Round Up: January 14

Fairly quick little update.

Apparently the GoC is considering a new policy re: security screening, the new one would apparently involve finger printing and credit checks.

Etienne has shared some of his work re: the use of Facebook as a Public Servant.

Our last weekly got three comments (reproduced verbatim):

kp said...

good article...I'd say that you are already one of "those" leaders.

January 09, 2009

Stephane Dubord said...

Here here kp!

But on the topic of risk-aversion in the PS, we had a discussion on the issue at the MTP Forum last month with Anatole Papadopoulos, and came out with a lot of reasons why it permeates the PS.

First is the type of employee attracted to the PS. Those looking for job stability and pensions aren't necessarily the risk-taking type.

Second, there's the risk-reward balance. In the private sector, if you risk and succeed, there's a high reward factor, which the PS lacks. Even if you risk, and succeed, in some major endeavor, you won't get a bonus or a promotion out of it. You'll just get to include it in your competency portfolio for your next competition.

I think the reason for the lack of risk-taking is that the PS attracts risk-averse employees to begin with, and then doesn't offer any incentive to risk. No matter how little there is to lose, it still outweighs the lack of incentives to gain.

January 12, 2009

Anonymous said...

Hi Nick and Mike. I've been lurking your site for months and just **have to** come out of hiding after reading your most recent post. The Human Resources Branch at Industry Canada is in the process of designing an innovative new physical workspace for itself. We are lowering the cubicle walls, creating collaborative work pods, providing private rooms for those times when work requires major concentration and going wireless in order to create a mobile workforce. And, we're doing it in full partnership with our Accommodations folks who are keen to implement something new with us. If you're interested in hearing more about our plans and following our story as we move into the new space in May or June 2009, send me an email ... nathalie(dot)kachulis(at)ic(dot)gc(dot)ca. :o)

Nathalie Kachulis
Deputy DG, HRB
Industry Canada

And our last email rant got this comment:

Anonymous said...

It's interesting to note that the Ontario Public Service and the City of Vancouver are on that list. If the provincial and municipal governments can make it on there, what's stopping us?

-A

January 14, 2009

Thanks to all of our readers/those who leave comments. Nathalie, I will send you an email before the week is up!

Email Rant: 10 Second Commute

It's been awhile since we did an email rant. So without further ado.


-----Original Message-----
From: Mike
To: Nick
Subject: 10 second commute


hmmmm....

http://tinyurl.com/7l2bvx


-----Original Message-----
From: Nick
To: Mike
Subject: RE: 10 second commute

and yet we are looking for what, an additional 4 million square feet of commercial real estate?

Who's brand is #2 globally? Oh that's right IBM!


-----Original Message-----
From: Mike
To: Nick
Subject: RE: 10 second commute


post both links on the blog... though with a more diplomatic spin


-----Original Message-----
From: Nick
To: Mike
Subject: RE: 10 second commute

btw did I mention that this podcast (c/o Deloitte) points to the fact that during hard economic times the government should be looking to reduce its capital expenditures and re-examine its real estate portfolio... (have I pushed you over the edge yet?)


-----Original Message-----
From: Mike
To: Nick
Subject: RE: 10 second commute


you no doubt heard on the radio this morning that they're looking at about 4 big purchases... all at the same time and therefore artificially spiking up demand


-----Original Message-----
From: Nick
To: Mike
Subject: RE: 10 second commute


yes. I actually like what the urban planner said yesterday morning on CBC about looking at commercial investments along the existing and planned transit way... that is, of course, if we had transit operators...

-----Original Message-----
From: Mike
To: Nick
Subject: RE: 10 second commute


that best brand slide show isn't necessarily about best people to work for - though there is probably a distinct correlation.


-----Original Message-----
From:Nick
To: Mike
Subject: RE: 10 second commute


i know but I am sure they also rank highly on employers... this is from 05 but I doubt much has changes since then, they probably still rank in the top 100.


-----Original Message-----
From: Mike
To: Nick
Subject: RE: 10 second commute

newer.


----Original Message-----
From: Nick
To: Mike
Subject: RE: 10 second commute


way to disprove the point and derail the rant - IBM Canada, not on that list... thanks a lot.

----Original Message-----
From: Mike
To: Nick
Subject: RE: 10 second commute

=)


----Original Message-----
From: Nick
To: Mike
Subject: RE: 10 second commute



Jacka...

CPSRENEWAL.CA Weekly: Some Reflections About Renewal

Just prior to the holiday season I had the opportunity to attend a renewal mini-workshop put on by my friends at PCO's renewal secretariat and sponsored by outgoing Deputy Secretary to the Cabinet, Jim Lahey; it doubled as his unofficial retirement party, one of Jim's last attempts to spur on the renewal conversation.

This was my first interaction with Jim and let me say that, while I can't speak to his overall contributions to the Public Service in sweeping terms, his demeanour, candour and passion were inspiring. I also had the opportunity to meet some other great people, most notably Katherine Baird from the Public Policy Forum (who co-authored Canada's Public Service in the 21st Century: Destination: Excellence) and Bob Chartier, the GoC’s resident leadership expert.

There was a lot to take from the workshop. Here is just a small taste of the conversational flavour of the evening.

Katherine and I had a very interesting discussion on what the ramifications would be if we simply started to change the physical space within which we worked. How would breaking down the cubicle walls, creating open and bright collaborative workspaces while retaining a handful of shared offices for private meetings affect the work culture? Mike and I have often discussed enough, we even ranted about it once. I doubt this idea will gain much traction but if there is a manager out there willing to experiment, why not give it a whirl? You may find that your team is more innovative or collaborates more frequently if you liberate them from the physical rigidity of the typical workspace. Involving them in the physical act of tearing down the walls between them may even increase the magnitude of the impact on their approach to working together. So why not leave the accommodations people out of it? Consider it a team building exercise.

Bob and I spoke about the need to simply engage in conversations about some of the problems within our work culture(s) or rules-based systems something we don't do that well in the Public Service. More often than not we are quick to self-rationalize as to why we can't have the conversation, even if we know it is one that should be had or that could bear fruit. We need to move beyond avoidance and into engagement. Jim added that he often hears public servants say that they want to take risks without facing consequences, yet there can be no risk without consequences. We then got into a conversation around the fact that the risk adverse culture within the public service is confusing given the difficulty involved in terminating employees and documenting poor performance. If anything, we should be expecting to see more people taking risks than avoiding them altogether.

If this is not evidence of learned helplessness, I don't know what is.

In that spirit I want to try to drive the blog back to the discussions about work culture that originally prompted its creation. I don't think we have gotten away from that altogether; however I feel as though we focused a lot on technology in the workplace, and there are clearly other determinants at play.

In Jim's closing remarks he spoke a bit about leadership’s 4 components: courage, judgment, love and humility. Courage and judgment reside on one axis, love and humility on the other. Good leaders are courageous enough to get involved, to take risks, to stand on points of principle, and to call nonsense by its name. Good leaders temper their courage with judgment. Judgment, says Jim, can only be learned by making mistakes. Often the gain to one's faculty of judgment is of a similar magnitude to one's mistake. Good leaders love what they do, they are passionate and inspire passion in those around them. Yet good leaders remain humble, and know that without others, they lead nothing and can accomplish nothing.

The most important thing that I took away was something that Jim said to me when I was leaving. I was explaining that I am trying to direct my career so that I can be one of those leaders he spoke of. He looked at me and said, "Don't wait - do it now".

Round-Up: January 7th

Blogs

Etienne has posted a small series of posts that you probably have already read:

1. In response to the comments ...
2. There is something happening here
3. New Year's Resolution

Krishna Kumar has a good post on today's knowledge worker [h/t to Chamika]. Here is a snippet:

... a knowledge worker’s productivity is not a function of how many hours they work or how much they earn. And this is completely the opposite of how most managements think. They have fine-grained rules about work hours and holidays, polished after decades of dealing with manual workers. Sometimes, these rules actually allow management to set a floor for low-performing knowledge workers, but they prevent high-performing individuals from achieving their true potential.

While Seth Godin makes some good points about boundaries in this post.

@ CSPS

Mike Kujawski has his rescheduled armchair disuccussion on Government Blogging Best Practices on January 15th.

Also Doug Bastien has informed us that the CSPS he has created a Facebook group where users can join and receive regular invites to upcoming CSPS armchairs. Doug has been very active with his use of GCPEDIA (including maintaining stats). You can check out his user page here.


Social Media

1. 7 ways to get your next job via social media
2. The Top 10 Reasons I Will Not Follow You in Return on Twitter
2. Twitter Squatters are the latest online threat

Other

The Public Policy Forum (PPF) welcomed it's new President, David Mitchell.

Public works has put out a call for more office space in the city, Kanata is apparently the spot. There was a great discussion with an Urban planner about it on CBC radio one's Ottawa Morning this morning.

CPSRenewal Weekly: Scheming Virtuously

Fellow Public Servants,

Mike and I have been working on producing a paper that reaches beyond the typical weekly column. We started back in September and have finally concluded. In this, our last weekly column before the holiday season, we would like to share it with you and ask you to share it with others.

The paper, entitled, Scheming Virtuously: A Handbook for Public Servants is meant to help public servants find ways to get involved and be innovative within the public service – to build a culture of stewardship within the public service. In short, it is another tool for those of us looking for or working towards renewal.

This publication is prefaced with a mandatory disclaimer, which for clarity I will reiterate explicitly here prior to linking to the document:

“Yes, we are federal public servants; however this paper is not sponsored or endorsed by the Public Service of Canada.

The opinions expressed are those of the authors and may not reflect the views of the Public Service of Canada, its Departments and/or Agencies, or their employees.

We have put this guide together in the spirit of the Clerk of the Privy Council’s call to get involved in Public Service renewal, and our own struggles with figuring out how we can actually do it.

In the spirit of what we’re presenting here, this paper is the result of our own virtuous scheming. This document has been a long work in progress, made even longer by the fact that, strictly speaking, the production of this paper doesn’t form any part of our actual work duties.

For the record, this document routinely took a backseat to our substantive work, and never the other way around.”

That being said, you can download the PDF here (easier for printing and circulating via email) or, more interestingly, you can read and edit the document on GCPEDIA here.

We would like to encourage you all to read the document and supplement the “Hints” subsections within the GCPEDIA article. We are specifically looking for more concrete ways to build renewal from the ground up.

Well that's it for us here at cpsrenewal.ca until the new year. We are looking forward to your feedback about SV, and as always, feel free to drop us a line any time.

One last note, while there may not be anymore posts until the new year, keep an eye on my twitter stream, I will use it to share links that may be of interest over the holidays.

Cheers!