Anglophone candidates are systematically favored, to the detriment of Francophones, during a key stage in the hiring of executives at Global Affairs Canada, internal documents show. And this, even if all the senior management of the ministry which oversees the embassies underwent training to recognize its “unconscious biases”.
One day in November, in 2019. Paul (we use a fictitious first name to protect the identity of our source) settles in front of his computer. He starts a video recording and responds in less than half an hour to every complex question about the administration of Canadian diplomacy, which he learned of a few minutes before. His answers are then analyzed by hierarchical superiors, who arrive in December with the verdict: he is rejected.
Like him, more than two-thirds (68%) of French-speaking candidates failed the nerve stage of the video interview, called ” VidCruiter », To become executives in the diplomatic network of Canada. However, only a little more than half (56%) of the English-speaking candidates were eliminated at this stage, at the same time inflating their proportion among the appointed executives. The English-speaking majority is the only group of employees who, proportionally, are more likely to have passed the competition than to have started it.
“We all have the right to feedback [lors d’un échec], testifies Paul at Duty, two years after the fact. In my case, the supervisor who looked at my VidCruiter, he was an anglophone. My concern is: do they [les recruteurs] were able to really capture the nuances of my answers? “
The smallest details of the organization and progress of the most recent round of executive hires, which took place between June 2019 and June 2020, are recorded in 112 pages of internal documents produced thanks to the Access Act. to information. Several emails exchanged by its managers are also recorded there.
These documents provide clues to understand why so few Francophones reach the senior positions of Canadian diplomacy. The duty revealed last year that the most prestigious branches of Global Affairs Canada were almost all led by senior English-speaking executives, while the department is made up of 42% French-speaking civil servants.
Prestigious competition
Unless personally appointed by the discretion of the Prime Minister, a diplomat who aspires to one day become an ambassador must take the Global Affairs Canada Senior Executives Competition (“EX-01” as the jargon). The opportunity does not present itself often. It may take years for the administration to organize such a competition.
The 2019-2020 exercise consisted of filtering the approximately 800 candidate civil servants to retain around 70, intended to become hierarchical superiors, or even heads of mission. Several officials described this competition as the most difficult of the entire federal public service, given the prestige of the positions.
“It leads to very prestigious positions, and which are also very well paid”, adds Jean-François Savard, professor at the National School of Public Administration (ENAP) and specialist in the federal public service. “Global Affairs Canada is particularly closed [aux candidatures extérieures]. Once people get into entry-level positions, then they’re the ones who move up in the ministry. “
The long promotion process consists of four stages: selection (” screening “), Delayed interview (” VidCruiter »), In-person interview, and finally the reference check. The department produced analyzes showing the gender, visible minority status, and language of the remaining candidates at each stage.
Candidates from the English-speaking majority are represented at 68% on the starting line (527 candidates), but finish at 74% of those nominated (56 finalists). By comparison, 32% of the initial candidates were French-speaking (247 candidates), a proportion that melted at the end of the race, to 26% (20 finalists).
Unconscious bias
Since Francophones are not an “equity group” in the public service, no specific analysis was devoted to them during the last EX-01 competition. No manager raised a problem with their proportional high elimination rate, according to email exchanges obtained.
The rate of visible minorities, people with disabilities, and Aboriginal people also declined over the course of the process. This, even if the managers of the competition repeated on several occasions, in their communications, a claim to encourage equity in employment.
The documents on the EX-01 competition, however, specify that “information on unconscious bias was provided to all evaluators”. All senior management would have received such training on unconscious bias the previous year.
Global Affairs Canada does not keep any written record of the material provided during these training sessions, demonstrates an access to information request made by The duty.
Acceptable proportion
“I always had the impression that there were quotas. That it was necessary to eliminate a percentage of French-speaking candidates, according to their criteria, ”testifies Paul. The official, still employed by Global Affairs Canada, is not authorized to speak to the media with his face uncovered.
“Systemically, the value of English-speaking employees has always been higher,” he adds. I have the impression that this is reflected in the competition. “
The duty spoke to two other candidates for Global Affairs Canada’s executive competition, who failed at various stages of the process. One of them argues that the administration is satisfied when the proportion of named Francophones corresponds approximately to the proportion of Francophones in Canada.
“They say to themselves, when we reach nearly 25% [de francophones] in the end, it could be worse, he said. There are analyzes on other categories, but not on: is there enough French? “
Faced with data submitted by The duty, Professor Jean-François Savard sees it as proof of “anglonormativity”. “It’s a bit like the principle of systemic discrimination. You are in a system where people are anglophones, and they do not realize that they discriminate against francophones on the basis of French. If you are French speaking, you will not express yourself so clearly […] When you arrive for an interview, of course, you have less chances than the others. “
He believes that the Francophones who are the most successful in these competitions are also those who have the best command of the English language, such as those who grew up in a Francophone minority environment.
According to section 39 of the Official Languages Act, the government must ensure equal promotion opportunities for French-speaking and English-speaking public servants. The staff of the institutions must also “reflect the presence in Canada of the two official language communities. “
In an email to Duty, Global Affairs Canada ensures that it takes “very seriously” this second objective of being “representative of the Canadian population”.
“In order to maximize the achievement of our objectives and identify potential biases, we conduct in-depth analyzes at all stages of the process”, we are assured, mentioning official languages among other factors. discrimination such as ethnicity and sexual orientation.
It is explained that each interview carried out with the tool ” VidCruiter Is validated by a second separate assessor, and that all members of the EX-01 process committees have an adequate linguistic level to assess candidates, with a concern for assigning French-speaking assessors to candidates speaking that language.
Minister Mélanie Joly was not in post at Foreign Affairs at the time of the last round of executive hiring. She nevertheless commented on the matter when she was Minister of Official Languages, promising to “change the culture” of the public service and to give more teeth to the law to force the bilingualism of the administrative machine.