22 INSIGHT
What are we to do with OAS eligibility?
Vol. 25 No. 3
February 13, 2012
Publisher and Editor:
John Hobel
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EDITORIAL
Managing Editor:
Todd Humber
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Senior Editor:
Sarah Dobson
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Messing with public pensions is a very poor diet for a poli- tician to subsist on.
Few issues get people more
riled up than money they’ve
been promised and seniors traditionally flock en masse to the
voting booth.
But Prime Minister Stephen
Harper started playing with
that hot potato last month in a
speech to the World Economic
Forum in Switzerland. Canada’s aging population poses
a threat to social programs,
he said, and changes must be
made to limit the growth of
spending on retirement income
programs.
Harper took pains to point
out the Canada Pension Plan
(CPP) is actuarially sound,
leading to speculation the government has its sights set firmly on Old Age Security (OAS).
Minister of Human Resources
and Skills Development Diane
Finley later confirmed in Parliament that OAS is indeed ripe
for change, calling the current
system unsustainable.
At press time, the govern-
ment was short on details but
■ EDITOR’S NOTES
TODD HUMBER
the consensus is it’s mulling
increasing the eligibility age for
OAS payments from 65 to 67.
From an employer perspective, is raising the age for OAS
benefits a good, bad or indifferent thing? It’s probably a little
bit of all three.
Unlike CPP, which is a pay-
roll tax, employers and employ-
ees don’t contribute (at least
not directly) to OAS. It’s funded
from general tax revenues. But
the bill is hefty and is going to
explode in the next couple of
decades. Right now, about 4. 9
million seniors receive OAS
benefits at a cost of $36 billion.
But by 2030, that figure is ex-
pected to balloon to 9. 3 million
seniors with a price tag of $108
billion.
Labour Relations Editor:
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Assistant Labour Relations Editor:
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Authentic leadership steers firms
through unsteady, uncertain times
Web Co-ordinator:
Mina Patel
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mina.patel@thomsonreuters.com
Organizational lead- ers operate in global economic uncertain- ty where the speed
of change and complexity of
stakeholder demands produce
a challenging and often stressful platform for performance.
For their organizations to
succeed, leaders must find
ways to engage and inspire others while dealing with multiple
— and often conflicting — demands from customers, senior
management, boards of directors and staff.
Employees, whose confidence may be rattled by the
pace and ambiguity of pressured working environments,
are seeking greater transparency and stronger relationships of trust with their bosses.
Organizations are finding that
bosses who can communicate
and lead with authenticity are
making a difference.
Emotional intelligence is
an important contributor to
authenticity. In addition, leaders must understand and be
comfortable expressing their
values and be able to manage
their behaviour and stay true to
these values even when feeling
stressed or facing adversity.
Employees are seeking
meaning and significance from
their work, according to Bill
George, author of True North:
Discover Your Authentic Leadership. They are willing to trust a
leader when they can personally identify with his values and
see him holding fast to those
retention among employees.
Employers that develop and
support leadership authenticity
will be more successful in the
competition for talent.
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■ GUEST
COMMENTARY
MAUREEN BROWN
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All rights reserved.
values despite the high-stakes,
turbulent environment.
A critical prerequisite for authenticity is self-understanding.
Authentic leaders know their
own values, strengths and
weaknesses, and their impact
on others. This helps them to
manage themselves, and others, under stress.
Workers don’t expect bosses
to be perfect but they do need
to trust that their leaders are
acting in the interest of the organization and its stakeholders,
rather than pursuing political
or personal agendas.
Self-understanding builds
trust in relationships, particularly when individuals are
taking risks. Employees want
to believe their leaders know
themselves well enough to assess and manage the risk they
are assuming for themselves,
and asking others to take on.
Authentic behaviour is
also related to confidence,
self-esteem, performance and
Most organizations realize
leadership development is cru-
cial to their current and future
success. A Conference Board
of Canada survey of HR execu-
tives in 2010 identified key tal-
ent retention and building lead-
ership as top priorities. In the
short term, management and
leadership development is the
highest priority; in the longer
term, succession management
is the second highest priority.
LETTERS TO THE EDITOR
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Canadian HR Reporter,
Thomson Reuters Canada Ltd.
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Email: todd.humber@
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CHRR reserves the right
to edit for length and clarity.
Maureen Brown is a senior
associate at the Niagara
Institute in Niagara-on-the-
Lake, Ont. The institute has
partnered with Hamilton’s
McMaster University on
a three-day leadership
development program. For
more information, visit
www.niagarainstitute.com.
