It was a bit easier to sell, because the accounting systems that we had in place.... I mean, the decision had been made to go accrual, and going accrual in the estimates appropriation wasn't that big a challenge in Ontario. It was getting all the departments to go to full-blown accrual accounting that was the big issue. That's where there was a tremendous amount of resistance from a number of departments.
It was very important for a leader at the most senior level of government to come out and say, “This is going to be done.” And you have to set a timeframe, whether it's three years or four years or five years. It can't really be open-ended. That has to be set at the very top. But when that was done....
The other thing that's also very important is that we have performance contracts in Ontario. You get a bonus, and part of your bonus is based on whether you deliver on the deliverables in your performance contract. I remember telling the secretary of the management board when we were chatting about it that if the ADM in charge of corporate services in a ministry or the deputy minister had a performance contract, and they had ten things in it, the number one thing I would do is put success on the ERP system as one of the ten things. I basically said, “Talk is cheap, but if you do that, it's going to affect how much money they get at the end of the year.” And they did. They put it in their performance contracts for the senior individuals, and it communicated to the senior people that this wasn't a nit. This wasn't just some bookkeeping exercise. We considered this to be a strategic priority of the government.
Consequently, they put it in the performance contracts so there was an impact at the senior levels as to whether this thing got done and whether it got done on time.
That's a bit of a segue.