Putting people first: recruitment, retention, and culture change depend on it

Attracting people into the Canadian Armed Forces, Regular Force, or Reserves is directly correlated with how the CAF is equipped to care for them and their families once they are in uniform. The ongoing recruitment and retention challenges for the CAF and the Department of National Defence are enormous, and are reflected in the perceived or real lack of support by the government to address issues head-on. Recruits are hesitant to enlist, and this will continue while the government prioritizes words over actions. The CAF currently analyzes the reasons why members release. If they could get the Treasury Board to really understand the work environment of CAF members, they could reverse engineer policies and programs to address the issues, and prevent them from happening at all. This is not only good policy, but good issues management as well. Focus on the family Gregory Lick is the National Defence and Canadian Armed Forces Ombudsman. Photograph courtesy of Gregory Lick For example, in 2013, the office of the DND/CAF Ombudsman released a report titled On the Homefront: Assessing the Well-being of Canada’s Military Families in the New Millennium. It contained 18 recommendations that directly addressed the most-urgent needs for CAF members and their families. The message was clear: take care of the military family, and the military members will take care of us, at home and overseas. While the minister accepted and implemented some recommendations, others still have not been addressed. The government asked the DND and the CAF to “action” some recommendations, but they were not fully implemented. Since we released that report, our office has continued to promote the importance of adequate support for our military families, publishing reports that aimed directly at addressing the most important concerns they face. In 2017, the Government of Canada released its defence policy, Strong, Secure, Engaged. Our office was ecstatic to see that Initiative 24 was to “develop a Comprehensive Military Family Plan to help stabilize family life for Canadian Armed Forces members and their families who frequently have to relocate.” By 2019, the CAF had briefed our office multiple times on the promising groundwork for this plan. On paper, it looked great, and struck all the important chords. If implemented, we believed that this plan would have positively impacted members and their families. Then, inexplicably, this plan vanished. The government has not approved, announced, nor implemented it. Since that time, we have pushed the government to find out what happened. But with the recent refresh of the defence policy, it remains missing in action. Why does this matter? Because as I write this in 2024, the No. 1 reason members are leaving the CAF is because of family-related issues. This was not always the case, but it is now. Our office saw this coming a long time ago. As media continue to report on the challenges military families face, aspiring CAF members will second guess this career path. Fix the military grievance system For another example, we look to the recent, very public misconduct scandals facing the CAF that exposed the sorry state of the military grievance system. The system is plagued by backlogs, misapplication of policies and procedures, and issues surrounding administrative fairness. CAF members have no union representation, and the military grievance system is one of the only redress mechanisms to resolve substantive issues. In any workplace, it is essential for redress mechanisms to be effective, time-sensitive, and responsive. In a non-unionized military environment, it is sacrosanct. Aspiring CAF members expect resolutions when aggrieved, not to fight the system while they are fighting for us. The frustration, trauma, mental, and even financial challenges brought upon by the state of the grievance system is heartbreaking. The CAF’s response to backlogs in the system is frequently to form a “tiger team” to reduce the number count. But this does not get to the systemic causes of such delays. Since our office was stood up in 1998, successive ombuds have written to the minister and senior leadership of the CAF asking them to fix the grievance system. Repeatedly, this government has either rebuffed or ignored these entreaties. Issues facing the grievance system have a snowballing effect, and they have now become common reports in the mainstream media. In June, our office will publish a report that provides clear recommendations on how to address some of the concerns with the grievance system focused on medical complaints, and areas where the department lacks authority to remedy issues. If implemented, it will positively impact the current situation. (Un)Reserved service Over the past five years, Canadian Armed Forces Reserve Force members have done more than ever in support of Canadians here at home: from floods to wildfires to serving alongside primary health-care providers in long-term care facilities during the COVID-19 pandemic. The CAF rarely denies requests from provinces and territories for assistance. However, the increased expectations for support from our Reserve Force mean we must also increase the attention we pay to those who serve in our Reserve units. Over the last decade, our office has published multiple reports related to Reserve Force members of the Canadian Armed Forces, including the Canadian Rangers. As we follow-up on the recommendations we made to the CAF, we are disappointed to discover that this government has not fully implemented any of our recommendations. This is troubling. Last September, our office published Hidden Battles: A systemic investigation into the identification of mental health needs and support for Primary Reserve members participating in domestic operations. We could never have foreseen that 14 months after we launched our investigation, the 2023 wildfire season would be the largest on record, demanding a large response from Reserve units across Canada. Our six recommendations aimed to ensure that the CAF meets the mental health needs and support of Reserves, which is essential to ensuring the mental readiness of Reserves to meet these challenges head on. Both recruitment and retention depend on the government treating Reserve Force members fairly. Farewell As my term as Ombudsman concludes on July 2, I recognize that none of the solutions to these complex problems are simple. However, the government has not prioritized the work we—and similar organizations—have done, the evidence we have considered, the recommendations we made, nor the ample opportunity they have had to improve the situation for CAF members and their families. So many issues facing the defence community are solvable. The members who put their lives at risk for us and the families who support them deserve more. Gregory Lick is the National Defence and Canadian Armed Forces Ombudsman. His term ends July 2. At time of publication, no replacement has been named for the position. The Hill Times

Putting people first: recruitment, retention, and culture change depend on it

Recruits are hesitant to enlist, and this will continue while the government prioritizes words over actions.

Canada’s aging crisis and a call for reform in eldercare

Sudan’s warring sides and the long-simmering ethnic conflict

Balanced approach needed on right-to-repair bill, protecting IP rights and public safety

Reflections from a new citizen

Public Safety Canada’s dealing with natural and communication infrastructure disasters

As COP29 wraps up, will Canada finally stop funding fossils this fall?

The never-ending story of studying military to civilian transition

Throwing money at recruitment won’t fix the CAF’s personnel problems

The Canadian military is in worse shape than the numbers indicate

Canada can ill afford to ignore the treatment of military families: our national security depends on it

Military recruitment and retention crisis requires addressing low morale, housing availability, say Tory, NDP critics

News

Get free news updates

Opinion

Submit a guest opinion article

resources

Advertise

subscribe

get help

Get free news updates

Submit a guest opinion article

Putting people first: recruitment, retention, and culture change depend on it

Recruits are hesitant to enlist, and this will continue while the government prioritizes words over actions.

Get The Policy Briefings Newsletter