While a workplace survey released last month revealed serious morale and turnover problems at the Canadian Human Rights Commission, the Office of the Auditor General identified turnover as a problem at the commission more than two years ago.
The commission became a subject of intense scrutiny last month after a survey of employees revealed that, aside from an already high turnover rate of 40 per cent last year, another 37 per cent of employees were actively looking for work elsewhere. Many blamed a negative work environment for the desire to leave.
The employee survey paints a picture of an overworked and under-resourced organization. And while cuts to funding and structural problems may be in part to blame, employees also said senior leaders are responsible for compounding the problems.
Respondents to the survey most frequently complained about the senior management team. Three members of the leadership group of six were consistently singled out for problematic behaviours including: attempting to cast blame for mistakes; taking retaliatory action against those who express disagreements; and publicly criticizing individuals and their work.
Employees also complained about unmanageable workloads and the misallocation of resources, including too much time and effort spent on international work. Some managers were criticized for mimicking the style of the unpopular senior leaders, other staff expressed concern about a gender bias in the commission where males are favoured over females with respect to promotions. And while employees apparently feel that the poisoned work environment contributes to increased turnover, which in turn leads to more problems, employees also said senior leadership shows a lack of concern about the high turnover.
“Participants indicated that they are frustrated by the lack of concern that has been shown by some in the leadership group over the high rate of turnover in the commission,” write the authors of the report conducted by human resources management firm Watson Wyatt Worldwide, “They believe that the leadership group was aware of this high level for some time but made no attempt to get to the true causes of these departures.”
Although the team from the Office of the Auditor General (OAG) did not look at human resource management issues like morale, focusing instead solely on the cost effectiveness of the commission, the OAG team concluded that turnover was causing problems at the commission, said Alan Gilmore, one of the members of the audit team.
The commission has long been dogged by complaints about backlogs in the system and questions over its mission and impartiality.
With some critics calling for the dissolution of the commission, Chief Commissioner Michelle Falardeau-Ramsay, returned from a working trip to Indonesia to pledge swift action to fix the problems.
“We knew, before committing to this process, that there were areas where improvement was necessary. The high turnover of staff at the commission was the reason we asked for this report. We also knew, if management was truly committed to such a process, then some lessons, painful lessons, were going to be learned,” she said.
But in interviews later, Falardeau-Ramsay said she was surprised at the level of discontent among CHRC employees. She said she has always maintained an open-door policy and employees had never expressed such serious concern to her in the past.
Another report submitted to the Minister of Justice last June, called for fundamental changes to the commission after determining the model for human rights commissions across the country may be flawed and resources being badly used.
The government-sponsored committee concluded delays and problems were inherent in the model and explored the possibility of recreating the commission to run more efficiently through the better use of resources.
“I think that while obviously there should be some immediate changes I hope the focus isn’t only on quick fixes, in case perhaps bigger changes don’t get considered,” said Bill Black, a professor of human rights law at the University of British Columbia and a member of the committee.
But he disagreed with the idea that the Canadian Human Rights Commission should be abolished.
“I wish the problems of discrimination were solved,” he said. But data from annual equity reports prove that it isn’t true. “We need commissions and I think it is deplorable that people take advantage of these kinds of stories to suggest we don’t. If there were problems in the police department we wouldn’t say, ‘Okay, let’s not have police anymore.’”
He also said that cutbacks to funding, like that endured by many government agencies in the mid ’90s may be to blame for current problems.
There is absolutely no question that cuts to funding have contributed greatly to the problems the commission is facing, said Catharine Barratt, a spokesperson for the CHRC. For example, the commission was forced to close regional offices and centralize operations. The report from the OAG identified this as a problem.
“Since downsizing its regional offices and centralizing investigations, the commission has experienced a high turnover of its investigation staff,” stated the report from the OAG.
“Because staff from the regions did not accept transfers to the National Capital Region, the commission had to hire 14 new investigators. Since 1995, 15 investigators have left the unit that handles most complaints, six within a year of being hired. As a result, a series of investigators often work on the same case. The commission told us it takes about a year for an investigator to become fully functional. Currently, 14 of the 22 investigators in this unit have less than a year’s experience.”
The auditors also expressed concern that high turnover meant relying on inexperienced investigators and in turn the commission wasn’t consistently adhering to some of its key investigation standards, possibly undermining confidence in the commission.
After the release of the critical report and frank criticisms from staff, the CHRC faced questions about how it could investigate working conditions in other organizations when its own working conditions were apparently so poor.
But Barratt said just because they are having problems of their own it should not detract from the work they are doing.
“I would hope that it wouldn’t undermine our credibility,” she said. “This organization is made up of people and people are fallible. There is no organization, regardless of what its mandate is, that is absolutely perfect.”
Besides there was some positive news in the report that the most of the media reports ignored she said.
Employees still feel very good about the objectives and for the most part spoke positively about relationships with co-workers. And while three of the senior team were singled out for doing a poor job, two others were consistently mentioned by many employees as doing an exceptional job.
“These are sometimes unfortunate lessons that we have to learn and experiences that we have to go through, but if we apply those lessons we will grow from it and be a stronger commission because of it.”
The commission became a subject of intense scrutiny last month after a survey of employees revealed that, aside from an already high turnover rate of 40 per cent last year, another 37 per cent of employees were actively looking for work elsewhere. Many blamed a negative work environment for the desire to leave.
The employee survey paints a picture of an overworked and under-resourced organization. And while cuts to funding and structural problems may be in part to blame, employees also said senior leaders are responsible for compounding the problems.
Respondents to the survey most frequently complained about the senior management team. Three members of the leadership group of six were consistently singled out for problematic behaviours including: attempting to cast blame for mistakes; taking retaliatory action against those who express disagreements; and publicly criticizing individuals and their work.
Employees also complained about unmanageable workloads and the misallocation of resources, including too much time and effort spent on international work. Some managers were criticized for mimicking the style of the unpopular senior leaders, other staff expressed concern about a gender bias in the commission where males are favoured over females with respect to promotions. And while employees apparently feel that the poisoned work environment contributes to increased turnover, which in turn leads to more problems, employees also said senior leadership shows a lack of concern about the high turnover.
“Participants indicated that they are frustrated by the lack of concern that has been shown by some in the leadership group over the high rate of turnover in the commission,” write the authors of the report conducted by human resources management firm Watson Wyatt Worldwide, “They believe that the leadership group was aware of this high level for some time but made no attempt to get to the true causes of these departures.”
Although the team from the Office of the Auditor General (OAG) did not look at human resource management issues like morale, focusing instead solely on the cost effectiveness of the commission, the OAG team concluded that turnover was causing problems at the commission, said Alan Gilmore, one of the members of the audit team.
The commission has long been dogged by complaints about backlogs in the system and questions over its mission and impartiality.
With some critics calling for the dissolution of the commission, Chief Commissioner Michelle Falardeau-Ramsay, returned from a working trip to Indonesia to pledge swift action to fix the problems.
“We knew, before committing to this process, that there were areas where improvement was necessary. The high turnover of staff at the commission was the reason we asked for this report. We also knew, if management was truly committed to such a process, then some lessons, painful lessons, were going to be learned,” she said.
But in interviews later, Falardeau-Ramsay said she was surprised at the level of discontent among CHRC employees. She said she has always maintained an open-door policy and employees had never expressed such serious concern to her in the past.
Another report submitted to the Minister of Justice last June, called for fundamental changes to the commission after determining the model for human rights commissions across the country may be flawed and resources being badly used.
The government-sponsored committee concluded delays and problems were inherent in the model and explored the possibility of recreating the commission to run more efficiently through the better use of resources.
“I think that while obviously there should be some immediate changes I hope the focus isn’t only on quick fixes, in case perhaps bigger changes don’t get considered,” said Bill Black, a professor of human rights law at the University of British Columbia and a member of the committee.
But he disagreed with the idea that the Canadian Human Rights Commission should be abolished.
“I wish the problems of discrimination were solved,” he said. But data from annual equity reports prove that it isn’t true. “We need commissions and I think it is deplorable that people take advantage of these kinds of stories to suggest we don’t. If there were problems in the police department we wouldn’t say, ‘Okay, let’s not have police anymore.’”
He also said that cutbacks to funding, like that endured by many government agencies in the mid ’90s may be to blame for current problems.
There is absolutely no question that cuts to funding have contributed greatly to the problems the commission is facing, said Catharine Barratt, a spokesperson for the CHRC. For example, the commission was forced to close regional offices and centralize operations. The report from the OAG identified this as a problem.
“Since downsizing its regional offices and centralizing investigations, the commission has experienced a high turnover of its investigation staff,” stated the report from the OAG.
“Because staff from the regions did not accept transfers to the National Capital Region, the commission had to hire 14 new investigators. Since 1995, 15 investigators have left the unit that handles most complaints, six within a year of being hired. As a result, a series of investigators often work on the same case. The commission told us it takes about a year for an investigator to become fully functional. Currently, 14 of the 22 investigators in this unit have less than a year’s experience.”
The auditors also expressed concern that high turnover meant relying on inexperienced investigators and in turn the commission wasn’t consistently adhering to some of its key investigation standards, possibly undermining confidence in the commission.
After the release of the critical report and frank criticisms from staff, the CHRC faced questions about how it could investigate working conditions in other organizations when its own working conditions were apparently so poor.
But Barratt said just because they are having problems of their own it should not detract from the work they are doing.
“I would hope that it wouldn’t undermine our credibility,” she said. “This organization is made up of people and people are fallible. There is no organization, regardless of what its mandate is, that is absolutely perfect.”
Besides there was some positive news in the report that the most of the media reports ignored she said.
Employees still feel very good about the objectives and for the most part spoke positively about relationships with co-workers. And while three of the senior team were singled out for doing a poor job, two others were consistently mentioned by many employees as doing an exceptional job.
“These are sometimes unfortunate lessons that we have to learn and experiences that we have to go through, but if we apply those lessons we will grow from it and be a stronger commission because of it.”
