Manager, Licensing, Leasing and Planning

About Us

The Nova Scotia Department of Fisheries and Aquaculture (the Department) has a legislated mandate to manage, promote, support, and develop the fishing, aquaculture, and seafood buying and processing industries that contribute to the economic, environmental and social prosperity of Nova Scotia’s coastal and rural communities. We work to promote Nova Scotia as Canada’s premier fish and seafood province. 

About Our Opportunity

The Manager of Licensing, Leasing and Planning is responsible for the Province’s aquaculture licensing, leasing, planning, and marine plant harvesting leasing functions. The role is accountable for leading a specialized regulatory and operational program that supports timely, consistent, transparent, and accountable licensing and leasing decisions under the Fisheries and Coastal Resources Act. The position also requires strong regulatory decision-making capability and may be required to perform duties associated with the Aquaculture Administrator role.

The position leads end-to-end application management for aquaculture licences and leases, including application intake, completeness review, interdepartmental coordination, tracking, analysis, regulatory decision support, and preparation of files for decision. The Manager is responsible for strengthening processing of applications, improving service delivery, supporting regulatory alignment, and ensuring applicants receive clear, consistent, and timely direction throughout the review process.

The position also provides leadership for aquaculture planning tools, rockweed leasing processes, application performance reporting, and continuous improvement initiatives. The Manager works closely with senior leaders, internal programs, other provincial departments, federal partners, applicants, industry representatives, and the public to support accountable regulatory decision-making and effective program delivery.

Primary Accountabilities

• Lead regulatory program delivery: Provide leadership for aquaculture licensing, leasing, planning, and marine plant harvesting in alignment with legislation, regulations, and government priorities, including representing the Department in multiple forums to support transparent and accountable regulatory decision-making.
• Oversee application review and decision readiness: Manage the intake, assessment, tracking, and decision-readiness of aquaculture licence and lease applications and marine plant harvesting lease applications.
• Improve processing performance: Strengthen workflows, timelines, tools, templates, and tracking systems to support timely, consistent, and transparent application processing.
• Use data to support decisions: Lead application data collection, analysis, and reporting to inform senior oversight, regulatory decisions, workload planning, service improvements, and performance monitoring.
• Guide planning: Lead the use of planning tools, Aquaculture Development Areas, the Coastal Classification System, and rockweed leasing considerations to support site assessment and regulatory decision-making.
• Lead and develop people: Manage a multidisciplinary team by setting priorities, supporting performance, developing staff, and fostering a respectful, accountable, service-focused workplace.

Qualifications and Experience

As the ideal candidate for this position, you will have a bachelor’s degree, plus several years of progressive and relevant experience.

This position requires a combination of education, leadership experience, regulatory knowledge, decision-making capability, and program management expertise. The successful candidate will demonstrate experience leading complex regulatory, operational, policy, planning, or natural resource management programs, preferably in a government environment.

The successful candidate will have demonstrated experience in program leadership, staff supervision, issue analysis, stakeholder engagement, performance reporting, process improvement, preparation of advice or recommendations for senior decision-makers, and application of regulatory decision-making frameworks.

The successful candidate must demonstrate strong leadership, judgement, accountability, communication and relationship management. The position requires the ability to manage complex and sensitive issues, lead staff through change, analyze regulatory and operational risks, develop practical solutions, and deliver results in a high-volume, deadline-driven environment.

An equivalent combination of education, training, and experience may be considered.

Assets:

• Experience with aquaculture licensing, leasing, permitting, regulatory decision-making, or other natural resource regulatory processes.
• Experience leading process improvement, performance reporting, or service delivery initiatives.
• Experience with land or marine use planning, spatial analysis, mapping tools, or site assessment processes.
• Experience working with Indigenous communities, industry stakeholders, federal partners, or interdepartmental review teams.
• Experience performing statutory, delegated, or administrator-type decision support functions in a regulatory environment.

Equivalency

Applicants relying on education and experience equivalencies must demonstrate such equivalencies in their application.

Benefits

Based on the employment status and union agreement, the Government of Nova Scotia offers its employees a wide range of benefits such as a Defined Benefit Pension Plan, Health, Dental, Life Insurance, General illness, Short and Long Term Disability, Vacation and Employee and Family Assistance Programs.  For information on all our Benefit program offerings, click here: Benefits for government employees.

Working Conditions

This position works in a fast-paced office environment with competing priorities, sensitive files, regulatory decision points, and frequent deadlines. The role requires regular coordination with internal and external partners, preparation of decision-support materials, and management of issues that may involve public, industry, Indigenous communities, interdepartmental, or senior leadership interest. Some travel may be required to support meetings, site-related discussions, stakeholder engagement, or program delivery.

What We Offer

• Career development where you have access to career guidance, tools, resources, and ongoing training for every stage of your career
• Engaging workplace: our employees feel valued, respected, connected, and tuned in, we have forward-thinking policies and strategies
• Countless career paths
• A Dynamic, client-focused office environment where service excellence and teamwork are our focus.