2020 PSES Champion’s Message to Employees!

November 30, 2020 – Defence Stories

Good day,

Over the coming week, you will be receiving email invites for the 2020 Public Service Employee Survey (PSES). The PSES is one of the platforms for civilian Defence Team members to express their opinions about key topics such as engagement, leadership, and compensation.

As PSES Champion, I strongly encourage you to participate in the survey, as it is a valuable tool for employees to have their voices heard and to identify ways to support a highly engaged and productive workforce. Regular participation allows senior leadership to see visible progress of initiatives or actions taken as a result of previous PSES results, and to adjust accordingly.  While sometimes it takes a few years for change to take effect, it is important we continue to monitor our progress.

The 2020 PSES runs from 30 November 2020 to 22 January 2021. The objective is to gather information to support the continuous improvement of people management practices in the department. The range of themes covered in the 2020 PSES includes workplace well-being, COVID-19, compensation, respect, diversity, harassment, discrimination, and other people management priorities.

Advanis, a Canadian market and social research firm, will administer the survey on behalf of the Treasury Board of Canada Secretariat. The survey should take approximately 20-25 minutes to complete. This is a small time commitment that will assist us in developing strategies that will benefit your well-being and the Defence Team as a whole.

You can complete the survey via the email link that will be sent to you. Although you are able to forward the email to a personal email address and complete the survey outside of the DWAN, please do not forward your email link to another individual. Your link is specifically meant for your own use and the survey can only be completed once.  We are also mindful of the operational realities of the work environment on the bases and wing commands across the country.  Therefore, the availability of paper copies of the survey are also being explored.  Additionally, you can further choose to complete the survey by telephone at: 1-866-539-7829.

Your participation is absolutely vital to the success of the survey. The more voices that are heard, the better your senior management can identify areas for improvement and address them accordingly.  Management and senior leadership are here to support you in participating in the PSES and many initiatives or actions are derived by the results. Despite the pandemic and the fact that some employees are now solely working from home, the work continue to be carried out, albeit differently. Your views have always been important, even more so during this time.

Results for the 2020 survey are scheduled to be released during the spring months; results for 2019 are available to be accessed at any time. Moving forward, DND is increasing its capability to better understand the results and develop strategies to improve the well-being of our entire organization. Through the use of new data analytics tools, we will be able to access and interpret the results in a manner that was not possible before.

Please be assured that your answers will remain confidential. If you have any questions about the survey, or if you have not received an email link by Monday, 7 December 2020, please visit the Advanis support site or send an email to +PSES-SAFF@ADM(HR-Civ) DSPA@Ottawa-Hull.

Thank You,

Julie Charron, ADM(RS)
DND Public Service Employee Survey Champion