Whether you support them or not, Quebec students are giving us all a valuable lesson in leadership.
When Quebec Premier Jean Charest announced relatively small increases in tuition fees that were already the lowest in Canada, he was speaking from the head.
When Quebec students responded by boycotting classes and taking to the streets, they were reacting from the heart.
For over 100 days now, each side has carried on their own one-sided conversation, with neither appearing to be able to even understand the other -- as the most recent breakdown in talks has demonstrated. There is a good reason for that.
The premier has failed to understand the power of passion and collective narrative. His approach is akin to using data about the dangers of smoking to try to convince someone to quit. While it makes sense, using data and logic alone ignores the addiction and the powerful sense of satisfaction, pleasure, and even community that smokers enjoy. Just as logic alone rarely helps in the effort to curb smoking, it hasn't worked to stop the student protests.
In keeping with the great student protests of the past that have permanently changed society, Quebec's students have built a narrative that incorporates the past, ongoing public and government commitments to higher education; the present, in which students are facing mounting debts to pay for tuition; and an uncertain future, in which post-secondary degrees do not guarantee good jobs and fulfilling careers. Woven into this narrative is the drama unfolding on the world stage, as Greece and other European countries struggle with debt, and the arguments on the distribution of wealth continue.
Against this collective narrative, Premier Charest's decision to ground tuition fee increases on appeals to logic and reason was bound to fail.
However, the lesson for leaders is not that they have to back away from tough decisions that need to be made.
Rather, it is to recognize the collective narrative that is unfolding. To begin, you have to show that you are listening and that you understand the other person or group's position. Repeat the arguments your opponents are making, simply by saying "What I think you're trying to say is..."
Once you show you're listening and understand, you can advance your own position, couched in a narrative that the other person can understand.
A dollars and cents argument that says tuition must be increased because it is the lowest in Canada will not, and has not, resonated with students who view their opposition as a matter of social justice and a better future for society as a whole.
When Premier Charest returns to the bargaining table, he must make the case that the increase in tuition will achieve those goals. He cannot let the students own emotion. He must build this narrative for a shared future, one with prosperity and opportunity for Quebec. Only then can the two sides understand each other and come to an agreement that will bring an end to the protests on the streets of Montreal.
It's a lesson that all leaders, in government and business, need to take to heart as they make tough decisions in an era of uncertainty.
Christopher Hickson: BACKLASH: Why This Working Man is Fed up With Quebec Protestors
Don't get me wrong, but... that's a biased opinion. Not that I don't respect it. But it just sounds like Jean Charest handed you a cheque and asked you to write this stuff.
Today's problem doesn't lie necessarily in present politics but in how they have been conducted in Quebec (and let's say North America) for the past decades and there is a movement trying to change that. The populace is utterly uninterested because they have been constantly abused, and they have never had the weapons (metaphor) to fight back, because the government wants it that way, totally understandable. The government cannot lie to the youth saying all should do their fair share when it's known world-wide that these very men and women that form the ruling body of the society steal day and night, between every breath, to fill their pockets, their bank accounts and their retirement income as well as savings. All this money they could do very well without, and others could do very well with. Such as the education institutions, not just post-secondary, but secondary and elementary.
Or maybe it doesn't resonate because the argument isn't based on dollars and cents at all. it is based on 'being the lowest in Canada', which is not a dollars and cents argument but a value judgement: "We should be like the rest of Canada, not like the majority of OECD countries."
Furthermore, the author's assertion that students can't handle logic is based on government spin, not on actual events. In the latest negotiations, the students presented significant compromises and used the government's own fiscal arguments against them. They presented an option where the first two years of the tuition hike would be compensated for by the removal of an equivalent amount of tax credits. The education minister's response had nothing to do with dollars and cents or logic. The students' position was a fiscal equivalent to her own. She said that the offer was *politically* unacceptable because the government can't accept backing down on the hike itself. The government's stance has nothing to do with fiscal responsibility and everything to do with political posturing.