas, the majority of management consultants providing advice to the New Zealand government operate as sole practitioners or as members of small consultancy practices. The range of services provided is large, covering change management, strategic review, project and program management, procurement, organizational design, etc.

Nonprofit consultants
Some for-profit consulting firms, including McKinsey and BCG, offer consulting services to nonprofits at subsidized rates as a form of corporate social responsibility. Other for-profit firms have spun off nonprofit consulting organizations, e.g. Bain creating Bridgespan.

Many firms outside of the Big Three offer management consulting services to nonprofits, philanthropies, and mission-driven organizations. Some, but not all, are nonprofits themselves.

Liability
As with all client-contractor work, liability depends heavily on the subject of contract terms. While the management consulting service provider for obvious reasons has a business reputation to protect, legally there is little protection for the client. This is due to the scope of the contract being the only thing subject to potential insurance claims as well as lawsuits.

As with other client-contractor relationships, settling for liabilities that exist outside the scope of the contract deliverables has been proven to be of considerable difficulty, also in management consulting. For this reason, it is important that clients procuring management consulting services think twice about what type of help they need, so that the scope, length and content of contract reflects such need.

Criticism
Management consultants are sometimes criticized for the overuse of buzzwords, reliance on and propagation of management fads, and a failure to develop plans that are executable by the client. As stated above, management consulting is an unregulated profession; anyone or any company can style themselves as management consultants. A number of critical books about management consulting argue that the mismatch between management consulting advice and the ability of executives to actually create the change suggested results in substantial damages to existing businesses. In his book, Flawed Advice and the Management Trap, Chris Argyris believes that much of the advice given today has real merit. However, a close examination shows that most advice given today contains gaps and inconsistencies that may prevent positive outcomes in the future.

Ichak Adizes and coauthors also criticize the timing of consultant services. Client organizations, which are usually lacking the knowledge they want to obtain from the consultant, cannot correctly estimate the right timing for an engagement of consultants. Consultants are usually engaged too late when problems become visible to the top of the client's organizational pyramid. A proactive checkup, like a regular medical checkup, is recommended. On the other side, this opens additional danger for abuse from disreputable practitioners.

International standards
ISO published the international standard ISO 20700 Guidelines for Management Consultancy Services on June 1, 2017, replacing EN 16114.

This document represents the first international standard for the management consultancy industry.

Training and certification
An international qualification for a management consulting practitioner is Certified Management Consultant (CMC) available in the United States through the Institute of Management Consultants USA. Additional trainings and courses exist, often as part of a MBA training; see.

title: Management consulting


text:
Senior management

Senior management, executive management, or upper management is an occupation at the highest level of management of an organization, performed by individuals who have the day-to-day tasks of managing the organization, sometimes a company or a corporation.

Overview
Executive managers hold powers delegated to them with and by authority of a board of directors and/or the shareholders. Generally, higher levels of responsibility exist, such as a board of directors and those who own the company (shareholders), but they focus on managing the senior or executive management instead of on the day-to-day activities of the business. The executive management typically consists of the heads of a firm's product and/or geographic units and of functional executives such as the chief financial officer, the chief operating officer, and the chief strategy officer. In project management, senior management authorises the funding of projects.

Senior management are sometimes referred to, within corporations, as executive management, top management, upper management, higher management, or simply seniors.

Top management
A top management is a specific form of which typically consists of some of the top managers in a firm. However, there is no clear definition to what the top management of an organization is. It is put together by the chief executive officer (CEO) to work on a specific task. In working on this task, the generally has a much higher responsibility and considerable autonomy than other types of teams.

Possible tasks include: The way top management is put together and work together as a team can greatly differ from other teams. This is mainly based on the fact that top managers have succeeded as individuals which often leads to a focus on functional team objectives rather than to working interdependently on a shared goal. Top management consist of top managers from different functional areas of the firm, so they usually have different areas of expertise. Diversity and heterogeneity in teams can have a positive effect on teamwork. Nevertheless, there are also negative effects which have to be overcome as a team like not valuing different opinions and perspectives. A CEO that models valuing behavior and ensures the team has both a clear purpose and clear objectives can do just that. This also reduces social categorization effects because it leads to team members focusing more on their shared goals than on their differences.
 * ensuring the organization is effective and successful by taking on responsibility for the implementation of an appropriate strategy that the organization can adapt to,
 * effectively managing the demands of stakeholders,
 * giving clear definitions of what constitutes effectiveness and success,
 * ensuring the implementation of the strategy and the targeting of resources towards success,
 * reviewing if their actions are relevant to the organization's overall goals.

The exchange of information during the working process is as important for top managements as it is for all other kinds of teams. In order to work effectively, the team needs to understand how to communicate, share information, set goals, give feedback, manage conflict, engage in joint planning and task coordination and solve problems collaboratively. The CEO plays a key role in enabling the team to do so. He or she must take on the responsibility to coach the team and to reflect on their work. In their research in 2005, Simsek and colleagues found that especially a CEO's collectivistic orientation has a positive influence on team work behavior. Collectivistic orientation means that the CEO subordinates his or her personal to the group interests and goals, emphasizes sharing and cooperation within the team and enhances task-relevant processes of teamwork like gathering, processing and interpreting strategic information. This in turn enhances a process called behavioral integration which was developed by Hambrick (1994). It describes the degree to which a group, here the top management, engages in mutual and collective interaction.

Hambrick divided this concept into three parts:
 * 1) The level of collaborative behavior within the team
 * 2) The quantity and quality of exchanged information
 * 3) The emphasis on joint decision making

Top managements can face multiple difficulties which mainly derive from their individualistic views and strong opinions. It is therefore of great importance that the team works through these conflicts, creating a climate of safety, keeping their vision and mission in mind and build an appropriate work environment for themselves and the organization.

title: Senior management