Project Story: A Journey to Quebec

The Story in Brief

In the early 2010s, several companies from the oil and gas industry, supported by the Government of Quebec, launched shale gas exploration projects. On paper, the initiative appeared technically sound and economically justified. However, it suffered from one major weakness: it overlooked the social dimension, failing to genuinely consider all stakeholders. Like the plot of a blockbuster movie, the project quickly faced strong opposition from local communities. The media seized the story. Public concern intensified. Residents reported unusual odours near their homes. Citizen groups were formed. Writer and theatre director Dominic Champagne became one of the leading public figures opposing the project. A modern-day epic. For a training course, there is hardly a better example than a large public project involving numerous stakeholders, communication challenges and real-life events.

Learning Through Another Industry

This perfectly illustrates the Nova Train approach: immersing participants in a real story they can analyse through its stakeholders, conflicts, project drift and communication failures. Participants are asked to take a position, develop communication strategies, tailor their messages to different audiences and react to unexpected events as the scenario unfolds. Press articles and archived news footage enrich the case study. Rather than simply discussing project communication, participants become part of the story.

When Participants Surprise Themselves

I recently delivered the training course “Project Communication: Building Sustainable Relationships with Stakeholders” using this case study as the central thread. The group included professionals from several industries, including the public sector, agricultural software and digital services. We began by mapping stakeholders. Participants then developed messages tailored to different audiences, learned how to explain the problem before presenting the solution, and designed communication plans adapted to each phase of the project while anticipating potential resistance. During one role-playing exercise, a participant had to announce the launch of the first extraction operations during a simulated press conference. He spoke calmly, structured his message effectively and answered difficult questions with remarkable confidence. It felt like watching a real press briefing. That is also what training is about: those rewarding moments when someone discovers strengths they may not have realised they possessed.

The Value of Transposition

Working on a case study far removed from one’s own industry creates valuable distance. Participants can no longer rely on familiar routines, technical expertise or the standard answers used within their own organisations. Instead, they must analyse the situation from a different perspective and develop new ways of thinking. Taking participants outside their everyday professional environment does not move them away from their challenges. Quite the opposite: it often allows them to see those challenges more clearly.

Let’s Talk

If you would like to design a training case study that encourages your teams to think differently and develop new perspectives, contact us for an initial exploratory conversation.