I won't be a Lumber Jack - my Fight against Canadian Windmills.

Being a management consultant specialising in process efficiency sometimes makes life more difficult. Let me tell you what happened with my Canadian eTA application, a new visa waiver programme for Canada, similar to the American ESTA programme. 

I booked a flight to Calgary, wanted to spend a week and a bit in the Rocky Mountainsm, hiking and stuff; and after having paid the air fare I went on the Air Canada website to find out about eTA. I went on the eTA website and applied. One question was: Do you take regular medication? And I instinctively knew there was a problem. I had some form of skin cancer last year and need to take a pill a day. I stood in front of a dilemma - should I lie and say No I might face the risk of getting caught at the border. Being stamped a liar I'd never be allowed back into Canada. Should I not lie, I knew I'd have to go through a questionnaire or so and it would not be as easy to obtain an eTA as it would have been if I had lied. 

I didn't lie, told the truth, and I got the following message: 

Your application for an Electronic Travel Authorization (eTA) has been received. A review of your file is underway. You will be advised within 72 hours of next steps regarding your application.

You can check the status of your application by using the Check eTA status tool. To do this, you will need the application number noted above and details from the passport you used to apply for your eTA.

72 hours it says. Well..... 168 hours later, this is 7 days, I received another e-mail from them: 

Status: Pending – Client action required

eTA number: V30786838x

Passport number: xxx

A review of your Electronic Travel Authorization (eTA) application is underway. In order for Citizenship and Immigration Canada (CIC) to continue processing your application, we need some documents from you.

Do not submit your documents by email. To submit your documents, you will need to create or log into your secure MyCIC account at www.cic.gc.ca/mycic. CIC will request documents from you through this account.

Once you have created or logged into your MyCIC account, you will need to link your eTA application to your account by clicking on the “Link eTA application to this account” button.

For future visits to your MyCIC account, go to www.cic.gc.ca/mycic. Select the “Continue to GCKey” button and enter your GCKey user ID and password.

During the review of your file, you are not considered to hold a valid eTA. As such, you should not plan or undertake any travel to Canada until you are advised otherwise.

Right, I have to open that link and sign up and submit some papers. I guessed it was the travel insurance or a certificate of what kind of illness I had. I still had that paper that I completed my radiotherapy sessions and was about to scan it. Whatever. I clicked on the link and an error message occurred. I tried with my Mac and at work with a normal windows computer. I always got this message: 

Server Error

403 - Forbidden: Access is denied.

You do not have permission to view this directory or page using the credentials that you supplied.

I was annoyed. I clicked myself through some website, Canada.ca, and found a link where one can report any system issues. I submitted my problem and received the following: 

Thank you for contacting Canada.ca.

This email has been automatically generated to let you know that we have received your message.

The Government of Canada privacy policies do not allow us to forward email messages on your behalf to any other Government of Canada organizations, programs, services or representatives.

We do not respond to correspondence that contains offensive language.

I waited for a day or so and received the following message: 

Canada.ca does not maintain the Citizenship and Immigration Canada website.

Information on how to report technical difficulties encountered with the Citizenship and Immigration Canada website or on how to obtain related assistance is accessible from the "Help Centre" section of the Department’s website at the following URL:

What do I do if I run into technical problems with my online application to CIC?
http://www.cic.gc.ca/english/helpcentre/answer.asp?q=799&t=23

Good Lord! I clicked on the link and opened up a help section and reported my problems. I got the following message back: 

*** Please note that this is an automated message. ***

Thank you for contacting Citizenship and Immigration Canada (CIC).

You may expect an answer if:

*   you have submitted an application;

*   your application has exceeded normal processing times<http://www.cic.gc.ca/english/information/times/index.asp>;

*   you wish to report important changes or an emergency situation;

*   you wish to report a technical issue with Citizenship and Immigration online services.

Please note that we will not respond if you have not provided all the mandatory fields in submitting your question.

For general questions on the Citizenship or Immigration programs,  visit the online Help Centre<http://www.cic.gc.ca/english/helpcentre/index-featured-int.asp> on our website<http://www.cic.gc.ca/>.

Submitting the same request multiple times will not expedite the processing of your enquiry.

The turnaround time for a response is of 10 business days for online technical difficulties and 30 business days for case specific inquiries.

Please note that Citizenship and Immigration Canada can only communicate with you in one of our two official languages: English or French.

Thank you.

Citizenship and Immigration Canada

10 days. I have to wait 10 days now!!!! 10 days????? Okay, I waited for 10 days. In fact, I waited for 15 days and am still waiting for resolving my IT issue I had with the site. 

Last weekend I called a phone number which I found on their website. I got something like the following automated message:

"Invalid number, no phone calls answered."

I was about to cry! Please God, I don't want to steal from the Canadian health care system, I am happy with the NHS. I only want to travel to see Calgary and the Rocky Mountains, and that only for a week. What on earth is going wrong there??? 

After 3 more days I received the following message: 

Status: Closed

Application number: V30786838x

Passport number: 

Following an assessment of your application for an Electronic Travel Authorization (eTA), it has been determined that you do not meet the requirements for an eTA. Please see the attached document for the reasons leading to this decision.

 Your application is now closed.

You are not considered to hold a valid eTA. As such, you should not plan or undertake any travel to Canada. Should you decide to travel to Canada, you may experience delays at boarding or on arrival, and you may not be allowed to board your flight or enter Canada.

I do not meet the requirements? I haven't had a single chance of doing anything but wait, wait for more than 4 weeks now. What's wrong with you guys in Canada? Can't you implement an online visa procedure and system and get your interdepartmental communication right?

Basically, that's it, right? My mistake was that I did not lie, telling the Canadian authorities about the pills I am taking daily. This triggered the whole issue, I am sure. 

As management consultant I can conclude the following: 

- No sufficient project management planning for introducing the eTA system.-

- No IT knowledge to send out links that actually work.

- No contact possibility

   -  e-mails can't be sent, other than via the website that didn't work.

   -  the call centre did not answer any messages.

- No communication link between their IT department and operations department. Those operations people should have seen that there was an open IT ticket.

- No time keeping. In both cases they exceeded the time promised to get back to me. 

And what are the consequences? 

- No holidays for me in Canada.

- Loss of money, as I will have to return the ticket. Also, the eTA had to be paid.

- If I should I ever want to enter Canada again, I would always have to answer the following question: Have you ever been denied entry into Canada? I'll always be brandmarked. I will always have to explain to some immigration officer about this. And nothing is my fault. 

CANADA, PLEASE SORT YOUR PROCESSES OUT!!! 

One of my problems is, as management consultant I understand processes and know exactly when processes go wrong, like in this instance. The frustrating thing is, that there is nothing I can do. I could open a new eTA case, but I'd get the same over and over again - being denied, being sent a non-working link, being made to wait and wait and wait and nobody to talk to. 

I am hoping anyone from the Canadian Immigration Authorities will read my blog and do something about this situation. 

---------------------------

I posted this blog entry last Thursday, 25 January. I thought the case was over. No, it goes on. 

Also on the 25th I wrote this Twitter entry:

Thanks Canada. Feedback about ill-working processes en route to implementing eTA.  http://roland-brunner.blogspot.de/2016/02/i-wont-be-lumber-jack-my-fight-agains.html … 

@CitImmCanada

This morning, the 27th I have received the following message: 

Dear Roland,

Thank you for contacting Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada (IRCC).

In order to access your MyCIC account we suggest you to try this link: http://www.cic.gc.ca/english/e-services/mycic.asp

If you are still experiencing technical difficulties fill out this email form choose Electronic Travel Authorization - General and Technical Enquiries located in the drop down menu under the heading Enquiry,and include:  

Sincerely,

Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada
www.cic.gc.ca

I do still have my ticket, but I am somehow on the verge of losing interest in flying to Canada and am pondering whether I should simply leave it. My enthusiasm for hiking through the Rockies for a few days is dwindling.

Guys in Canada, you should really sort your inefficiencies and processes out, please!

I'll send another message to them to their twitter account and will also write to this e-mail address. If that doesn't work, I'll give up. 

----------------------

Today is the 9th of March and I have given up. I returned the airline ticket. I tried to get another eTA but when I ready "Were you ever refused entry into Canada?" I decided this is too much to bear. Somehow, I completely lost interest. It's just such a shame that they can't implement a visa IT system and get their processes right. 

----------------------

The story goes on: On the 12th of March I have received the following after I, in fact, replied to that one e-mail from the 27th. In that e-mail I copied in this blog link asking them to read through as I could not possibly write the whole shebong. I also wrote a bit about what happened. Of course, nobody ever read that blog entry (as I can see in Google Analytics). As a result I have received this automated e-mail, yes, yet another automated e-mail. All in all, I must conclude that I had to deal with such an amazing degree of incompetence that it's hard to believe if I hadn't collected all those e-mails as evidence. 

Status: Closed

Application number: V3078683xx     

Passport number:           

Thank you for contacting Citizenship and Immigration Canada regarding your application for an Electronic Travel Authorization (eTA).

The status of your application is: Refused.

In accordance with Section 11(1.01) of the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act (IRPA), an electronic Travel Authorization may be issued to a foreign national if he or she is not inadmissible to Canada and meets the requirements of the Act.

Subsection 16(1) of the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act states that a person who makes an application must answer truthfully all questions put to them for the purpose of the examination and must produce all relevant evidence and documents that the officer reasonably requires.

You have not submitted proof of funds, proof residence and itinerary details as requested on 2016/02/09 to be provided by 2016/02/19.

Please note however, that clients who do not submit required documents within the deadline provided, or clients who do not submit the documents that were specifically requested may see their applications being refused. As such, you may want to submit another eTA application, ensuring that all required documents are submitted within the timeline granted and that issues raised earlier are properly addressed.

You are not considered to hold a valid eTA. As such, you should not plan or undertake any travel to Canada. Should you decide to travel to Canada, you may experience delays at boarding or on arrival, and you may not be allowed to board your flight or enter Canada.

Sincerely,

Citizenship and Immigration Canada

I am wondering if anyone from Canada will ever read it. It's such a great case study of what can go wrong. 

If I should ever get a reply from them, I'll copy it below here. 

Just to link my travel blog to here, an entry from my last trip to Canada in August 2010. I flew to Halifax and took a tour for a few days, PEI, etc. 

http://rollsgoesworld.blogspot.co.uk/2010/08/halifax-nova-scotia-canada.html 

Being Found - another Feature of the UK Labour Market.

One other feature of that very labour market I find myself in is that it disables one to actively search for jobs at the company one might want to work for. There are a few sites with job openings (for consulting and similar industry jobs) but all of them are advertised by agencies. It seems, all companies solely recruit via agencies! 

This is an important finding, as agencies operate differently to what a company would do "back in the old days" when we all bought our weekend newspapers and answered job advertisements. 

Since agencies completely took over in the UK, the dynamics of the labour market have changed dramatically; it is faster, more precise, and it does not enable one anymore to search actively;

Faster: Jobs are active on the market only for a few days. In most cases, I feel, it is not even worth looking at adverts older than a week, sometimes even days (I refer to Monster.co.uk adverts, etc). As reference point, think back in the days when a job was advertised in the newspaper and deadline was 3 or 4 weeks ahead. Those days are clearly gone! 

When looking for a temporary job as freelancer, these adverts get outdated 2 days maximum after they have appeared on the market. 

More precise: Here, please refer back to my other article I wrote last week about the perversion of the labour market; if a company wants to hire a one-legged executive production director who dyes his hair once a week with the colour pink and has 35 years of specific sector experience, he is being found! 

Active search: Since the takeover of the agencies, the labour market, at least my niche I am finding myself in, is no longer actively searchable. One is being searched and found nowadays! 

The only way to be active is ensuring one can be found. So, what one needs to do is to regularly update LinkedIN and XING and go to Monster and TotalJobs and pretend to update something, just so the system knows you are an "active searcher". What I also do, I have a list of agencies and I send them my CV regularly in order to ensure I am on top of their pile when going through CVs. 

And unfortunately, that's all one can do; one needs to ensure one is being found!

Feed your Monster - How to conduct successful client meetings

Currently, I am tasked to work on 14 projects within a PMO environment within my client´s organisation. And it reminds me again that there are a few things which are vital for any consultant – be structured, prepare your meetings, and work on your tasks efficiently and effectively.

The use of “we” and “us”

First of all, whenever a consultant speaks he should speak in “pluralis majestatis” – the “we”. “We have created..., we have achieved..., we have worked on..., we have managed...!” It should emphasise that consultants work as a team and we do things together. Ramobs are no consultants!

Client Meetings or “How to feed your Monster”

Whenever you meet your client you need to “feed him”; this is mainly with information and to help him with decisions he has to make. Apart from the odd morning tour where a simple “How are you?” suffices, usually one should never go empty handed or without any reason to the client. Never!

So, before seeing him, prepare your meetings:
- What do you want to get out of the meeting?
- What information do you want to give him?
- What decisions do you want to be made?
- In case you need a decision, what options do you give him from which he can make a decision (do not come empty, always give him options to choose from!)?
- How do you respond to any of his potential objections?

Once the meeting has started, shut up and listen, listen, listen. Oh yes, and listen! You should not talk, the client should. Always listen to what he says. Successful consultants have good listening skills. Do not talk too much, do not always repeat what you said, and do not fall into the trap to try and educate your client. If he wants coaching he will say so. Otherwise, treat him with respect and the way you want to be treated. Look at your client´s body language and read it. You will see when he gets bored, impatient, relaxed, excited, agitated, etc, and manage it. Never forget, opposite you is your monster and you need to feed it. Your client is your tamagochi. You are in control. 

When you attend a client meeting with a colleague the golden rule is – if you talk your colleague shuts up, and when your colleague talks you shut up. Give feedback afterwards, but do not correct your colleague during a meeting (unless he makes the worst ever blunder!) and always act as a team. When the consultant asks a question to the client the other consultant should not answer! Often, questions are of a sheer tactical nature. Oh yes, and do no forget the pluralis majestatis even if you alone did something.

When the meeting comes to an end, summarise! Tell the client what decisions have been made during the meeting and which actions are coming out of it. After the meeting, either do those actions straight away or write them down on an action plan and work on them systematically.

And that is it! Sounds simple, is sometimes not so simple, but it is the only way forward!

Milwaukee, the project (1)

I am going to spend a bit more time to describe this project. So, I arrived and got greeted by a big man with extremely black sunglasses, New York mafiosi type with a twist of Californian sunshine state surfboy. "Hey buddy, how's it going?". I was a "buddy", that was new to me. British English is different! The only thing missing was a "high five".

All the European project managers I knew by then were stiff and pretty much up their back. But hey, I was in the US and things were different here. So, the 2 of us started up the project. The other team members were to come later. What is definitely different between the US and Europe, American consultants tend to be older than their European counterparts.

I think this has to do with the role of a consultant. In the US it is more like that the client can rely on their "wisdom" and gets "hands-on experience", whereas in Europe a client buys "university high flyers", long hours at the job, and career orientated consulting sharks.

Needless to say, I was the youngest (and most experienced in terms of consulting and company methodology) on the project. This project manager got changed quite quickly and was replaced by 2 project managers who shared responsibility. The only highlights were Julie, who was then responsible for the US in terms of training, and Chad, who was the auditor.