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Released on May 10,
2016 at 10:00 EDT
Tag # 687
Exposed: Fowke's conspiracy
against Bigger administration
Fowke should be thrown in jail for wilful blindness and
wasting millions of tax dollars
Fowke:
Incompetent and Negligence
Fowke
must be held accountable for the contract negotiations and the
labour relations mess in the fire services division, which
cost taxpayers over $ 800,000.
The
city's embattled, incompetent Human Resources Director - Kevin
Fowke, has failed in his back door attempt to conquer the CAO
office. Soon after former CAO Doug Nadorozny was fired and
escorted out from the City hall, Fowke was appointed interim
CAO. Controversially, Bob Johnston, from the Sudbury Airport
Authority, was then selected as a preferred candidate for the
job.
Behind
the scenes, while Johnston tried to settle in at the City
hall, Fowke led corrupt bureaucrats in attempts to regain
their authority. Fowke utilized his old tactics and underhand
connections with other bureaucrats to discredit Johnston.
During the P6M project process, Bob Johnston was misguided by
Fowke and was provided information concerning labour relations
issues such as excessive overtime and absenteeism in the fire
services division. Fowke forced Johnston to address these
issues parallel to the P6M project. Addressing the labour
relations issues with P6M defeated the purpose of the project.
This controversial action triggered a very unsettling
situation with the Bigger administration. Johnston failed to
follow instructions from the Mayor and council by directly
addressing these issues before the council meeting.
Fowke
colluded with Johnston against the Bigger administration.
According to a leaked e-mail from City Hall, Johnston wrote to
Fowke, "your efforts there wasn't enough political will to be assertive
with the union. This may be the case, but I believe I will be
able to take a new approach when presenting this data so that
the magnitude of the problem resonates with them."
This provides clear evidence that Johnston’s actions are
political.
It
is also clear that Fowke motivated Johnston to bring this
matter to the council. Fowke's sole intention was to create a
path for Johnston through which he would leave the office and
thus free the CAO position for his taking. His motive was
successful and Johnston wrote back to Fowke: "If council rejects my strategy I will stand down and never discuss
this matter again. Quite frankly, I have no interest in
continuing to work for a corporation...".
Johnston
further wrote that "it is important that a communication
strategy be established to inform the public of the
disparities and inequities in the system."
These leaked e-mails are also evidence that Fowke colluded
with Johnston against the Bigger administration to go public
and attempted to discredit the council and mayor.
Mayor
Bigger condemned the interim CAO’s (Johnston's) political
approach for choosing to discuss fire services at the Sept.
22, 2015, council meeting. Ironically, Johnston’s supposed
“political approach” was merely orchestrated by Fowke's
conspiracy. According to an uncovered e-mail from Bigger's
office, he stated: "I specifically told you not to antagonize the firefighters union
with your personal comments on P6M. You chose to disregard my
direction. Your role is to follow the direction of mayor and
council. I am not impressed."
Bigger copied this e-mail to fellow City councillors.
Fowke
has nothing to do with politics at City Hall but to follow the
instructions of the Mayor and council. Fowke, however, painted
a different picture with the public and the Mayor. Fowke said
in June 2015 that " increases
in overtime were not directly related to the schedule in the
Fire Services division." Furthermore, he stated that
"they
are related to increased training commitments to volunteers
and because of using trainers on evenings and weekends."
According
to the leaked e-mail, Fowke also admitted to the increase in
sick leave and absenteeism and suggested that negotiations on
this matter could be resolved during the next contract.
However, this would not even be a problem in the first place
if Fowke were able to forecast that consequences would arise
from a 24-hour shift schedule.
Fowke's
incompetence and conspiracy led to all these issues. The
City's fire chief, Trevor Bain, even wrote to Johnston that he
does not want to get in "war of words" with Fowke.
Fowke did not discuss the matter directly with the fire chief,
but instead, utilized a political approach - Johnston as an
instrument to develop a toxic relationship with Bigger.
Finally, Johnston was removed from the CAO position and Fowke
was able to snatch the interim CAO position in City hall.
Fowke
later addressed the media and stated that "the City was
planning to hire a private recruitment company to search for
the new CAO." Bigger surprised Fowke however, when he announced
that the council had already selected the CAO.
Ed Archer, interim CAO from Regina will resume his job
as permanent CAO with the City of Greater Sudbury.
In
addition to all of this, it should be noted that Fowke is also
facing allegations over wasting millions of tax dollars on
legal fees to cover his incompetence and for scamming
thousands of tax dollars in referral fees from law firms.
The
Bigger administration must take stern action against Fowke and
he must be removed from City Hall in order to protect
taxpayers. This will also prevent future conspiracies from his
behalf against the Bigger administration and taxpayers.
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--------------------------------------End
Editorial
Released on May 26, 2016 @ 21:00 EDT
This research
findings initially published on
Public Administration and Development, (35), 113–127,
(2015). Brief overview and excerpts from the article follows.
High flying
managers have been inclined to look elsewhere for their route to the top
This article discusses
contributions of human resources management (HRM) to strengthening state
institutions in organisational settings. It also identifies leading
practices and frontiers in HRM practice and research. “Technical” HRM
expertise in development exists in matching organizational performance
with staffing, advancing decentralization, international project
management, and training, and research also shows extensive concerns with
patronage and anti-corruption. Frontiers are discussed in connection with
strategic HRM, notably improved leadership development/talent management,
workforce engagement in developing settings, re-thinking/professionalization
of appointee–executive relations, comprehensive HRM strategies, and
increased leadership for HRM itself.
Human resources
management (HRM) is critical to strengthening state institutions and
performance by attracting and retaining well-qualified and talented people
to work on key issues and ensuring that leaders’ efforts contribute to
organizational and worker. Our society face many, oft-discussed challenges
of poverty, environmental degradation, security, regulation, corruption,
and racial and ethnic integration, and all of these require civil servants
and leaders who are capable and well motivated to make progress. They also
require effective, ‘rightsized’ organizations that use appropriate
technology and work processes. Examples of HRM supporting progress towards
development goals include selecting capable public leaders, linking
managerial performance to results, strengthening anti-corruption regimes,
increasing employee engagement.
The economic perspective
focuses on supportive and stabilizing roles of the state sector,
de-emphasizing HRM as a strategic force and involving reform and state
retrenchment through new public management (NPM). By the late 1980s, HRM
was largely confined to routine decisions and playing restricted,
bureaucratic, and reactive roles, including support for NPM
implementation. As researchers state, “high flying managers have been
inclined to look elsewhere for their route to the top…it is rarely the
case that a chief executive officer will have ‘cut his teeth’ in the
personnel department.” The “economic” era of the 1980s, associated
with organizational restructuring and retrenchment, is now seen as “a
lost decade”, and greater attention is needed to ensure a merit-based
bureaucracy that leads to meeting goals. A managerial perspective is once
again needed, and “there is solid evidence that HRM is not simply
connected with organizational performance but actually determines
it." In short, all managers are now expected to be proficient in HRM
technical tasks (e.g., hiring and appraisal), occasionally supported by
human resources (HR) specialists who provide guidance and support.
Moreover, human capital development, retention, leadership, and workplace
culture have become strategic issues for organizations and senior
managers. The connection between performance, people, and strategy has
been made.
Human resources
management concerns organizational practices and knowledge that address
the relationship between the individual and the organization with an eye
to optimizing effectiveness from the view of both the organization and
individual. HRM can be further defined as including the following: (i)
technical functions for the day-to-day operations of managing people in
organizations (i.e., staffing, position management, pay systems, benefits
management, training, appraisal, and discipline); (ii) policies and
strategies that further the development, performance, and well-being of
employees; and (iii) a strategic perspective and focus on meeting/shaping
future organizational needs. Of course, all practice and policy are
context dependent, which, in development setting, often causes a focus or
need for HRM to build up capacity under very challenging and resource-poor
conditions.
Studies show distinctive
“technical” HRM expertise for development dealing with
decentralization, matching of performance objectives with staffing,
integration of ethnic groups, and training. It also shows critical roles
in corruption control but notes unanswered questions around HRM
leadership, including commitment to ensuring the integrity of HRM
processes themselves. Frontier opportunities are identified in SHRM areas
of leadership development and selection, talent management, workface
engagement, and ensuring leadership arrangements at the top of agencies.
In line agencies as well as at the center, HRM has leadership roles to
play in ensuring progress towards development objectives. An important
question concerns the capacity and appropriateness for adapting these
approaches. Concerns are voiced about donors pushing upon countries best
practices that do not fit the context. By and large, the HRM strategies
discussed here require administrative leadership that takes excellence
seriously, over convenience and precedent, say. These strategies are
surely not expensive in terms of resourcing, nor do they impose unfit
processes, but increased attention to integrity over “common practice”
is surely not always convenient, nor is promotion based on demonstrated
performance over seniority. Leaders need to recognize the short-term and
long-term benefits of these measures, including HRM officials ensuring the
integrity of HRM processes and connecting HRM to state capacity and
performance. Successful strategies are found in many jurisdictions, large
and small, and better understanding is needed about the conditions that
allow for such reform.
Reference
Berman, M, E. (2015). HRM In Development: Lessons And Frontiers. Public
Administration and. Development. 35, 113–127.
Editor
WikiLeaks Sudbury
May 2016
Related document
HRM
in Development: Lessons and Frontiers
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