Project Description

RBC – RAP

CHALLENGE

RBC set out to create their first Reconciliation Action Plan (RAP), a milestone framework to guide its commitments with Indigenous Peoples. They knew it had to be more than symbolic. It needed to be built on listening, authenticity, and accountability.

Awareness of RBC’s commitment to reconciliation was low, and their efforts risked being perceived as transactional, symbolic, or corporate rather than meaningful and Indigenous-led. Early engagement with communities had been limited, and RBC quickly realized a deeper, more representative process was required.

So, RBC tasked BOOM InterTribal to create, design and launch a RAP that truly centred Indigenous Rights Holder voices, built trust, and shifted perception from “corporate report” to a living, cultural story, delivering something that would resonate with both Indigenous communities and employees.

SOLUTION

BOOM InterTribal led the creative and strategic journey to bring the RAP to life in three phases:

1. Listening First: Research & Engagement

We partnered with Archipel Research & Consulting to ensure the process was Indigenous-led from the start.

  • Community Voices: We facilitated sharing circles with First Nations, Inuit, and Métis communities, gathering direct input from rights holders on what truly mattered.
  • Targeted Impact: In just 48 hours at the Assembly of First Nations Annual General Assembly (AFN AGA), we brought together over 60 community members, chiefs, councillors, and leaders for in-depth focus groups, while also capturing 142 surveys (470 visits) from highly-targeted delegates.
  • Insight: Community members made clear that RBC’s RAP must reflect Indigenous knowledge, cultural relevance, and measurable, lasting change.

2. Creating a Living Story: The RAP & Celestial Cycles

Most RAPs stop at decorative art. We created a unifying concept rooted in Indigenous worldviews: Celestial Cycles.

For generations, Indigenous Peoples have looked to the stars, moon, and solstices for guidance – navigating seasons, movement, and decision-making through ancestral wisdom. These celestial cycles are not abstract; they are living systems of knowledge that continue to guide survival, prosperity, and interconnectedness.

This insight became the guiding framework for RBC’s RAP. Just as celestial cycles provide direction and continuity, the RAP was designed as a cultural map for RBC’s reconciliation journey. A path guided not by corporate convention, but by Indigenous knowledge and the voices of rights holders.

Each of RBC’s five Pathways was brought to life through a celestial symbol:

  • Economy → Full Moon: Supporting prosperity at its fullest expression.
  • People → North Star: Indigenous leadership lighting the way forward.
  • Community → Constellations: Partnerships as stories of connection.
  • Environment → Solstices: Embracing balance, change and renewal.
  • Leadership → Celestial Compass: Accountability and shared direction.

By aligning its commitments with these symbols, RBC positioned itself not as the author of the story, but as a partner moving within it – guided by Indigenous knowledge, accountable to community voices, and committed to walking the journey together.

This reframed reconciliation as a shared journey: Indigenous wisdom provides the compass, while RBC commits to following its guidance through tangible actions.

To bring this to life visually, we worked closely with artist Emily Kewageshig to embody each Pathway. From each piece, we extracted a central element – the moon, star, compass – to serve as a visual “icon,” weaving continuity throughout the document. The result was a RAP that felt less like a static corporate report and more like a living story of movement, guidance, and relationship.

Download the Full RAP

3. Launching with Purpose: Campaign Activation

To ensure the RAP wasn’t just read but felt, we extended Celestial Cycles into a launch campaign that carried the same spirit of movement and connection.

  • Print & Digital: Ads anchored in the celestial artwork declared RBC’s ambitions with headlines like “Guided by a shared vision of economic prosperity.”
  • In-Branch & Online Video: 6- and 15-second videos brought the RAP to screens, using the artwork as portals that invited audiences into RBC’s commitments.
  • Press & Promotion: RBC Origins was reimagined with a new logo, embedding the North Star at its center as a symbol of guidance, resilience, and a modernized identity.

Every touchpoint was designed to reinforce the same message: reconciliation is not a corporate obligation, but a shared journey guided by Indigenous knowledge and illuminated by RBC’s ongoing commitments.

RBC - RAP
RBC – RAP

RESULTS

Early Impact & Validation

  • Community Validation: Indigenous participants affirmed the RAP’s direction as authentic, grounded, and meaningfully tied to their voices.
  • Highly-Targeted Engagement: Focus group and survey participation at AFN reflected chiefs, councillors, and leaders across regions – a depth of engagement that outweighed volume.

Strategic Differentiation

  • New Benchmark: By weaving Indigenous ways of knowing into a corporate framework, RBC’s RAP set a new benchmark for Canadian institutions, redefining what a RAP could and should be.
  • Cultural Resonance: Celestial Cycles resonated with Indigenous leaders as rooted in ancestral knowledge, while corporate audiences embraced it as an accessible and inspiring metaphor – bridging two worlds.
  • Campaign Awareness: In-branch, online, and social activations extended reach beyond Indigenous communities, signaling to all Canadians that reconciliation is a shared responsibility.

Looking Forward

Results will continue to be measured through:

  • Brand lift studies among Indigenous and non-Indigenous Canadians.
  • Digital engagement metrics (video completion rates, CTRs, social interactions).
  • Ongoing stakeholder feedback on progress against the five Pathways.

By grounding RBC’s RAP in Celestial Cycles, BOOM InterTribal transformed a compliance-style report into a cultural story of guidance and shared prosperity. It proved that reconciliation, when Indigenous-led and insight-driven, can be more than words on a page – it is a shared story we are writing together.