On October 6, LiveWorkPlay was recognized as the #2 Best Place to Work in Ottawa before an audience of 400 business and organizational leaders at Best Places to Work & @DisruptHROttawa 2026. Thank you to the @obj_news and the many partners and sponsors who made the evening possible. The combination of Best Places to Work and DisruptHR made for a particularly fitting evening. Speakers challenged conventional thinking about trust, belonging, performance, hiring, workplace rules, and leadership. Those themes connected directly with changes LiveWorkPlay began making about a decade ago. Our Board of Directors authorized significant investments in people and workplace culture. Our Co-Leaders Julie Kingstone and Keenan Wellar collaborated with the staff team and translated those commitments into organizational systems and practices. Directors and Team Leads brought them into day-to-day operations. Staff throughout LiveWorkPlay have continued to use them, question them, improve them, and identify where we can do better. One of the most relevant DisruptHR presentations came from Sanita Alias, who challenged workplace rules built around control rather than trust. Her message strongly reflected our own experience of moving away from conventional top-down supervision toward collaborative performance management and coaching. The Best Places to Work recognition is based on an independent two-part assessment combining an extensive review of workplace policies and practices with an anonymous employee engagement survey. LiveWorkPlay averaged 98% overall, with every category at 93% or higher. We are also especially proud that LiveWorkPlay is the first charity providing direct services to people in the community to be recognized as one of Ottawa’s Best Places to Work. For community-based social services, sustained investment in compensation, benefits, professional development, workplace culture, and new approaches to leadership can be challenging. We hope this recognition demonstrates that innovation in how people are supported at work can and should be part of our sector too. One of the strategic directions that helped launch this work was called *Building A Leaderful Organization." Looking at the LiveWorkPlay team gathered at Algonquin College last night, that phrase felt particularly appropriate. Full story, photos, and live video: liveworkplay.ca/2026/10/07/b… Thank you to everyone who came out to represent us! Follow the link above for photos of everyone mentioned below. [Aby Clarke] [Maggie Dimock] [Shayna Grey] [Anna Nelson] [Joshua Gray] [Jared Dykler] [Jen Broad] [Rebecca Coxon] [Mary Gusella] [Daniel Spagnolo] [Kaye Kwok] [Eileen Barak] [Chayne Nerad] [Brigid FitzPatrick] And a shout-out to [Cory Haskins]! #BestPlacesToWork #DisruptHROttawa #Ottawa #WorkplaceCulture #Leadership #LiveWorkPlay

Our September Purple Star Employee of the Month: Tyler! ⭐💜 Always first to jump in and learn something new, and now our new Shipping Supervisor. Ask him about airplanes if you've got a few hours! ✈️ Congrats, Tyler! 👏 #PurpleStar #EmployeeOfTheMonth #PurpleAuctionHouse

It's Customer Service Appreciation Week, and we’re especially grateful for the people at Citizens who show up every day ready to help our neighbors. Our Customer Service team is there to listen, answer questions, solve problems, and help our neighbors. They bring patience, compassion, and care to thousands of interactions with our customers, often helping people through stressful or unexpected situations. It’s work that takes empathy, knowledge, and a genuine commitment to serving others. To our Customer Service team, thank you for the care you bring to Citizens and the customers we serve. We appreciate you! Show them some love in the comments! 💙 💚

Congratulations to our members at the @NYCWater celebrating big work anniversaries this year! Executive Director Alice Wong was honored to attend. #nycmea #nycmanager nycmea.org/dep-qwl-employee-…

Every shift, the staff at @GEHNHSnews show up for others. This week, others showed up for them. Around 1,600 hot meals served during staff appreciation week - a small gesture of gratitude for teams who give so much every day. #rrtcares #RapidReliefTeam

Christian is our September Employee of the Month!🎉 Christian’s willingness to help others and dependability make her a valued member of our team. She is always ready to support her coworkers whenever needed, and we’re proud to recognize her as our September EOM!💙

12 years ago, when I was at @RegionsBank 🏦 in Birmingham, AL, we celebrated Employee Appreciation Day. I led this team to win our first-ever flag football 🏈 trophy! 🏆 The team didn’t have a coach, so I volunteered to coach. I had experience coaching #rugby and refereeing, so I put those skills to work. My philosophy is simple: self-belief, confidence, teamwork, and discipline. Thank you 🙏🏽 , Regions teammates, for the great memories! Cheers! 🥂

❤️ Employee Appreciation! ❤️ ⭐ Dana Dittmer 📅 5 Years of Service 💐 Floral Thank you for your dedication and hard work. We’re so grateful to have you as part of the Indianola HyVee family! 🥳👏 #IndianolaHyVee

Our Pennsylvania office sends an Eastern Time Zone Breakfast Message for Employee Appreciation Week. Cheers to our team there. We know you are wildly busy and appreciate the outstanding work. #OlerRelo #ResidentialMoving

Behind every student’s success is a team of dedicated employees. 💙🧡 Employee Appreciation Night brought LCS staff and families together for food, music, games and fellowship. Thank you to everyone who helped make the celebration possible! #OneLCS

Strong employee engagement starts with clear goals, open communication, recognition, and growth opportunities. Strong engagement starts with strong leadership. forbes.com/sites/sap/2021/10… #EmployeeEngagement #Leadership

🎉 Congratulations to Mike Smith, OneMonroe’s Employee of the Month! Mike is known as a dependable team player who steps up wherever he’s needed, gets the job done without hesitation, and consistently supports his coworkers. His hard work, reliability, and “quiet professional” attitude make him a valued part of the OneMonroe team. 👏 OneMonroe Read more about Mike and his recognition: zurl.co/gE22O #EmployeeOfTheMonth #OneMonroe #TeamOneMonroe #EmployeeSpotlight

Interrupting engineering focus time for daily standup calls tanks dev velocity Smart founders link GitHub PR updates to Loom recordings, dropping automated 60-second video summaries directly into Slack channels Async updates eliminate bloated calendar schedules

A big congratulations to our 𝗘𝗺𝗽𝗹𝗼𝘆𝗲𝗲 𝗼𝗳 𝘁𝗵𝗲 𝗠𝗼𝗻𝘁𝗵 - 𝗦𝗲𝗽𝘁𝗲𝗺𝗯𝗲𝗿 𝟮𝟬𝟮𝟲 for this well-deserved recognition! 👏 🎉 Congratulations, 𝗠𝘀. 𝗧𝗶𝘀𝗵𝗮𝗻𝗶 𝗦𝗲𝗻𝗮𝗻𝗮𝘆𝗮𝗸𝗮, on this outstanding achievement! ⭐🏆👏

Employee of the quarter announcement!📢 We’re celebrating Maria, our Tax Supervisor, who has been recognised as a PK Champion.🏆🥇 Maria has earned this recognition for her exceptional client feedback and excellent client service. Thank you for all your hard work, Maria! 👏

Nothing kills team spirit faster than mandatory fun

I got a message this morning that my Monday team meeting was canceled next week because both of my coworkers were going to be off. So I thought about how long my weekend was about to be and decided to take the day off too. Only thing is that we have to explain our reason for requesting our time. I didn't have a real reason, so I just put, "One is the loneliest number." My director approved it and replied that it literally made her laugh out loud. I'll be here all night.

I’m still aliiiiiveeeeeeee. Been in meetings and trainings the last three weeks. Zoom fatigue is so real

Me after staying silent and contributing absolutely nothing to the team meeting