What We Have Here is a Failure to Communicate – Influencing Policy Makers

Author
Ron Merk

Many of us have been trying  to change how BC and it’s Health Care System deals with Weight Loss Surgery for many, MANY years. So far all our efforts for any significant change in BC related to Weight Loss Surgery and wait times has had little or no effect. After a while, you have to ask yourself; “What am I doing wrong?” Why don’t they listen?” Do I need to change my tactic?”

I think it’s time to go back to basic training on “Influencing Politicians”. We’ve all been told that letters are great, especially if we tell them our own personal story. We’ve certainly written enough from our WLS community over the years. You’d think by now the flood of their tears after reading our sad  Pre-op letters and joyfully Post-op letters would have caused an extremely empathic response. NOT!

So what are we missing? Why isn’t our letter campaign working, Why can’t we get greater leverage with our advocacy/lobbyist groups? When you actually start to look at influencing tactics, you discover very quickly that our methodology of letter writing is considered fairly ineffective. Don’t get me wrong! I’m not saying we should stop. We just need to understand that when we write a letter today, it’s going to have about the same impact as when we wrote one 5 years ago.

The Americans seem to have the edge on “influence tactics”, not that I would want our system to be like theirs, but we could learn something from them.

So if we’re not going to have paid lobbyists, bribe politicians with condos in the Caribbean or pay to create a Congressional Hearing, what can we do to increase our success with our Canadian Policy Makers?

Here are some thoughts to consider. We should NEVER approach a politician with our concerns unless we’ve created a solid business plan to establish credibility, a one-page overview, a 30-second pitch and answers to the following questions:

1. What’s the problem?
2. What’s the solution?
3. What’s In it for them?
   
4. What will it cost them if I they don’t implement our solution?
5. What do we need to make it happen?
6. How does the Province/Canada get its money back?

I believe we also need to broaden our perception of who we are. We’re not just WLS surgery Pre-ops and Post-ops. We’re people who have an Obesity challenge, can talk about obesity and it’s issues with authority and certainty AND have solutions to obesity.

Here’s an example of what I mean. If we’re going to write letters to politicians, perhaps instead of our traditional “Please help us with surgery wait time!” whine, they should go more like this:

“Dear MR or Miss MLA

Did you know that 60% of the people who voted you into your office are over weight? Did you know 20% percent of them are obese? Want to guarantee your re-election at the polls next time? I have information the will make your re-election a certainty. In addition it will catapult your name  into the headlines  both Provincially and Nationally as a spokes person of the common people……..<learn more!>”

Well, ok … maybe that is really over doing it a bit , but it does make my point. We need to re-think our strategies, we need to focus on the broader issue of obesity and we need to advocate in terms of what the benefit is for the policy makers.

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