A Reassessment of Work Organization in Canada
It can be very tempting, faced with increased pressure on margins, intensified competition, and stagnant (or eroding) results, to seek quick and visible gains: cross-sectional cost-saving plans, hiring freezes, accelerated deployment of digital tools… However, such levers often end up generating a form of disappointment, as they solely aim to optimize the execution of activities and operations, without fundamentally questioning the work structure.
This reflection takes on particular acuity in the Canadian context. Labour productivity in Canada remains significantly lower than that of several comparable economies. Canada’s hourly productivity level is 30% lower than that of the United States, according to the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD). This means that it takes many more hours of work to produce an equivalent value.
Quebec also lags behind by about 30%, this time compared to the average of developed economies, according to the Blue Book of Productivity, published in March 2025 by the Quebec Chamber of Commerce Federation. Such gaps are not insignificant; they directly influence the standard of living, business investment capacity, and long-term competitiveness.
However, one of the primary sources of productivity remains largely under-exploited because it is less visible, less tangible. This is the operational model, and particularly the processes that materialize it. This overhaul may seem complex and demanding, but it allows for deep-rooted change and avoids easy solutions without added value, or contradictory functioning or behaviours in relation to the company’s ambitions.
Avoiding False Debates
Talking about productivity without first clarifying what is meant by “performance” quickly leads to misunderstandings. Performance is not simply an increase in volumes or a reduction in unit costs; it is based on the balance of three inseparable dimensions.
The first is value, the organization’s ability to respond to a real expectation (from a client, user, or partner) in a relevant and distinctive manner. Producing more, for example, only makes sense if this increased production corresponds to recognized value.
The second is efficiency with which this value is created. It refers to how human, financial, and technological resources are mobilized to produce a useful result.
The third is sustainability, the ability to maintain this performance over time without exhausting teams, increasing organizational or technological debt, or degrading social or environmental impacts.
An organization that truly reveals itself to be performing is necessarily productive. On the other hand, a strictly productive company – producing more, faster – is not always globally productive. It is possible to increase the pace while degrading quality, customer experience, team engagement, or system resilience.
Defined in this way, productivity is not simply executing activities more quickly, but also creating more value per unit of time invested. It involves a systematic reduction of everything that does not add value: waiting, rework, redundant controls, fragmented decisions, conflicting priorities, resource waste, etc.
Where Productivity is Lost
The productivity deficit may manifest at all levels of the operational model.
A strategic vision that is insufficiently clear or poorly articulated leads to energy mobilization on secondary, even contradictory priorities. In other words, a lot of work is being done, but not necessarily on what creates the most value.
A functional organization that is compartmentalized generates silos, multiple transfers, and areas of non-responsibility. Work progresses in bursts, according to validations and arbitrations, rather than as a continuous flow.
Key competencies may be mispositioned: experts may be overloaded, constantly called upon to compensate for structural weaknesses, while other skills remain underutilized.
Governance focused on activity rather than results, combined with leadership that is not in line with the required posture, favors monitoring volumes, loads, or compliance, at the expense of real value creation.
All these elements crystallize in processes. They act as a mirror of the organization’s actual functioning, far beyond the charts or speeches.
Processes as Strategic Revealers
Processes are often approached from a technical perspective: sequences of activities, tools, forms, deadlines. However, this reading turns out to be limiting. In reality, a process reveals how the organization thinks and arbitrates: who decides, on what criteria, at what moment, and with what responsibility.
It is not just a chain of actions; it is a value creation mechanism that transforms a strategic intent into a concrete result. Revising a process is not only about speeding up execution, but also about questioning its foundations:
– Who is it really aimed at?
– What promise does it serve?
– Where is value really created?
– Where does it dissipate? In friction, waiting, rework?
– Who is responsible for the final result, not just each isolated step?
Such a redesign almost always involves a shift in the center of gravity: less control, more accountability; less task logic, more flow logic; fewer purely technological solutions, more clarity on work organization.
That’s precisely why many automation or digital transformation initiatives fail to produce lasting gains. They accelerate poorly designed processes, sometimes reinforcing complexity and tool dependence, without addressing root causes. Thus, optimal use of artificial intelligence, for example, complements the evolution and optimization of rational and logical processes.
The Need for a Systemic Approach
Faced with a productivity problem, the organization is naturally drawn to the most visible symptom: a bottleneck, an overloaded team, or an obsolete tool, for example. However, these manifestations are rarely isolated. They are often the expression of a deeper and systemic misalignment.
Improving productivity sustainably requires moving beyond treating symptoms and adopting a comprehensive approach that views the operational model as a coherent whole. This can be analyzed through six closely interconnected axes, whose effects reinforce each other.
The value chain and processes help determine where value is actually created, but also where it dissipates: in waiting times, rework, delayed arbitrations, or fragmented decisions.
Organizational structure defines who decides, at what level, and with what level of autonomy. Multiplying validation levels slows down the flow, lengthens deadlines, and dilutes responsibility for the final result.
Governance and leadership condition the organization’s ability to make decisions, support teams in areas of tension, and make clear judgments between competing priorities. Without explicit decisions, complexity sets in.
Consequently, it is essential that leadership induces the right behaviors and exemplifies the required changes. Leaders must be role models and support productivity concerns in their actions.
Data and indicators shape behaviors: what is measured becomes what is optimized. Misaligned indicators fragment collective effort and steer energy towards partial, sometimes conflicting goals.
Talents and skills directly influence flow fluidity. Where there is a high process or skills debt, the system slows down and excessively relies on a few key expertise.
Finally, technology should support value flow, not constrain it. Automation only makes sense if it truly eliminates low-value work, instead of freezing or exacerbating non-optimal processes.
Continuous Improvement as a Productivity Lever
The methods are well-known and proven: the Lean model, value chain mapping, or the DMAIIC (define, measure, analyze, innovate, implement, control) can help structure analysis and avoid intuitive or symptomatic decisions. However, the method itself does not create any performance. Without real adoption by managers and teams, it remains a formal framework disconnected from everyday operations.
It should also be noted that continuous improvement is not a one-off exercise or a project for specialists. It is built over time, through simple but demanding routines: result-centered reviews rather than activity-centered ones; short experiments with explicit success criteria; clear visualization of flows; and, above all, bold decisions on what to stop and what to pursue.
It is this discipline, more than the sophistication of tools, that transforms DMAIIC and continuous improvement initiatives into true operational advantages. When integrated into daily management, these practices become managerial reflexes in the service of value creation.
A Change in Posture Above All
Seeking productivity without revisiting the operational model creates an illusion of performance. This would be the case, for example, of an organization that is active but does little to enhance its real value creation capacity. While tactical levers certainly generate movement, they rarely create a lasting impact.
Improving productivity requires shifting from a control logic of activity to a responsibility logic over results. It then becomes necessary to question both the processes, decision rules, and implicit priorities that structure work. The observed resistance is not cultural; it is rational. Teams cannot be asked to perform better in a system that remains stagnant.
Ultimately, the issue is not productivity; it is managerial courage. The courage to revisit what truly structures work, to simplify where complexity has taken root, and to make clear choices about what creates value or not. Progressing organizations will not be the ones doing more, but those making better decisions.
Note
1 – Quebec Chamber of Commerce Federation, Blue Book of Productivity: 40 recommendations for acting quickly and on multiple fronts, report published in March 2025.
