Archived - Audit of the Language of Work at National Defence Headquarters — Follow-up

Promotion of official languages

An analysis of the National Defence progress report revealed that considerable effort has been expended in implementing the Official Languages Program Transformation Model across Canada. Since 2008, National Defence has promoted official languages in a variety of ways, including a nationwide awareness campaign, information kiosks, and workshops for middle managers and supervisors on the importance of linguistic duality.

National Defence has also published several articles promoting the use of both official languages and aiming to create a culture based on respect for language rights. For example, an article on the functional approach entitled “Right person, right place, right time” as well as a number of inserts on official languages have appeared in The Maple Leaf, the Canadian Forces weekly newspaper. National Defence has distributed tools and promotional products, including some that relate to language of work, like the video Dare! Osez!. It also distributed a brochure on the Official Languages Program Transformation Model that outlines the principles of the functional approach leading to full compliance with the Official Languages Act.

Other best practices include the Coordinators of Official Languages Network, competency profiles for coordinators and the Official Languages Advisory Committee, which discusses official languages matters. The Director of Official Languages produced a customized online course for the Coordinators of Official Languages. This Web-based tool is also available to managers who are interested in knowing more about official languages policies and regulations.

In August 2009, the Director of Official Languages published a directive on individual training and education in both official languages for military personnel. In response to the Office of the Commissioner of Official Languages' report on the linguistic audit on the individual training and education system, a communication plan was developed to ensure that military personnel are aware of their right to receive their training in the official language of their choice. We will be able to assess the results of this new directive when we conduct the follow-up to this audit, which should take place in 2012.

National Defence continued its efforts to develop new official languages policies as part of the implementation of the functional approach. It also published documents on the provision of services in both official languages, succession planning, second language training, and individual training and education for military personnel in both official languages.

According to National Defence, a language-of-work policy is still a priority for the implementation of the Official Languages Program Transformation Model; however, this policy, which was in draft form at the time of the 2006 audit, is still awaiting publication. National Defence mentioned that, before its publication, it will be necessary to resolve a number of policy issues relating to the management of personnel having skills in the appropriate official language. In our opinion, a language-of-work policy is essential to create a work environment that is conducive to the use of English and French.

In the June 2008 Policy on Official Languages for the Provision of Services, the Director of Official Languages defined the right of Department of National Defence employees, Canadian Forces members and their dependents to obtain certain services in the official language of their choice.

The Department of National Defence also harmonized the previous and current versions of the Public Service Official Languages Exclusion Approval Order, as the current version is more restrictive regarding extensions.

In December 2009, the Department of National Defence published the reviewed Directive on the Identification of Language Requirements for Civilian Positions. This directive identifies departmental obligations regarding bilingual requirements, where prescribed. The commander or manager, advised by the Coordinator of Official Languages as the subject matter expert, is responsible for objectively identifying what the language requirements are for civilian positions within his or her organization.

Leadership

Senior management has an essential role to play in ensuring that the workplace is effectively bilingual. Sustained effort is necessary to establish an organizational culture that truly respects the language rights of all personnel. Managers and supervisors at all levels must communicate regularly in both official languages and demonstrate through their actions that they value linguistic duality. The Coordinators of Official Languages should also be able to promote workplaces that give equal status to both official languages, in addition to distributing tools and information on this subject.

Paragraph 36(1)(c) in Part V of the Official Languages Act states that federal institutions in regions designated as bilingual for language of work have the duty to ensure that “where it is appropriate or necessary in order to create a work environment that is conducive to the effective use of both official languages, supervisors are able to communicate in both official languages with officers and employees of the institution in carrying out their supervisory responsibility, and any management group that is responsible for the general direction of the institution as a whole has the capacity to function in both official languages.”

The Department of National Defence and the Canadian Forces recognize that leadership is a key contribution to the creation of a workplace that is conducive to the use of both official languages. The efforts that they have made to ensure bilingual leadership deserve mention. According to data provided by National Defence, 95% of civilian employees in the EX group have a language proficiency level of at least CBC. Moreover, all lieutenant-generals, vice-admirals, major-generals and rear-admirals are now required to maintain a CBC level of proficiency.

A progressive approach was adopted to ensure that all generals, brigadier-generals and commodores are at the CBC level by December 31, 2011. Currently, only 69.6% of brigadier-generals and commodores are bilingual. Furthermore, starting from the 2010 posting season, 90% of newly promoted colonels and captains (Navy) must be at the CBC level. By 2012, all newly promoted colonels and captains (Navy) will have to be at the CBC level. By December 31, 2013, all colonels and captains (Navy) are to be at the CBC level. Currently, 71.2% of colonels and captains (Navy) have at least a CBC level.

While senior management has made good progress, these results are diminished by those of supervisors and for incumbents of positions providing personal and central services. In its 2009–2010 departmental performance report, National Defence described one challenge as being that employees still do not have sufficient language skills and that some employees do not meet the language requirements of their positions.

While the number of bilingual military personnel has increased, capacity is still less than the number of designated bilingual positions in the National Capital Region. The situation is better with respect to civilian employees in the National Capital Region.

A little over half of the military personnel holding supervisory positions meet the language requirements of their positions. About a quarter of these positions have language requirements below BBB. The data provided in the progress report showed that 81% of civilian supervisors meet the language requirements of their position (an increase of 6% from 2006), and very few of these positions have language requirements below BBB.

A little over half of the military personnel who provide personal and central services meet the language requirements of their position. On the civilian side, the percentage of employees providing central services and the percentage of employees providing personal services who meet the language requirements of their position have fallen since 2006 by 12% and 14%, respectively, with each now at 65%.^{Footnote 1}

The Canadian Forces has identified up to 21 occupations that provide support and services relating to parts III, IV and V of the Official Languages Act. It is currently working to confirm the language requirements for these occupations, as well as the number of individuals in each occupation who require language training, and when and how they will receive second official language training. Full implementation is expected within four years. As for the issue of transferring military personnel based solely on their language skills in order to respond to immediate needs, the Canadian Forces indicated that this would not be a reasonable approach because a number of service requirements and personal circumstances must also be considered.

Taking these requirements into consideration, the Director of Official Languages is developing an implementation proposal to post a sufficient number of Canadian Forces personnel to meet the requirements of each function. Deployment to Headquarters, which, according to the progress report, presents challenges with regard to official languages, could also offer opportunities to expose a greater number of military personnel to a bilingual workplace so that best practices may be passed on throughout the organization.

The Canadian Forces indicated to us that it still had a problem with balance, which is particularly hard to achieve for junior and mid-level personnel. These people are asked to learn and improve their occupational knowledge and skills, to widen their professional competencies, to support operations and to develop as individuals (fitness, community engagement, second official language, etc.). For this reason, the Canadian Forces intends to adopt a progressive approach to second official language education and training. Focused on timely occupational requirements, this approach is designed to reduce unnecessary or excessive burden on personnel and allow for long-term solutions in the provision of bilingual services and in the respect for language rights.

The Canadian Forces explained that it has bilingual capacity in most of the units in the National Capital Region, mainly at the middle and senior leadership level. It also explained that Unit commanders have the flexibility to reassign military personnel within their units so they can be supervised in the language of their choice. We do not believe that this is an appropriate administrative measure, particularly in the case of supervision.

Only 19.5% of bilingual positions for military supervisors are at a level of CBC or above, compared to 25.6% among civilian personnel. Moreover, 25.4% of military supervisory positions have a language designation below BBB, while that percentage is at 0.25% among civilian supervisory positions.

The insufficient number of bilingual military supervisors and military personnel capable of providing personal and central services in both official languages is detrimental to the effective use of both official languages.

As generally recognized by the Public Service Commission, the language proficiency level appropriate for supervisory positions in designated bilingual regions must correspond to the most difficult tasks to be carried out for each skill.

The supervisor-employee relationship involves sensitive personal or complex issues, and the supervisor must be able to give sage advice to his or her employees. The supervisor must also possess a high level of skill in both official languages to be able to provide supervision of equal quality in both languages.

The Canadian Forces pointed out that, to make informed decisions and take proper measures to improve its bilingual capacity, more work is required to determine exactly what is meant by “supervision” in a military context. Once the official language requirements of supervision functions have been examined in closer detail, the Canadian Forces will be in a better position to develop appropriate supporting policies.

The Directive on the Identification of Language Requirements for Civilian Positions at National Defence states that, in order to create a work environment that is conducive to the effective use of both official languages, certain senior management positions are designated CBC. This is the case for positions or functions that include the supervision of employees in bilingual positions or in positions with different language requirements.We consider this to be a best practice that should be extended to all civilian and military supervisory positions.

Numerous studies^{Footnote 2} show that the absence of functional bilingualism among supervisors is a major obstacle to the use of both official languages in the workplace and, more specifically, to the use of French as a language of work. Because they are in a position of authority, supervisors play a key role in creating a workplace that respects the equal status of both official languages.Their behaviour has a direct impact on the organizational culture of the immediate work environment. Moreover, these studies show that if a supervisor has a lower level of bilingualism (for example, BBB), this discourages employees from using French as their language of work. Managers must not only possess sufficient language skills in both official languages, they must also adopt behaviours that demonstrate their commitment to linguistic duality.

Canadian Forces is implementing a new scoring system for promotion selection boards. This system requires increasingly higher levels of bilingualism as members rise in rank. It also serves as a means to better integrate second official language management into the career paths of military personnel. This progressive approach will allow all junior and mid-level ranks to improve their language skills as they progress in their careers.

We have been informed that career management authorities and the leaders responsible for occupations (trades and professions) now fully embrace the requirement for bilingualism. They have begun to include language training as a crucial step in officer and senior non-commissioned member development.

According to National Defence, the Project to Review the Linguistic Designation of CF Units, Civilian Positions and Military Functions will allow it to establish corrected and justified language designations.

In the future, the central career management system will provide units with the required bilingual staffing. Unit commanders and their superiors will be informed of their obligations to ensure that each of the bilingual functions is correctly executed with the unit's resources. Bilingual capacity will thus be managed in the same way as other qualifications in the Canadian Forces. Unit commanders will be held responsible for the performance of their unit in all respects, including service provision and supervision.

Workplace

Subsection 36(2) in Part V of the Official Languages Act states that federal institutions have the duty to ensure that, in designated regions, “such measures are taken … as can reasonably be taken to establish and maintain work environments of the institution that are conducive to the effective use of both official languages and accommodate the use of either official language by its officers and employees.”

The 2008 Public Service Employee Survey conducted by the Treasury Board of Canada Secretariat and an internal survey called Your Say carried out in 2007 by the Canadian Forces show that, although it seems to have increased, the satisfaction of Francophones remains well below that of Anglophones. We can therefore conclude that Francophones generally feel less comfortable using the language of their choice in various work situations and that they receive less support and training opportunities than their Anglophone colleagues. In its progress report, National Defence stated that certain results clearly show that, despite the initiatives it has conducted, more efforts will be required to create an environment that is conducive to the use of both official languages.

National Defence also pointed out that the official languages component is integrated into the key leadership skills for civilian employees. For military personnel, although senior officers are no longer required to draw up performance management agreements, they are still expected to set official-languages-related performance objectives.

Commanders of command and group principals have appointed Coordinators of Official Languages with direct access to level 1 managers. The responsibilities of these coordinators include ensuring that the requirements of the Official Languages Act (including supervision, work tools, meetings, occupational training, software, services provided by contract personnel, etc.) are respected at all times. We are of the opinion that these coordinators should have a leadership role in the promotion of linguistic duality in the workplace.

Canadian Forces informed us of a new philosophy that it is adopting regarding second official language education and training to ensure sufficient capacity of bilingual personnel and to ensure that personnel meet the language requirements of their positions or functions. The new philosophy will not only prioritize language training for personnel who must be bilingual as part of their functional responsibilities, it will also create a progressive approach to language development for career goals. The Director of Official Languages stated that the aim is to ensure that, after completing the second official language training, these people are employed in an environment where they can enhance their newly acquired skills.

National Defence pointed out that, in order for the functional approach to work, there must be a system that provides the right individuals with the right official languages skills to be employed in the right jobs. National Defence is currently experiencing a number of difficulties collecting and processing language-of-work data. It has not been able to provide us with exact data on the implementation of the recommendations. National Defence's progress report presents a general overview of the functional approach, the Official Languages Program Transformation Model, and various awareness campaigns conducted across Canada. The Department explained to us that some Headquarters-specific data must be compiled manually or are simply not available. It also pointed out that the information in the database may not be accurate, given the functional approach in the units. National Defence explained that military personnel do not necessarily perform the functions of the position to which they are transferred.

One of the objectives of the Official Languages Program Transformation Model is to establish a performance measurement system that allows a precise accurately and regularly monitors the institution's ability to comply with the Official Languages Act. This performance measurement system has been developed in two parts designed to measure more than 150 indicators regarding parts III, IV, V, VI and VII of the Official Languages Act. The first part consists of a database that extracts information from the Human Resources Management System. This enables the Department of National Defence and the Canadian Forces to monitor static data, such as the linguistic competency profiles of civilian or military personnel. This database was upgraded and has been fully operational since the fall of 2010. The second section consists of a checklist that allows data to be compiled on-site (for example, the number of posters displayed in both official languages in a bilingual unit) and constitutes a working tool to adjust and report relative compliance with the Official Languages Act.

A full-scale trial of the performance measurement system was conducted at a number of major organizations within National Defence in order to evaluate the Department's and the Canadian Forces' compliance with the Official Languages Act. It will be followed by a thorough analysis and corrections as required. Implementation of the system, along with its associated Defence Administrative Orders and Directives will then follow.

National Defence indicated that the system is expected to be in place by the summer of 2012, at which time the members of the Coordinators of Official Languages Network will be in a better position to assess whether their organizations are compliant with the Official Languages Act. At the same time, the Canadian Forces will be in a better position to assess which areas of its official languages portfolio require special attention.