Yasmine Hammamet, Tunisia, October 15, 2003
Convincing: The Tightrope Walked by Ombudsmen
Notes for an address to the Third Statutory Conference of the Association des ombudsmans et médiateurs de la Francophonie
Dr. Dyane Adam - Commissioner of Official Languages
Check against delivery
Ladies and gentlemen,
To convince or persuade, as Pascal said in The Art of Persuasion, is above all to lead someone to “acknowledge that something is true.” To convince, from the Latin word cum vincere, “to overcome with,” means to bring about change by gaining support from others through the truth and correctness of what we say and do.
Since I was appointed as Commissioner of Official Languages of Canada, I have wanted to be an agent of change.
As you know, my mandate derives from Canada's Official Languages Act, a quasi-constitutional act enshrining the equal status of English and French in federal institutions in Canada.
This means, of course, that a constant effort must be made to ensure that French, the weaker language, enjoys the equal status to which it is entitled within the federal administration. While Francophones accounted for 26.9 percent of Canada's population in 1971, they now account for just 22.9 percent. Their feelings of insecurity are very real given the predominance of the English language in North America.
That is why I constantly insist on the creation in Canada of an official languages culture that includes attitudes, behaviours and values. It is a culture rooted in respect. The creation of this kind of cultural dynamic requires strong, consistent leadership based on shared values.
I have called my presentation: “Convincing: the Tightrope Walked by Ombudsmen.”
I would not wish to suggest, of course, that as ombudsmen we are funambulists! In all honesty, though, at one time or another in our professional lives, we have all felt as if we were walking a Tightrope, struggling to find our balance and choose the tools we need to achieve our reform objectives.
Sure, we can make all kinds of recommendations. It's our job. But in the end, our recommendations will be implemented only if the government and the general public understand them and agree unreservedly that they are useful and legitimate. Instead of making threats at the first sign of reluctance on their part, we should use diplomacy and persuasion.
In order to convince both the government and the citizens of the importance of what we are doing, we nevertheless need effective strategies and persuasion techniques. At the same time, we must also take time for reflection and pay attention to the continuity of our training.
I. Persuasion Strategies
I would like to say a few words first about strategies.
The greatest pitfall for ombudsmen or mediators is to start lecturing.
Let me illustrate this through a short anecdote.
| One day, a zookeeper fell into the lions' pit. There he was, all of a sudden, surrounded by ten big cats with one thing on their mind: devouring him. To dissuade them, the keeper launched into a great harangue, with all the eloquence born of terror. He reminded them through various examples that all humans and animals are brothers and that, one day, the lion will lie down with the lamb … even though, as Woody Allen says, the lamb might not sleep very well. The lions listened very respectfully to the keeper's lecture. Some even had a tear come to their eye. At the end, there was a warm round of applause. And then, with no further ado, they ate him up. |
The moral of this story is very simple: when it comes to strategy, preaching must not be confused with persuading. Fine speeches are no substitute for good strategies. The keeper's mistake was that he did not understand the organizational culture of the group he was addressing.
In my view, there are three requirements for good dynamics between ombudsmen and public administrators:
1. Ongoing dialogue
Ombudsmen and administrators can work together well only if they have good, regular communications. It is important to have exchanges that extend well beyond the formal relationship defined by investigation methodologies.
Mutual understanding of the obligations and constraints under which both parties operate and of the organizational culture of institutions is fundamental to a constructive dialogue.
2. System of values
Equally important is the need to uphold democratic and ethical values in the systems of government of democratic countries.
3. Accountability at all levels
Finally, in order to have productive relations with the bureaucracy, it is not sufficient to understand one another and act in an ethical way. It is also necessary for Parliament (or the Assembly) to take an ongoing interest, through the appropriate committees or commissions, in the reports and observations that ombudsmen submit. Elected officials must fully assume their responsibilities and close the loop.
In the end, the underlying objective of all this persuasion, the heart of the matter, is fostering leadership and accountability on the part of everyone concerned. Ombudsmen have every reason, therefore, to position themselves as the promoters and defenders of more equitable and more transparent governance that shows greater sensitivity to the needs of the citizens.
In order to bring about this change, one must understand the psychology of organizational change. Most public officials want to do a good job. They sincerely want to administer in ways that are respectful of the rights of citizens. Ombudsmen must first know how to recognize what public officials are doing well before pointing out what could be done better.
Senior public officials are subject to a multitude of pressures: changing priorities, budgetary constraints, administrative changes, and the growing role of new technologies. Ombudsmen have to know, therefore, how to present the changes they want not as problems to be endured, but rather as challenges to be successfully managed. Better yet, the ombudsman's recommendation should be seen as a solution to a problem public officials grapple with.
I can tell you that much of my time and energy are devoted to marketing change to members of Parliament and senior officials of the Government of Canada. I convince them simply by telling them the truth: all change and all progress must happen through them, with their leadership and courage. This is the basic argument I use when addressing them. Let's just say that we have a reciprocal educational dialogue.
Then I tell them about the six roles that I intend to carry out with common sense, fairness and understanding. These roles are like techniques to help them serve the public better in accordance with the law.
II. Techniques
I tell them at the outset that I decided from the time of my appointment to add to my functions as a monitoring agent a proactive approach focusing on prevention and raising awareness, on work done upstream rather than downstream. This argument is almost always very well received.
I undertake at the same time to prioritize my activities and coordinate them to have the greatest possible effect.
I also clearly define the scope of our activities, namely, the six roles that I intend to carry out [show diagram of the roles from the annual report].
Ombudsman Role
This is the bread and butter of a protector of the individual citizen. I will therefore not expand very much on this point, other than to point out three or four initiatives with which public officials were particularly pleased.
- We reviewed our investigation process in depth to make it even more results-based. This review prompted us to consolidate complaints in some circumstances. We also developed more expeditious methods for settling cases that are not very complex in order to concentrate more on solving complaints that entail systemic problems.
- In addition, we intend to rely more often on conciliation and mediation techniques, while continuing to pursue our prime objective of ensuring that the Act is upheld and the linguistic rights of complainants are protected.
- We are also aiming for more active involvement by managers in our investigations and more active co-operation with them. We want them to be actively involved in the development of lasting solutions and then to ensure that these solutions are implemented. We wish in particular to solve problems in the field together with local officials.
- We also train our employees to ensure that they are very familiar with the institutions, their strategic objectives and their work plans. As a result, our employees understand the scope of programs and initiatives and their impact on members of the public.
Liaison Role
This role is two-fold:
We deal both with local managers and regional councils of senior government officials and with the management committees of institutions to make them more aware of their responsibilities.
Meeting public officials on their own turf not only gives them an opportunity to help us understand their basic situations but is also a sign of respect. It is also a way of conveying the importance we attach to customized solutions. Finally, it is a golden opportunity to respond directly to objections and to inform and convince.
We also maintain ongoing contact with associations and groups of concerned citizens in order to have a good understanding of their needs and current concerns.
- These contacts enabled us, for example, to realize how increasingly important on-line services are to citizens.
This liaison role is a key aspect of our upstream work. It helps to bring together officials and the communities they serve. It also enables us to target our activities better, to adjust our aim and to ensure that our recommendations are as relevant and effective as possible.
Monitoring Role
We also work with officials and members of Parliament when bills, regulations and policies are being drafted in order to ensure that linguistic rights are given due consideration. This requires quite extensive parliamentary relations activities. This role is primarily preventive. We keep ourselves well out of policy, but stress that it is in everyone's interest – and everyone understands this very well – to examine the problems that we raise.
- For example, we provided studies and presentations to parliamentary committees regarding a number of major issues such as the delivery of health services in French outside Quebec, the integration of immigrants into minority French-speaking communities, and the place of French on the Internet.
Promotion and Education Role
I use an assortment of communication tools to promote a better understanding of Canada's linguistic duality. For example, I give about 250 interviews a year to the media and deliver an average of about 30 speeches. The media, it goes without saying, are the ombudsman's natural allies, echoing and magnifying his or her messages.
We also disseminate our annual report and various studies very broadly. These are opportunities to present ourselves to the media and deliver the key messages that we want conveyed. The publication of our annual report, for example, is always headline news in papers across the country. We also meet periodically with the editorial boards of large newspapers to exchange views on issues related to Canada's linguistic duality. Finally, we have developed an array of information products for the general public and for students and teachers. The full panoply of our communication tools can be found on our Web site at www.ocol-clo.gc.ca.
Auditing Role
My prerogative to conduct investigations on my own initiative enables me to carry out audits, studies and evaluations of a more comprehensive kind and to attack systemic problems head on.
We also wish to strongly encourage government institutions to monitor themselves by adopting an auditing and internal complaint resolution infrastructure that enables them to detect and correct mistakes before they are brought to our attention.
We have been especially interested for some time in institutions adopting self-monitoring procedures. This reduces the time and effort we spend following up on our recommendations.
- For example, in April 2002, we published a study called Official Languages on the Internet: Web Sites of Diplomatic Missions and International Organizations. We concluded that these sites reflected Canada's linguistic duality quite poorly or incompletely and urged the Department of Foreign Affairs to monitor this issue on its own from time to time.
Court Intervention Role
As a final recourse, I do not hesitate to ask the courts to ensure that linguistic rights are upheld.
You may have noticed that four of the six roles I have described involve basically preventive or preparatory work. Ombudsmen, like firefighters, often put fires out but they always prefer to prevent them.
To be effective, ombudsmen must avoid the temptation to spread themselves too thin. They must spend as much time as necessary on good strategic planning. They must know which studies and which approaches to senior officials, policies and the media will enable them to advance their cause and gain ground.
- For example, it was through a series of targeted studies on weaknesses in the federal government's current linguistic governance, along with appropriate media coverage, that we were able to persuade the federal government to propose an action plan to renew and reinvigorate its Official Languages Program by including measurable, concrete, sustainable objectives. The plan also includes substantial additional funding.
III. Opportunities for Reflection
The last point that I would like to draw to your attention is the importance of opportunities for reflection as ombudsmen and mediators.
Late last March, I had the great pleasure of hosting the First Annual Conference of the Forum of Canadian Ombudsmen. This forum is actually a network of ombudsman agencies and other interested people. Its mission is to promote the ombudsman role in various sectors of Canadian society and internationally.
We attempt to work together to maximize the usefulness and credibility of ombudsmen. Forums like this foster the development of new ideas and directions by underlining best practices and setting professional standards.
At this conference, for example, we examined the question of developing a code of ethics and procedural codes to enhance quality and accountability.
We looked into equity standards and the creation of a national compendium of ombudsman law. Such a compendium would make it possible to codify legal standards and types of interventions.
In addition, we discussed the impact of technological innovation on our investigations and the way in which our offices function. We also addressed the thorny issue of reparations for complainants. And so on and so forth... In short, we worked together on ways to do our jobs better, on ways to persuade better.
I therefore strongly encourage the formation of such forums or national and regional networks. The more we support one another, the stronger we will be, and the better we will be able to defend human rights, democratic values, equality and equity among citizens.
Conclusion
Our respective countries, in their wisdom, have adopted an instrument that I consider essential to the management of a modern country. To be an ombudsman or mediator is to be a beacon of more equitable, more transparent governance that is more sensitive to the needs of citizens. It's a job with a great future.
As protectors of individual citizens at a time when governments are becoming both increasingly distant and increasingly all encompassing, we must develop every facet of our mission. It will be easier to accomplish our mission, dear colleagues, if we do everything in our power to do a better job of persuading and convincing.
Thank you.
