In this two-part episode of “The Path of Public Service,” Cordelia Clarke Julien, Assistant Deputy Minister at Ontario’s Ministry of Children, Community, and Social Services, shares her inspiring journey through public service, highlighting her history of empowering communities and supporting women of colour in achieving economic independence. Nicknamed “Change-maker,” Cordelia knows change is possible anywhere. She discusses how her career has taken her across seven ministries, a trajectory driven by the need to find spaces where her potential to lead meaningful change was recognized. She explains how her leadership philosophy centers around the three main components of positivity, purpose, and people, emphasizing just how important putting in the effort to understand other perspectives really is. Reflecting on her Jamaican American heritage, Cordelia shares how her upbringing by strong women showed her the importance of life-long learning and resilience. Through personal anecdotes, Cordelia discusses the challenges of racial biases she has faced in her career, sharing stories of overcoming obstacles as a Black woman in predominantly white spaces, leading to a career of perseverance, empowerment, and creating lasting impact in public service. Listeners will be inspired by Cordelia’s overflowing optimism, humour, and practical advice.
In part two, Cordelia goes on to discuss her approach to leadership and change management. She reflects on her journey through seven different ministries in Ontario’s public service, explaining that her moves were driven by the need to find spaces where her potential was recognized. She recounts her role as a change-maker, often brought into spaces to lead transformations, and the challenges of gaining trust from colleagues during change initiatives. Cordelia shares candid stories of facing professional challenges, including racial biases and assumptions about her capabilities, particularly as a Black woman in predominantly white spaces.
(0:02:11) The Pivot to Public Service
(00:06:17) 7 Different Ministries
(00:08:43) Understanding Different Perspectives
(00:10:02) How Cordelia Pursued Her Own Potential
(00:14:44) Resilience: Overcoming Biases and Assumptions
(00:20:44) How to Ask About What Needs to Change
00:00:01 Katie Jensen (Host)
I'm Katie Jensen and this is The Path of Public Service from Applaud, celebrating people who have spent their lives working in Ontario's public sector. This is Part 2 of our conversation with Assistant Deputy Minister Cordelia Clarke Julien. In her public service career, Cordelia's made her mark on seven different ministries.
00:00:22 Cordelia Clarke Julien
A colleague of mine used to call me the changemaker because they always would say to folks, “If you see Cordelia coming into your area, then buckle up because something's changing.”
00:00:35 Katie Jensen (Host)
In this episode, we're diving into her remarkable career journey.
00:00:39 Cordelia Clarke Julien
I am not a status quo person. That is not me. If they're looking for someone just to keep the lights on. Keep walking. That's not me.
00:00:48 Katie Jensen (Host)
Including her approach to navigating different points of view.
00:00:52 Cordelia Clarke Julien
Maybe it's my background in public relations because I am a certified public relations specialist, and we always say perception is 99% of truth. And so that's one of the things I try to do when I go into new spaces is really try to understand the perspectives of which people are coming from the experiences that they are exuding seek to understand before you're understood.
00:01:22 Katie Jensen (Host)
What it's like being a change agent in ponds that are sometimes resistant to rippling.
00:01:27 Cordelia Clarke Julien
It is hard, because culture is not an easy thing to change, but I have seen changes made in places where you would have never thunk it would ever happen.
00:01:41 Katie Jensen (Host)
And what has kept her going?
00:01:44 Cordelia Clarke Julien
Being a black woman, I've had to be comfortable in spaces where you're the only one. That's fine. I'm not going to sit here and say that going through my career in the OPS was an easy one. It was not. But then people always ask me, “Well, then why do you stay?” And I said, “I stay for the potential.” That's what I stay for. Because there is potential here, there is a way in which we can make it better.
00:02:11 Katie Jensen (Host)
Before joining the OPS, Cordelia was a publicist with an extensive policy and change management background. We started by talking about what led Cordelia to pivot to public service.
00:02:24 Cordelia Clarke Julien
There was a singular moment. So, I was a publicist, and in my undergrad at York [University] and my Master's at McMaster/Guelf, and the singular moment I credit Ian Macdonald and Rita Burak. And I'll tell you, those names may not, I'm not sure if they sound familiar to you, but they will sound familiar to some people who've been around for a very long time. So, Ian Macdonald used to be a deputy Minister of Finance in the Ontario Public Service and at the time he was retired in teaching, of course at York University, and I was taking a course in public policy. That's part of my program. And the guest speaker at the time was the secretary of the then Secretary of Cabinet, which was Rita Burak.
00:03:04 Cordelia Clarke Julien
And Rita Burak came in and had a conversation with us and after every sort of seminar, sometimes you would, after the class, a few of us would be asked to stay back and have sort of a more of a conversation with the speaker or whatever the case may be. And as part of her presentation that was asking a lot of questions and making some public policy statements, those type of things. So, after class, Ian asked a few of us, me being one of them, stay back and we all were having just a short little conversion. And Rita Burak had noted that she felt that I had a really good policy mind, based on the conversations we've been having and encouraging me to think about the Ontario Public Service. And of course, the 20-odd-year-old that I was, with the chip on the shoulders like, “Please government? Please. Why would I go there? I just see people on smoke breaks all the time and I don't even smoke.”
00:03:59 Cordelia Clarke Julien
So, it's a bit of a chip on the shoulder. So interestingly enough she said, “We are starting this new Ontario internship program. You should check it out,” she said, “come in six months, so you don't like it, you can leave.” But I think, saw the confidence. I won't say arrogance, but confidence, of me at the time, and thought the best way to sort of encourage me was to be a part of that.
00:04:21 Cordelia Clarke Julien
And so I applied, I went in and I took a leave of absence from my work time and applied, and been here ever since. So that was how I ended up in the Ontario Public Service. So not graduating, saying I wanted to go into government. In fact, I think. If you had asked me, I would have been somewhere working in the international spaces because that is what my Master's is in so was never at all seeing this as an opportunity.
00:04:53 Cordelia Clarke Julien
Now, subsequently, since I've been here, I have had the opportunity to be an ambassador for the Ontario Public Service. And encourage others to come in because you can do a lot of different and great things here. When I sit back and I think about my career over the years, in terms of the things that I've had the opportunity to see and do, you wouldn't have had that anywhere else, right, in terms of the impacts on your own community on your own society, you see why you do what you do, right? In terms of that, and there are things that I am truly proud of, you know, brought in and legislation for occupational health and safety for workers, in terms of legislation to do awareness training, so every worker knows what their rights are in terms of safety. Brought in legislation for working at heights that resulted in a 30% reduction in people falling from heights and dying at jobs like so there's things that you've done that you say, wow, I had a part of that, in terms of those pieces.
00:06:03 Cordelia Clarke Julien
The work that we did with MAFR (Ministry of Agriculture, Food, and Rural Areas) on temporary foreign workers and making sure we're getting food to our tables during the pandemic. So, you do take a step back and say, “yeah, I have done a lot.”
00:06:17 Katie Jensen (Host)
So, because you’ve held several executive positions in the OPS and a couple different ministries.
00:06:25 Cordelia Clarke Julien
Seven.
00:06:26 Katie Jensen (Host)
Yeah, that too. Can you tell me about some of the particular quirks of each of the ministries or just some reflections you’ve had from your times working in across seven?
00:06:37 Cordelia Clarke Julien
Ohh my friend. (Laughing) OK, do you want me to go there?
00:06:43 Cordelia Clarke Julien
So, I have had the, and I would say, opportunity to work in seven different ministries and I will say to you, I am glad I did. Because what I found in working with the seven different ministries was more alike than different, but very different, for sure. So culturally, quite different in terms of how they see the world, but alike in that every single person that I have come across, at least in terms of working in the different ministries, all truly, truly, truly, truly are there because they believe they want to do better for society.
00:07:20 Cordelia Clarke Julien
And so that was comforting. There are ministries that are very rigid, I would say, right, don't like change, and I'm a change person. I love change. I go to places where changes are underway or needed and so there are some ministries, that in their minds, if it ain't broke, don't try and fix. Well, who says it's not broke, right? And why not do better? It is hard because culture is not an easy thing to change, but I have seen changes made in places where you would have never thunk it would ever happen. So, I would say to you, without outing any of my ministries, there were some that it was harder than others.
00:08:05 Cordelia Clarke Julien
But the interesting thing is, and I said that to someone just the other day, while you're going through it, you're just, oh, my God, this is the worst thing ever. Oh, my God. I can't. Like what? What? What is wrong with these people? Like after you come through it, and you're out on the other side, and you go elsewhere and then you realize that you learned a lot, you grew a lot in your leadership, in your thinking in your perspectives. I'm a firm believer in perspectives. Understanding people's different perspectives.
00:08:43 Cordelia Clarke Julien
Maybe it's my background in public relations, because I am a certified public relations specialist and we always say perception is 99% of truths, right? It's what you perceive it to be, it may not be what it is, but it's what you perceive it to be. And understanding perspectives really takes you a long way, right, in terms of that. And so that's one of the things I try to do. When I go into new spaces, is really try to understand the perspectives of which people are coming from, the experiences that they are exuding, right because they see things through the lens and the prisms of what they have experienced and what they have seen.
00:09:20 Cordelia Clarke Julien
So really trying to understand that and definitely from the perspective of seek to understand. Before you're understood, let me understand where you’re coming from, so that I am better positioned to then demonstrate to you, and hopefully be able to articulate to you, so that I am understood, and you can hear where my perspective, is right? So that's some of the things that I can say to you that I've learned from being in seven different ministries.
00:10:02 Cordelia Clarke Julien
But I'm not going to sit here and say, and I'll be honest, that going to seven different ministries was deliberate on my part. I ended up in seven different ministries because I had to. And I had to, because then the ministries that I was in, they weren't able to see my potential. They weren't able to see what I knew to be true. They weren't able to see me in a different level position or a different position altogether, or the things that I can bring. And so, I had to go elsewhere for someone else to see that potential.
00:10:43 Cordelia Clarke Julien
And that's how I ended up with seven different ministries. Not because I sat there and said, “Oh, I'm gonna do seven different ministries.” But because I was in those, the ministry I was in, I was like, “Oh, this is great, wonderful.” And then looked to leaders in those ministries to say, “Hey, I can do more. I can do this,” or “I'm thinking about this, and what about this?” And it was very much, “Well, no, no, no.” Right, “You need to stay in your lane, and you need to just do what you were brought here to do and that's it.” And so, when you get told, “I'm glad you think you can do more, but I don't think you can do more. So you need to stay there.” That's when you can either choose to hear them tell you that, or hear your own self in your own mind tell you, “Well, no, no, no, that's not true, of course I can, of course I can.”
00:11:45 Cordelia Clarke Julien
So that's how I ended up going to seven different ministries because it was those pieces of “Well, if you're not going to recognize and/or see my potential, the potential that I know I have, then I'm going to go somewhere else where somebody else will see it.”
00:12:00 Katie Jensen (Host)
I'm so glad that you were able to hear that they were basically saying “we're not ready for what you're going to do to us” and not take that as a reflection of the problems that you're trying to solve aren't solvable.
00:12:12 Cordelia Clarke Julien
Right.
00:12:13 Katie Jensen (Host)
Because I feel like that would discourage a lot of people, to just think like I've hit a wall, I need to stay in my lane and learn my place in this organization and just shut my mouth. But you were like, nope, nope.
00:12:24 Cordelia Clarke Julien
Yeah, and that's exactly what it is. And that's the next thing you hear. Like anyone who works with me, they'll hear me. I am the part of the possible. I come from that school of thought in terms of, “OK, this is the issue, this is what we're looking at. What is the art of the possible, right? How can we move the yardstick? How can we make it better?” You may not solve it because of course, let's be real. we're in public policy for a reason. And there are societal issues that were here when I got here. And maybe here when I'm gone. But we can make it better. How do we move the yardstick? How do we move it down the path and not just sit there and say “ohh hands up, it is what it is, blah blah blah,” right? How do we make it better? This is what is my purpose [is] as a leader, right, that when I come in, I am looking to make it better and to make sure that I have an environment where the work that I'm doing, public policy wise, is how do we make it better?
00:13:36 Cordelia Clarke Julien
How do we make our work environment better? How do we make it better for all of us as we're doing the work that needs to be done for the province of Ontario? So, it really helped me to solidify my purpose and helped me to solidify and understand that I'm not going to go for X job, Y job, because I am not a status quo person. That is not me. They're looking for someone just to keep the lights on. Keep walking. That's not me.
00:14:08 Katie Jensen (Host)
The whole thing we've been talking, I've been thinking about how it must have been so difficult to be junior in your career, knowing that you could be a leader but still having to work underneath people who maybe aren't as good at leading organizations like to navigate over that, probably, I assume that your husband heard a lot of, like rants after work at night.
00:14:28 Cordelia Clarke Julien
(Laughing) Ohh yeah and listen, I run the joke and it’s partially joke, partially true, that there are a lot of people in the Ontario Public Service that owe their lives to my husband.
00:14:40 Katie Jensen (Host)
That’s amazing.
00:14:44 Cordelia Clarke Julien
Because there were days that there were things that were said to me, there were behaviors that were put towards me. I'm not gonna sit here and say that going through my career, I would say in the OPS was an easy one. It was not. But then people always ask me, well, then why do you stay? And I said I stay for the potential, that's what I stay for. Because there is potential here. There is a way in which we can make it better and that's why I stick around, as people will say, cause when they hear some of the stories, like bringing in stakeholders to a round table discussion, because that was my forte, in terms of stakeholder management and those types of things and having myself there and my colleague who was actually my administrative assistant, who, of course, was Caucasian and having people come in and handing me their coats and talking to her and saying, “Hey, Cordelia, how are you?”
00:15:45 Katie Jensen (Host)
Wow.
00:15:49 Cordelia Clarke Julien
And then turning to me and asking me where the coffee was, like if I was going to be able to get coffee. So that, and that's not 1950s folks, that's Ontario public service circa 2000 and odd.
00:16:07 Katie Jensen (Host)
When they found out, did they wither and die in front of you?
00:16:10 Cordelia Clarke Julien
Uh, yeah, I mean, I tell the story about when that happened. And it's funny because my colleague laughed because she was there. And so, we had a round table come in and asked me where the coats are and hang up the coats. And she was just flabbergasted. They would turn to her and start talking to her. And turn to me, have a coffee. Whatever the case may be. So, it's this long table, right? Like long table. So, she went to sit at one end of the table. I sat at the other end of the table. I'm the one who said, “OK folks, let's get started.” They all sit at the table, Katie. And they looked at her.
00:16:47 Katie Jensen (Host)
Again. Oh my god.
00:16:49 Cordelia Clarke Julien
(Laughing) Yeah, they all looked at her, right. And again, being a black woman, I've had to be comfortable, I tell people all the time, you're comfortable in spaces where you're the only one. That's fine, right? And so, they all looked at her and she is turning redder and redder by the minute. Cause I'm not saying anything. She's waiting for me to say something.
00:17:14 Cordelia Clarke Julien
And so, I just made sure there was this awkward silence for a little bit, and humans can't take awkward silence. And I said, OK, gentlemen, let's begin. They turned and looked at me, and they looked back at her. (Laughing) And then I said good morning. I am Cordelia Clarke Julien.
00:17:37 Katie Jensen (Host)
So they all started like getting flustered?
00:17:39 Cordelia Clarke Julien
Yeah, they all say just gasped, and all the chairs, all swing to the other side. And yeah, she was laughing her head off. And so yeah, it's not the only time it's happened many other times too. So now of course with LinkedIn, people go and check you out first, and now they know who I am, so I can't get away with it as much in the past, but yeah, it was unfortunately a normality of my experience.
00:18:05 Cordelia Clarke Julien
But we persevere and I would say I've had the opportunity to work in spaces that there are not a lot of people who look like me. Right, I worked at the Ministry of Finance. I was seeing taxation. So, business tax, those types didn’t look like me. I've worked in occupational health and safety, construction. (Laughing) Definitely, didn’t look like me. I've worked in agriculture and food, I've worked in planning, spaces that there are not a lot of people who will see black women in, right. It was quite interesting to see the reactions of folks, especially as they came through these public policy spaces and was pushing through some changes. And that's one of the reasons why I remind myself what my capacity and my capabilities are.
00:18:59 Cordelia Clarke Julien
Because I am in these spaces, as a black woman, so you typically wouldn't see me in the space anyway, and not only am I in that space, but I'm in that space to change your world. So, it's a double whammy, right? It's not that you’re just joining the space and then you're hanging out, and you're like, “Yeah, yeah, everything is awesome. Everything is great.” No, no, no. I'm coming into this space, and I'm actually going to change it for you. And so, lots of push back on “well, who do you think you are,” and “you don't know this, you don’t know that.” So, lots of strength needed to build trust, because people are not gonna walk with you, on a change journey, if they don't trust you.
00:19:54 Cordelia Clarke Julien
And so, lots of work to have people trust me. Enough that they will be willing to walk with me on this change. And how I built that trust is going back to seeking to understand before I'm understood.
00:20:13 Katie Jensen (Host)
Because I'm sure people- I mean it's a lot of you know telling people that they're heard that that you understand their problems, but then also helping them understand that to make change things need to change.
00:20:24 Cordelia Clarke Julien
Yeah, yeah, no, absolutely. And it's funny. I was talking to a colleague who was asking me to do a change talk. We have a Speaker’s Bureau in the Ontario Public Service, and I'm on the Speaker’s Bureau, so I actually do talks on change management, leading through change, all those different types of things. I also do stuff on leadership in the public service, those types of stuff.
00:20:44 Cordelia Clarke Julien
And so, I was doing a talk on leading through times of change. And I said one of the things that is an interesting observation when you're meeting in a time of change, a lot of individuals that when you come into an area where change is necessary, there are quite a few people who want a change, right. It's very, very rare that you go into an area that’s changing there's like, “no, no, no, no, no, no. Everything is perfect.” Everybody has an opinion on how it could be better. Everybody does. Everybody has an opinion.
00:21:22 Cordelia Clarke Julien
So, part of the secret sauce is, don't reinvent the wheel. Go and ask them what the change is. You don't need to go in there and change just for the sake of changing or change because “hey, you think it should be yellow instead of blue.” No, you go and ask them, they’ll tell you “Cordelia, it needs to be green.” OK, let's make it green. This is the irony of it all. Is that when you go into spaces where you're seeing change needed, there are people already there who have been in that space for 15, 20, 30 years, whatever you want to call it, who can tell you #1: where the body is buried, but #2: what do we need to do to try and attain the outcome we've always wanted to see.
00:22:14 Cordelia Clarke Julien
What is it that you want to see? Not what is it that you think you need to see? Not what it is that someone told you, you should be seeing. But take a step back. What is it that you want to see? And you will have a barrage of people telling you what it is they want to see. And interestingly enough, they're not that different.
00:22:37 Katie Jensen (Host)
What's going to come next for you in your career? I mean, you're still quite young.
00:22:41 Cordelia Clarke Julien
Yes, you know, I don't know. (Laughing) You tell me, Katie.
00:22:44 Katie Jensen (Host)
Who else needs to have their pants shaken?
00:22:48 Cordelia Clarke Julien
I don't know, man. I guess. I guess, you know what that is a good question, and it's actually a question that I ask myself every day. Not every day, but in terms of recently, just saying, “OK, where to next?”
00:23:00 Cordelia Clarke Julien
I'm doing some great work now with respect to our social assistance programs. We were able to do some awesome work in terms of getting some greater support for those that are on Ontario disability. So, I'm really proud of that. Really proud of some of the things that we've been able to do in terms of supporting people and helping them get into some better jobs, right? But yeah, the question does say, OK, where to next? What more damage can I do? (Laughing) Yeah. What more damage can I do? I have the running joke. Actually, it's not me. A colleague of mine, who's since retired as well from the Ontario Public Service, they used to call me the change maker because they always would say to folks if you see Cordelia coming into your area, then buckle up because something's changing.
00:23:53 Katie Jensen (Host)
Thank God.
00:24:00 Cordelia Clarke Julien
Right. So, it's like here comes changemaker man, it's like, fighting and I said, well, no. And then we went over all the ministries I've been in and it's like, oh, yeah, I guess that is true. Every time I go somewhere, they see me coming. Some change is happening.
00:24:13 Cordelia Clarke Julien
Right. So. For me, where to next? New horizons, right? I'm not done. Alright. This is what I tell people. I'm not done. I got lots in the tank. I got lots to do. I got a lot of great ideas and I still, as I say to you, when I started this conversation, like I still have that innate voice in me that says “hey, I can do more. I can do more.”
00:24:40 Cordelia Clarke Julien
So, let's see what doing more means. I do think wherever I do go, there has to be some purpose behind it, right? I do know that about myself. So, whether it's somewhere else in the public sector, I think that's where it would be, because I do like the purpose driven pieces to it. But yeah, I have more, I can do more. I'm an awesome asset in terms of that. And so I continually make sure that I tell myself that I define me, not the other way around. It's a bit of a surreal moment for me too, because sometimes you don't even look back, right, like you don't.
00:25:20 Cordelia Clarke Julien
You just as I said, you're plowing through and you're going through and then it's afterwards that you realize, “oh, yeah, I did do that.” It's like, “oh, yeah, I did do that.” I still feel like there's so much more that I need to do. I don't know what it is yet, but every ounce of me feels it’s something big, I don't know, but I'm looking.
00:25:43 Katie Jensen (Host)
Thanks for listening. Applaud is proud to showcase the dedication of those who make decisions for the greater good and strive to leave the world a better place for all Canadians. All personal views expressed by guests and our hosts are their own. Applaud will continue to recognize those in public service, offer a kaleidoscope of perspectives, and operate in good faith to build trust with Applaud members and all public citizens. You can share feedback on this episode by visiting applaudpublicservice.ca.