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To non-Canadian eyes, Air Canada CEO Michael Rousseau\u2019s decision to post a message of condolences in English following the airline\u2019s deadly crash at New York\u2019s LaGuardia airport may not seem all that noteworthy. After all, Rousseau has acknowledged himself the limitations of his French. And this was an extremely emotionally fraught moment: In the first Air Canada accident to involve fatalities since 1983, the March 22 runway collision between a plane and a fire truck killed two pilots and injured dozens of others.<\/p>\n
Amid such a tragedy, the ensuing outcry over the CEO\u2019s language choice might look like a tempest in a teapot. But Canadians understood immediately why Rousseau\u2019s decision to speak English (other than a \u201cbonjour\u201d and a \u201cmerci\u201d) caused such an affront. It has now led to his retirement from the company later this year, as announced on Monday. (A spokesman for Air Canada said, \u201cMr. Rousseau has reached a natural retirement age\u201d and added that the company\u2019s succession planning had been underway internally for some time.)<\/p>\n
Air Canada is headquartered in Montreal, a majority French-speaking city, the largest in Quebec. It\u2019s a region where matters of language are often a third rail in public life. For many Qu\u00e9b\u00e9cois, French is not just a means of communication but a core marker of identity\u2014which helps explain the intense emotional reactions when they feel it is sidelined in official settings. <\/p>\n
Rousseau\u2019s message was meant to offer condolences for the deaths and sympathy for the injured\u2014and also to reassure the company\u2019s rattled 37,000 employees and put the spotlight on the heroism of the pilots and crew. He\u00a0expressed Air Canada\u2019s \u201cdeepest sorrow for everyone affected,\u201d and called it a \u201cvery dark day here at Air Canada.\u201d<\/p>\n
But those messages were overshadowed by the flap over his language. As a former Crown corporation (Canadian jargon for government-owned business) Air Canada is subject to the nation\u2019s Official Languages Act, meaning it is required by law to communicate in both English and French. So it was baffling to many that Rousseau, a Canadian, would not realize that a 3-minute, 45-second video in English would be a big faux pas. Making matters worse: The flight originated in Montreal, so it certainly had many francophone passengers and crew members among the injured, in addition to one of the pilots who died.<\/p>\n
Montreal Mayor Soraya Martinez Ferrada called it \u201cdisrespectful of the francophone community.\u201d And even Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney weighed in, slamming Rousseau for his \u201clack of judgment and lack of compassion.\u201d \u201cWe proudly live in a bilingual country, and companies like Air Canada particularly have a responsibility to always communicate in both official languages,\u201d Carney told reporters.<\/p>\n
Rousseau himself acknowledged the flub and said last week that he was \u201cdeeply saddened\u201d that \u201chis inability to speak French had diverted attention from the profound grief of the families and the great resilience of Air Canada\u2019s employees.\u201d<\/p>\n
Why effort matters more than perfect pronunciation<\/p>\n
Though speaking in heartfelt way can be hard for someone using a second language, many executives of multinational companies do nonetheless make the effort (even if their public relations staff typically crafts the message). Politicians too: New York Mayor Zohran Mamdani has made videos in Spanish, Arabic, and Hindi\u2014often including footage of him struggling with his lines\u2014to the delight of immigrant voters who appreciate the effort, even if he\u2019s butchering the pronunciation.<\/p>\n
This wasn\u2019t Rousseau\u2019s first time creating a language kerfuffle as CEO of Air Canada. In 2021, soon after taking the reins, Rousseau proudly noted in a speech to the Montreal Chamber of Commerce that he had been easily able to live in the city for more than a decade without learning French. (He grew up in Eastern Ontario, a part of the country with a sizeable francophone minority.)<\/p>\n
During the ensuing P.R. crisis, he apologized and pledged to learn French. Bloomberg reported that Rousseau had taken 300 hours of French lessons since 2021, so it\u2019s anyone\u2019s guess why he couldn\u2019t have cobbled together at least a couple of sentences in the mother tongue of many of Air Canada\u2019s stakeholders. (Some commentators suggested that for his compensation of $9.4 million last year, learning conversational French shouldn\u2019t be too much to ask.) Before Air Canada, he spent years as a senior executive of the retailer Hudson\u2019s Bay.<\/p>\n
The Air Canada board\u2014which should perhaps have nudged Rousseau along in his French studies\u2014said on Monday that French skills would be a key factor in choosing the next CEO. (Though Rousseau has won credit for guiding Air Canada out of the pandemic, shares are down 33% since he became CEO.)<\/p>\n
The language debates permeate many aspects of Quebec life: A few years ago, controversy erupted when the hallowed Montreal Canadiens hockey team hired an anglophone coach who was unilingual. He didn\u2019t last long.<\/p>\n
The business risk of offending your home market<\/p>\n
Some of Rousseau\u2019s defenders in the Canadian commentariat have raised fair questions about whether a CEO of a global business really needs to speak French, whether such a requirement narrows the talent pool too much, and whether any of this should even be the government\u2019s business.<\/p>\n
But ultimately, Rousseau\u2019s inability\u2014or perhaps even unwillingness\u2014to learn French, was just bad business. Angering politicians or columnists is one thing. But 23% of Canadians are native French speakers. Given all the competition in the airline industry, and choices travelers have, offending anyone is dangerous.<\/p>\n
Emotional intelligence, empathy, and the ability to read the room are essential skills for CEOs today. Others have learned that lesson the hard way years before Rousseau did: Remember when cloud computing company PagerDuty\u2019s CEO Jennifer Tejada quoted Martin Luther King Jr. in a memo announcing mass layoffs in 2023 and had to apologize? Or howBP CEO Tony Hayward grumbled \u201cI\u2019d like my life back\u201d after an oil spill caused by the company?<\/p>\n
Perhaps Rousseau should get credit for not using AI to mask his lack of linguistic fluency. But authenticity, even if expressed in broken French, is the best approach when it comes to soothing nerves and expressing sympathy.<\/p>\n
#Air #Canada #CEOs #Englishonly #condolences #lost #joba #warning #global #CEO<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
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