Paul MIGUS is an expert in strategic leader­ship advice, service trans­forma­tion, per­for­­mance mana­gement, stra­tegic port­folio management, and change leadership. He was a senior exe­cutive at the Assistant De­puty Minister level in  both the Australian and Cana­dian federal public ser­vices, as well as CEO of St. John Ambulance Canada.Among his many posts, he  has occupied the position of a Chief of Staff and Press Secretary to Cabinet Mi­nisters; Chief Audit Execu­tive/Assistant Deputy Minister, Service Canada; Assistant Deputy Minister of Modernizing Service for Canadians, Social Development Canada and of, Income Security Programs, Human Resources Development Canada; Acting Assistant Deputy Minister of Corporate Implementation Group, Public Works and Government Services Canada; Director General of Portfolio and Strategic Management,  Deputy Minister's Transition Team,  and of Policy and Strategic Planning, Public Works and Government Services Canada; etc.

Paul is a Canadian expert providing support to the Ukraine Civil Service Human Resources Management Reform Project in the area of performance evaluation improvement.  

 —     How the development of senior civil service and leadership is organized in Canada?

The leadership development of is a long process. In general, administration, government are related to the leadership development and activities of senior civil servants corps. It has started at 80-ies in Canada; there were several people, who initiate the process.  One of those -  Jack Minyon, who later became the Head of the Treasury Board. After retirement, he founded the School of Senior Management, which deal with the leadership development. It was not the only one institution, but there were two other similar schools. First one - the Language Learning Center – focused on studying languages, bearing in mind bilingualism in Canada, and studying bases of management. Second institution is a Center of Management, Training and Development, which work primarily with the senior civil servants; its main task was leadership development. Five years ago, in 2004, these three institutions were merged into one School of Public Service of Canada. The school is quite decentralized, with units/departments in all regions of the country.

 —     What kinds of leadership training are offered?

Thanks to this School, many people began to ponder over the leadership: what is leadership, what is management, which leadership competencies should exist. 17 key leadership competency profiles made the foundation for training and evaluation of civil servants, on their basis every civil servant makes individual development plan and knows what he/she needs to work on. It is not necessarily formal training. There are some online trainings, where you can fill in a special form and look over what you have to work on. There are over 1000 online courses in the distance learning mode, various courses of public administration, written communication, etc. Currently the forum where the civil servants can communicate and discuss important issues is under development.

Another way of professional development is a learning from one another when different high-level managers come together to handle the problems in the area. There is a separate program when group is formed of up to 20 individuals who have leadership skills and potentially can become deputy ministers, they visit three-four countries to gain experience; in general the program lasts for about two weeks. It is possible to be send temporary to work at another agency or even another country. Also it’s worth to mention informal mechanisms: official and working meetings, joint dinners, where one of the leading senior officials are invited to have a speech on some key issues: what policy should be, what expectations, what considerations, how this policy should be implemented. The main idea is sharing experiences, exchanging ideas, which gives opportunity to learn.

 —     Do activities of the Canada School of Public Service are focused only on managers or all civil servants?

We started only with leaders, but soon realized that it’s much better to have a school working with all levels of civil servants. Training is an open process as we also should prepare those who will replace the current leaders. This does not mean that we don’t need to work with leaders. There is a difference between professionalism of functional experts and professionalism of leaders-managers, of course, they need different knowledge and skills; thus School covers different levels of civil service and provides appropriate training.

 —     What are the studying peculiarities in this School?

There are things that are made from the very beginning. All civil servants, appointed for the first time, are required to go through the orientation training. Furthermore, if person is appointed as manger of any level for the first time, he/she must go through the compulsory training in this School. Training lasts for five days and at the end a certificate is issued; without studying newly appointed employee is simply not allowed to work. In addition, it is important that this School allows coordinating the training process throughout the civil service. Thus, managers know what employees are studying and what is expected from them. Another important point is that it might be easy to pass the law, but it could remain to be just a paper, if people do not realize what is it, why it is needed for. In other words, such misunderstanding slow down implementation of the act and undermine reforms and changes.

 With the help of the training of servants of all levels School helps to explain what they should do and what is expected from them. Annual evaluation also plays an important role, helping a servant to understand how their work will be evaluated, what is expected from him/her. And it also an important tool of communication between the manager and subordinate employee, helping to clarify the  current quality of the performance, expected results and the needs and possibilities for the improvements. 

—     Is there a difference between understanding of leadership in the public and private sectors?

The difference exists due to the difference of these sectors. Actually, the existence of the School is a consequence of the existence of such difference. In the private sector, the idea of earning profits is a driving force. It is much more complicated in the public sector; as to serve the public and at the same to be objective is an important value. Civil servants should be responsive to the politicians in the government, and at the same time remain politically neutral and impartial. In this context it is important that leaders are responsible for their employees when it comes to the civil service modernization, its improvement. There is a concept of "talent management", which shows respect for people, value of their development. Improvement function is comprehensive, from the lowest to the highest level. To be a leader in the civil service is much more difficult, therefore leaders have to have more competencies, which are much more complex.