Will the OMA continue to restrict their elections process?

Ontario Medical Association (OMA) election season is upon us again. The nomination period for people interested in running for leadership positions ended recently. This included a video promo in which a certain cantankerous old geezer contributed his two cents. But will the OMA allow a proper elections process this time round, or will the OMA continue to impose stringent controls on the election process, thus ensuring banality, dullness and an advantage for mediocre candidates (no really)?In the past, while campaigns for positions at the OMA have hardly been edge of the seat exciting (with many positions either acclaimed or unfilled), there at least was a spectre of campaigning that created some interest in the OMA and the elections process. However, that all started to change a few years ago, due to what I call the Dr. Nadia Alam rules. Unlike the real Dr. Alam, those rules desperately need to go the way of the Dodo bird.Read: Dr. Sohail Gandhi: OMA, CMA and CFPC should put members—not the corporation—firstI actually remember when the controversy started. There was to be an election for president-elect. As part of that there was going to be a virtual town hall with the candidates. At the town hall, each candidate was asked some pre-selected questions. But then, some random questions were tossed in. And . . . the complaining began almost instantly after the fact.“It wasn’t fair to toss random questions in.” “We weren’t prepared to be asked surprise questions” “It was designed to make us look bad.” Etc. The fact that answering unexpected questions might be a skill worth evaluating for a position that entailed a lot of media work, didn’t matter to the complainers. (I mean surely the media would never ever toss unexpected questions your way).Immediately after my own induction as president, there was a minor controversy that popped up that I had to deal with, completely unprepared. Even the usually benign Medical Post tossed tough questions my way. This happens when you are the spokesperson for the profession (i.e. the actual job of president). Newsflash for those who complained—you didn’t look bad because the “process was unfair”—you looked bad because, well, you sucked at handling the unexpected.But that wasn’t enough. The next rule that got put in place was to prevent former OMA presidents from running for the board, even if they have less than the six-year maximum term limit. The reason was ostensibly that “we put our presidents up on a pedestal and publicize them so much that they have so much name recognition.” Therefore it gives them an “unfair advantage” against others who would run.To which I say, quoting former Toronto Mayor Mel Lastman: “Ed Toro poo poo!”There’s a whole bunch of ex-Presidents who, if they ran for something at the OMA, would get completely trounced because of their name recognition. This works both ways people. Do excellent people get positive name recognition? Of course, they do. But it’s positive because they are excellent. They are exactly the type of people we need in leadership positions. The suboptimal people will also get recognized, but will not get the votes.It gets worse. In recent years the board election process has become so restrictive that candidates for board are basically banned from campaigning. All they can do is have a statement and video message and, well, that’s about it. Heck they are all given a tool kit with “approved” messages to distribute on social media. Once again, this is to ensure “transparent, open and fair election” or some such thing.Forgetting about the hackneyed nature of the “approved” messages, is it really too much to expect that people running for leadership might actually, you know, have the ability to communicate on their own? And would not the members be better able to judge candidates if they come up with their own messages, rather than some bland, inefficacious template from the OMA?The problem with this of course is that the only candidates that benefit are the ones who haven’t, through their own hard work, built up their reputation amongst their peers or have the ability to effectively communicate with their colleagues. The mediocre candidates, who don’t have these skills are actually given a leg up over better candidates because this process brings excellent people down to a mediocre level.The result is an insomnia-curing election process that resulted in barely 10% of all members voting last year.Why put all these rules in effect? I’ll be blunt: In my opinion, it’s because many OMA physician leaders (including board directors) were running scared of Nadia (in medical politics, she’s basically a one-name rockstar like Beyoncé). They all knew that if she ran for anything, she would beat whoever she ran against. This is why I call these the Dr. Nadia Alam rules. They are designed to minimize the opportunity for someone who through perseverance and inherent excellence has become a great candidate. These rules were put in place to make it easier for the mediocre candidates (like themselves) to win.I notice with interest that a few candidates for board (whom I happen to think are excellent) have already announced on some well-read physician social media pages that they are running for board positions. I wonder if some of the usual complainers will be calling the OMA to say that this was “unfair,” that this “gives them an unjust head start!”Look, the reality is that life isn’t fair. Some people are better at being leaders than others. They should be allowed to promote their excellence as it is these excellent people that we need in leadership positions.Dr. Sohail Gandhi is a former president of the OMA and opinions are his and not necessarily the opinions of the OMA board or of anyone at the Canadian Healthcare Network. This article is a reprint from his blog: justanoldcountrydoctor.com.

Will the OMA continue to restrict their elections process?

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