Mental Health Crisis in the Public Service

In today's Ottawa Citizen, there is an article on the Federal Public Service and the doubling in mental health disability claims between 1991 and 2007 and its impact on productivity and innovation in the public service. Mental health disability claims now make up 45% of all disability claims in the Federal public service.

The following is an extract from the article:

It’s an affliction among the country’s nurses, teachers, police, military and bureaucrats at all levels of government, undermining innovation, productivity, quality of service, policy-making and even the relevance of our democratic institutions, said Bill Wilkerson, founder of Global Business and Economic Roundtable on Mental Health.

Stress, burnout and depression is evident in all workplaces, especially in times of economic turmoil. But few employers have as profound a problem as the federal public service where the health effects of mental distress has been termed an epidemic.

“The public service is a tsunami of distractions — meetings, everything questioned, delegated, people moving … and no one is really in charge,” said Wilkerson. “It’s the most transient, fluid, unsettling work environment on the planet, so why wouldn’t people be anxious and in distress? They are human beings.”

The public service is heading into uncertain times. Speculation is rife that the public service will be the first place the Harper government turns when wrestling with the deficit. There are rumblings of changing or cutting public servants’ pension and benefits plans.

But Wilkerson argued the big savings will come by reforming management in the public service, which will go a long way to reducing disability claims. He said the across-the-board cuts that government’s typically resort to will only eat into the public service’s productivity.

“Pension reform and benefit reconstruction will not save the government money until it creates a work environment that protects mental health and the disabling effects of job stress and depressive disorder. Depression is the public health crisis in the government of Canada. Period.”

Similarly, he called the government’s so-called renewal of the public service, largely aimed at hiring new recruits, a “vision without hope” unless it focuses on improving the work environment. Instead of getting at problems with management, the government has hired thousands of new young workers and placed them in a toxic environment.

Wilkerson singled out two major trends that are crippling the public service. The biggest is the rapid and high turnover of people bouncing from job to job.

“The churn is remarkable, like a ship at sea casting about in turbulent waves and cascading until one day it tips over and sinks.”

A symptom of this is public servants’ obsession with delegating tasks until no one is really knows who is responsible for what. He said stories abound of revolving-door managers who are oblivious to how their behaviour affects others.

What’s needed is a cultural overhaul that brings back “human relations, not labour relations,” said Wilkerson. That means treating people fairly, with respect, giving them authority and fulfilling jobs. Without these basics, people “ruminate” and seethe — the key indicator to stress and depression, Wilkerson said.

So what do you think? Is Mr. Wilkerson correct and does his analysis also pertain to the provincial, territorial and municipal public services?

La mort d'un grand homme/The passing of a great man

Hier en lisant le journal, j'ai appris de la mort de Rémy Beauregard, le président de l'organisme Droits et démocratie. J'ai connu Rémy en 1989 quand j'ai commencé à la fonction publique de l'Ontario et Rémy dirigé l'Office des affaires francophones. Il a dirigé pendant sept ans la Commission ontarienne des droits de la personne. C'est une grande perte d'un défenseur des droits de la personne à travers le monde. Je tient à exprimer mes plus sincères condoléances à madame Suzanne Trépanier, l'épouse de Rémy.

Yesterday I was shocked to read about the death of Rémy Beauregard, president of Rights & Democracy. I first met Rémy in 1989 when I joined the Ontario Public Service and he was the head of the Office of Francophone Affairs. He subsequently went on to head the Ontario Human Rights Commission. This is a great loss to all who work in the field of human rights right around the world. I wish to express my deepest condolences to his wife Suzanne Trépanier. He will be missed.

And now for something completely different....music

I just had a late lunch today with a friend of mine and his son. I've known them for over 20 years (time sure does fly). His son is a musician and I have enjoyed his music ever since he started playing...first reggae and now rock/pop. His name is Dylan Murray and you can visit his website to listen to some of his wonderful music as well as link to some of videos on YouTube, or his MySpace Rock page or MySpace Reggae page. He sure uses all the internet connections.

The lyrics and music are wonderful!! Take a listen and you will see what I mean. I think you will hear a lot about Dylan in the future. For those of you in Toronto, he is playing at the Rivoli on January 15, 2010.

You are probably wondering what this has to do with public administration....well his father is a public servant.

From GUI to NUI

You're probably wondering what the title means...well many of you would know that GUI stands for Graphical User Interface. This is how we interact with computers - via a keyboard, a mouse, commands, menus, etc - to make them run programs and applications.

NUI stands for Natural User Interface. This is what we now have on smartphones such as the iPhone, where you interact with the device using touch, speech, gestures, etc. According to Steve Balmer, CEO of Microsoft, this is the future. Read his interesting article about NUI technology and the future of computing here.

Lots of food for thought. Now imagine utilizing this technology to deliver government services......

IPAC takes a step into Web 2.0

IPAC is moving into using Web 2.0 technology. Having created a Facebook page and a LinkedIn page, we are now moving into Ning. The site is up and running thanks to the impetus of IPAC New Professionals and Jennifer from the National office.

January 27, 2010 is the official launch date. Some of the presenters at the Winds of Change conference will post on the site throughout the day and there will be opportunities to use the site’s chat feature for live discussions.

The site includes opportunities to get involved in discussions, exchange ideas and connect with other public servants across Canada and around the world.

I urge you all to join by going to the IPAC Connect site.

Happy New Year and happy reading

The holidays are not only a time to enjoy family, friends and food, but it is also a time to catch up on making some headway through my pile of books. Over the last two weeks I have had the pleasure of reading a few very interesting books. Here is a short review of two of these books

One of my favourite "genres" of books are on politics. I read a couple of books on the 2008 US presidential election. The first is an insiders view of the Obama campaign. Written by David Plouffe, Obama's campaign manager, "The Audacity to Win" is an interesting book that recounts how a relatively unknown first-term US Senator won the presidency. In the primary campaign against what was thought was an unstoppable Hillary Clinton, the Obama team developed a strategy that focused on enlarging the democratic tent. This meant mobilizing non-traditional voters to become involved in the electoral process. In the Iowa caucuses, this meant mobilizing young people and because of the rules allowing for open voting, mobilizing independents and republicans to vote in the caucus. Utilizing a combination of new media (internet tools) and extensive person to person campaigning, the Obama campaign was able to dramatically increase the turnout at the Iowa caucuses and win a decisive victory there. They took this same strategy of focusing on mobilizing new and non-traditional voters to the other caucuses and primaries to win the nomination against the Clinton machine. During the campaign against John McCain, the Obama campaign developed a strategy that expanded the standard number of states that they contested. The book is insightful as it provides an insiders view of the campaign. It is quite entertaining, thought there is a bit of repetition in the book. Overall it is a very exciting and informative book about the US campaign.

The second book I read was also about the 2008 US Presidential election by Dan Balz and Haynes Johnson, entitled "The Battle for America 2008". This book provides a behind the scenes look at the Obama, Clinton and McCain campaigns throughout the primaries and the election. It is a good complement to the Plouffe book as it provides a broader context about what was happening in the other campaigns. They cover the interesting strategy followed by the Obama campaign, including when their supporters were pushing them to alter their strategy when things were not going well. Also interesting is the description and rationale of the selection of Palin as the Republican VP candidate. I would highly recommend this book as well to those of you who are interested in politics.

Happy New Year

Just want to wish all my faithful readers a Happy New Year and all the best for 2010!