Government’s new directive violates collective agreements: Unions
Federal unions are telling Ottawa to manage its expectations for the new performance management system.
The Professional Institute of the Public Service of Canada (PIPSC) recently filed a policy grievance on behalf of 17 unions to challenge key provisions of the government’s Directive on Performance Management for public service employees.
The grievance — filed with the Public Service Labour Relations Board — argues the directive is in violation of collective agreements.
After coming into effect on April 1, 2014, the directive introduced mid and year-end performance reviews, as well as evaluations before probationary employees can be made full-time employees. It also implements performance improvement plans for poor performers and gives managers the right to withhold pay increments from those same employees.
"We’re all very concerned that the Treasury Board issued the new performance management directive without any consultation with any of the bargaining agents," said PIPSC vice-president Shannon Bittman.
Through meaningful consultation, Bittman said, unions could have advised the government on provisions that violated collective agreements and collaborated on training processes.
The Treasury Board mandated 90-minute online training modules for managers, which PIPSC says are easily circumvented. While full-day modules for managers and half-day modules for employees have been developed, they are not mandatory.
"They’ve rolled the directive out without providing adequate time for training to management or employees," she said. "We question how this new performance management system can establish their so-called objective of providing a standardized system."
The directive applies to all employees in departments and agencies of the core public administration — including the Department of Finance, the Department of Health, the Treasury Board and the Correctional Service of Canada — and federal unions fear each department will apply the directive’s rating scales differently.
Treasury Board president Tony Clement, however, promised the directive will provide consistency.
"There will be no more so-called ‘chronic travelers’ who jump from department to department every time work starts to go south," Clement said in an address to the Association of Professional Executive of the Public Service of Canada. "There will be no more trading off of underperformers to unsuspecting departments with no indication of potential performance issues. There will be no more ‘neglected’ poor performers who are simply ignored or tolerated because that’s the easier thing to do."
While Clement promised the directive is not a "backdoor attempt" to further slash the size of the public service, he promised poor performers who fail to improve and become productive employees will be dismissed.
Through the application of this directive the Treasury Board expects to create a healthy workplace environment that promotes "leadership, commitment and results," as well as productive employees capable of providing "excellent" service to Canadians.
The Treasury Board reports the regime will be consistently applied across the core public administration.
But according to R. Douglas Williamson — CEO of the Toronto-based professional services firm The Beacon Group — the directive’s consistency is irrelevant.
"Performance management as a practice is broken," Williamson said. "Most organizations, including the federal government, are using a model and a mindset that was built for a totally different time. The world has changed and yet the art of performance management is lagging behind."
Williamson said managers should focus instead on discretionary investment. Conditions should be created in the workplace — including the relationship between employers and employees — that allow workers to invest more of themselves in their job and in the performing of the job.
"It’s kind of like the difference between a push and a pull," he explained. "The old performance management system is a push system. When you think of it the way we should be thinking about it, it becomes a pull mechanism."
The success of this style of performance management relies on the manager.
"The unsophisticated manager relies on blunt instruments to enforce compliance. That’s just so old-school as to be laughable," Williamson said. "The sophisticated manager understands that there’s a whole other dynamic. We just don’t have enough people skilled in those dynamics."
While Williamson admits there are added complexities to performance management in a government setting, there is a strong correlation to the corporate sector.
As in the corporate world, he said, training, above all, is the key to success.
"There’s no question whatsoever that managers have not been sufficiently trained," Williamson said, and because of this employees are left unsatisfied by the current system.
A vast majority of public service employees don’t feel their performance rating accurately reflects their work, said Bittman.
This disconnect will likely lead to the filing of grievances.
"We agree in a performance management system and our employees want to be told how they’re doing," she said. "They want constructive feedback so they can do their job better and provide excellent service to Canadians. But when they don’t feel they’re being graded fairly, that’s going to adversely affect employee morale."
