RCMP Commissioner Giuliano Zaccardelli, L BComm 70
From a young age, Giuliano Zaccardelli, L BComm 70, was drawn by the lore and legend — and especially the red uniform — of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police. “I’ve always been attracted to a uniform, and to the notion of serving, public service and social responsibility,” he says. “I can’t think of a time when I wasn’t interested in being a police officer.” That lifelong interest led him to join the Mounties in 1970, culminating in 2000, when he became commissioner of the RCMP.
Commissioner Zaccardelli, called “Zack” by most, was born in the small Italian village of Prezza and immigrated to Canada and Montreal with his family at the age of seven. “I think for me, growing up in Montreal as an immigrant had a lot of effect on my future, my career and the person I became,” he says. As a youth, Zaccardelli delivered newspapers and spent his high school and college years working weekends. “The notion of working to pull yourself out of the situation that you’re in and the idea of the value of school were absolutely essential,” he says of his immigrant upbringing. “It was around us all the time.”
It was the education ethic that temporarily diverted Zaccardelli from his goal of becoming an RCMP officer, bringing him to study in Loyola’s commerce program — admittedly not his first choice. At the time, he was fascinated by history, but his application to Loyola came amidst the mounting social awareness of the ’60s and soaring enrolments in history, social sciences and liberal arts. “I remember seeing the dean of arts at Loyola,” he says. “He told me, ‘Your marks aren’t good enough to get into history, but if you go down the hall and turn right, there’s the commerce department.’ ”
This apparent setback would prove to be crucial in bringing Zaccardelli to his current position. “It turned out to be one of the best things that ever happened in my life,” he recalls, “because when I joined there was a desire to have more members of the RCMP have commerce or business degrees, because the whole area of white collar crime was expanding. I wouldn’t have been able to get in had I not had the degree.”
Moving up
Giuliano Zaccardelli’s office, at the RCMP’s Ottawa headquarters, is adorned with ceremonial and historical law-enforcement items. He says the RCMP must shift focus from punishment to prevention.
Zaccardelli’s career with the RCMP has been a steady upward progression, marked with promotions and ever-increasing responsibilities. He joined the force right after Loyola and spent four years performing general policing duties in Alberta. In 1974 he was transferred to the Toronto Commercial Crime Section, where the RCMP was investigating Italian organized crime. “Going to Toronto was very instrumental in my career,” he says. “I was able to help the force because of my knowledge of Italian, but also, it gave me an opportunity to demonstrate certain abilities and competencies in an area of work — white collar crime — in the financial centre of Canada.” This also placed him well for tracking fraudulent “boiler rooms” — bogus investment firms. “Montreal at one point was known for having a number of major boiler room operations,” Zaccardelli explains, “from where they would call and get people to invest in less than the best business opportunities.”
His successes in these areas did not go unnoticed, and Zaccardelli was transferred in 1981 to the Calgary Commercial Crime Section, where he served as a senior investigator. Five years later, he was commissioned and began serving at RCMP headquarters in Ottawa as the Officer in Charge, Immigration and Passport Branch. A number of advancements followed, including promotions to assistant commissioner in 1995 and deputy commissioner in 1998. On September 2, 2000, Giuliano Zaccardelli was installed as the 20th Commissioner of the RCMP, something he attributes to timing and having the right qualities to lead Canada’s national police force.
“I think the question of leadership is important,” he says. “Passion for public service is something I think I bring to the job. I also bring an insatiable appetite to succeed, to do well. I think that goes back to my immigrant roots.”
Major responsibilities
As commissioner, Zaccardelli is responsible for the direction of the RCMP’s 22,000 members, who are spread out across four regional headquarters, 14 divisions and 750 detachments. Foremost on the RCMP agenda, he discloses, are the fights against terrorism and, even now, organized crime. “They didn’t go to sleep after 9/11.” Zaccardelli says. “That we have very sophisticated criminal organizations that are operating on a worldwide basis is a huge concern to all of us, not just in Canada, but indeed to our partners around the world.”
He adds that the increasing sophistication and speed with which the terrorist and criminal organizations can operate underscores the need for quick and efficient response. These challenges have forced a change in RCMP practices, shifting away from simple policing and punishment. The key to staying competitive in the high-stakes realm of policing, according to Zaccardelli, is to be intelligence driven. While for obvious reasons he can’t go into specifics, RCMP officers are no longer charged with simply reacting, but must shift their focus to crime prevention and dismantling. “When a major crime or a major fraud is committed, there’s very little comfort in solving it after the fact,” he says.
A matter of balance
In addition to his administrative responsibilities, Commissioner Zaccardelli regularly attends and speaks at policing conferences around the world. With so many demands on his time, he admits that there is little time in his life for personal endeavours. “I probably accept that by most definitions I may be a bit of a dysfunctional person and a bit of a workaholic,” he says. “But if that’s what it takes to provide better quality public service to Canadians, I’m willing to be a little dysfunctional.”
He strives to maintain equilibrium between his personal and professional lives. An avid horseman, Zaccardelli rides daily, and tries to hit the golf course whenever he can, adding that he never thinks of work while he’s playing. “Some people say to have a balanced life, you have to stop working at 4 o’clock,” he states. “Well, you know, life isn’t that way. The idea is that when you have time, make it quality time. That’s how I find balance.”
Jason Gondziola is a Montreal freelance journalist.
