'Woke' Ideological Requirements Outrank Experience in B.C. Health Hiring
The job posting demands demonstrated commitment and unwavering dedication to DEI, while stating only that consideration will be given to leadership and financial experience.
Public healthcare, Canada’s most prized achievement, is now openly prioritizing ideological compliance to ‘woke’ orthodoxy over competence.
A post by Caroline Elliott circulated screenshots of a B.C. Provincial Health Services Authority job posting for Director, Business Planning, highlighting the Indigenous-specific “anti-racism” and DEI language in its requirements.
This is not an inconsequential position. The role supports the BC Centre for Disease Control, the Genome Sciences Centre, and PHSA’s research programs. Tasks include budgeting, financial statements, variance analysis, capital planning, and business cases.
It is ridiculous enough to impose an ideological litmus test for taxpayer funded government positions — it is even worse to place more importance on those beliefs than experience for the job itself.
Consider some of the “core competencies”:
“Demonstrated knowledge of the historic and ongoing impacts of settler colonialism on Indigenous Peoples in social and health contexts…. including clear understanding of and commitment to eradicate Indigenous-specific racism and discrimination and embed Indigenous Cultural Safety and Humility.”
“Additionally, it involves embedding Indigenous Cultural Safety and Humility, and an advanced expertise and unwavering dedication to engaging with diversity, centering equity, and advancing inclusion (DEI).”
“Brings an understanding of the Indigenous specific racism and the broader systemic racism that exists in the colonial health care structure.”
“Demonstrates action-oriented practices addressing Indigenous-specific racism and dismantling systems of oppression.”
“Exhibits strong DEI and anti-racism competencies/skills.”
“Demonstrated deep understanding of their personal learning/unlearning journey in relation to Indigenous-specific racism and dismantling systems of oppression.”
“Demonstrated knowledge of the social, economic, political realities of settler-colonialism and impacts on Indigenous peoples.”
The tell is in the difference in language.
The ideological requirements use demonstrated knowledge, clear understanding, commitment to eradicate, unwavering dedication. The financial ones open with wording that consideration will be given to related leadership and managerial experience.
When discussing ideology, beliefs must be demonstrated and unwavering. Meanwhile, competence will be taken into account.
This is not to say the PHSA is looking to hire a completely unqualified activist. One of the qualifications is a real professional standard — accounting designation or MBA plus twelve years of progressively senior management. The point is they will not hire somebody who is not an activist. It’s a barrier to entry — and a big one considering ideological commitments are two out of the three qualifications. They will effectively take a pool of qualified individuals and shrink it to include only those who profess the correct politics.
It would be comforting to believe this is a one off — some HR manager sneaking their own politics into a single job posting. Except the same social justice dictates appear nearly verbatim across other PHSA senior postings — Director, Labour Relations; Manager, Financial Planning and Analysis; Director, Strategy, Planning & Implementation at BC Cancer. This is a bureaucracy-wide template.
There are two primary reasons this is not merely cultural but rather hardwired into the system itself:
B.C.’s Office of the Provincial Health Officer runs something called the Unlearning & Undoing White Supremacy Project.
British Columbia’s Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples Act (DRIPA) requires the provincial government to take measures to ensure provincial laws are consistent with the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples.
Let’s go through each one of them.
