Let's Meet
Krista Smith
Founder
Krista helps organizations prevent, navigate, and recover from moments of conflict and crisis. Krista works with organizations in every economic sector to help them create stronger and more functional workplaces, networks and communities. Before founding Root & Branch in 2020, Krista practised labour and employment law for 10 years. She is a certified workplace investigator and a perpetual student - particularly in aspects of non-profit leadership and governance, organizational behaviour, systems change, inclusion and belonging, and trauma-informed practices and interviewing techniques.
Krista recently finished a one-year term with Human Rights & Equity Services at Dalhousie University, where she updated and refined their Sexualized Violence, Harassment, and Discrimination Policies.​
From 2021-2023, Krista served as a full-time senior policy lawyer with the Mass Casualty Commission. Krista holds an LL.B. from Schulich School of Law, an M.A. in Journalism from Indiana University, and a B.A. in history from the University of California, Riverside, where she studied the colonial and post-colonial histories of sub-Saharan West Africa, Latin America, and the Black diaspora. Krista also minored in creative writing and economics.
Krista also sits on the Board of Be the Peace Institute, which seeks to address the root causes and consequences of gender-based violence in Nova Scotia.
Audrey Barrett
Partner
Audrey focuses on keeping humans at the centre while working to strengthen relationships, build understanding, and prevent and resolve conflicts in organizations big and small. For the past 15 years, Audrey has worked in policy development, implementation, and highlighting the importance of identity and social context education to support justice transformation across Jamaica, Canada, and Nova Scotia. Whatever the context, Audrey has always been dedicated to taking a relational, trauma-informed approach that creates safe spaces for people to be truly seen, heard and valued.
​
Before joining Root and Branch, Audrey had the privilege of working as Counsel and Senior Advisor with Canada’s National Judicial Institute (NJI) from 2013-2019. NJI is an independent, judge-led organization that provides educational programs and resources to Canada’s judiciary across the country. She specialized in the areas of social context, judicial independence, criminal law and evidence law.
​
Most recently, Audrey was Counsel with the Secretariat for the Action Committee on Modernizing Court Operations (AC). The AC is co-chaired by the Chief Justice of Canada and the Attorney General of Canada. It is supported by and Indigenous Advisory Group, and provides guidance to judges and court administrators across Canada for addressing challenges and highlighting innovative practices to modernize court operations and improve access to justice.
​
These experiences, along with a number of others, allow Audrey to approach issues holistically and find solutions that take account of, and work across, the spectrum of individual, organization and system.
​
Audrey draws on a number of other important influences for inspiration and experience including having grown up in small-town Nova Scotia and appreciating both the blessings of community and the beauty of the land, studying, teaching and practicing restorative justice and restorative approach in a number of different contexts, studying psychology and neuroscience in her undergraduate degree, and being a mother (and all-around problem solver!). Audrey holds an LL.B. and LL.M. from Schulich School of Law, an Hons. BSc. from Mount Saint Vincent University, and is a certified workplace investigator.
