Languages of work of employees by organization size, 2016
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Released: 2022-01-13
In Montréal, Ottawa and Greater Sudbury, employees of organizations that employ more than 500 people were more likely than other employees to use French most often at work in 2015/2016. This finding comes from an analysis of a new data linkage between the Canadian Employer–Employee Dynamics Database and the 2016 Census, which helps in better measuring and understanding the links between the size of an organization and the languages used by employees.
In Quebec, the results show that, overall, the predominant use of French at work among workers varied relatively little according to the size of the organizations employing them, but that the regular use of both French and English was more frequent among employees of larger organizations. However, the situation was different in Montréal and in the rest of Quebec.
Outside Quebec, in metropolitan areas with a strong Francophone presence, the use of French at work was more frequent among employees of organizations with 100 or more employees.
In Canada as a whole, Indigenous languages as well as other non-official languages were used more often by employees of smaller organizations.
In Quebec, regular use of both French and English at work was more common in larger organizations
In 2015/2016, 95% of employees in Quebec regularly used French at work, and 42% regularly used English. The use of different combinations of these two languages at work was common: 37% of employees used both English and French on a regular basis. Among employees, 81% used French predominantly and 11% used English predominantly. In addition, 7% of employees reported using both English and French equally most often, with neither language being predominant.
This picture changed slightly when considering the size of the organization where the employees worked (Chart 1).
The predominant use of French at work was slightly less common among employees of organizations with 100 to 499 employees (79%) than among employees of organizations of other size classes (81% to 82%). Similarly, the predominant use of English was slightly more common in organizations with 100 to 499 employees (12%) than in organization of other size classes (10% to 11%).
The regular use of both English and French was more common among employees of organizations with 100 to 499 employees (41%) and with 500 or more employees (40%). It was less common among employees of organizations with fewer than 25 employees (33%) and with 25 to 49 employees (36%).
Chart 1
Use of French and English at work among employees, by the size of the organization employing them, Quebec, 2015/2016
In Montréal, the predominant use of French was more common among employees of organizations with 500 or more employees
There were differences between the Montréal census metropolitan area (CMA) and the rest of Quebec. In the Montréal CMA (Chart 2), the predominant use of French was more common among employees of organizations with 500 or more employees (74%) and varied little among those working in smaller organizations (69% to 70%).
Conversely, in the rest of Quebec (Chart 3), it was employees of organizations with 500 or more employees that least commonly used French predominantly (91% vs. 93% to 94% among organizations with fewer than 100 employees) and that most commonly used English predominantly (6% vs. 3% among organizations with fewer than 100 employees).
Chart 2
Use of French and English at work among employees, by the size of the organization employing them, Montréal census metropolitan area, 2015/2016
Chart 3
Use of French and English at work among employees, by the size of the organization employing them, Quebec excluding the Montréal census metropolitan area, 2015/2016
In Moncton, Ottawa and Greater Sudbury, French was more commonly used by employees of organizations with 100 or more employees
In Canada outside of Quebec, 97% of employees used English most often at work; French was used regularly by 5% of employees. However, some areas were defined by more widespread use of French at work, including the CMAs of Moncton (45% used French regularly), Ottawa–Gatineau (34%, Ontario part only) and Greater Sudbury (26%).
Among employees working in these CMAs, French was used more by employees of organizations with more than 100 employees in the province (charts 4, 5 and 6). In fact, this situation could be found in all CMAs in Canada outside of Quebec, including those where French was less commonly used at work.
The difference was especially pronounced for the Ottawa–Gatineau CMA (Ontario part only). In this CMA, 39% of employees of organizations with 100 or more employees used French regularly at work, while this was the case for 24% to 25% of employees working in smaller organizations. This was mainly because the majority (55%) of employees of organizations with 100 or more employees in this area worked in the education, health care and social assistance and public administration sectors. Outside of these sectors, 26% of employees of organizations with 100 or more employees in this CMA used French regularly at work.
Chart 4
Use of French at work among employees, by the size of the organization employing them, Moncton census metropolitan area, 2015/2016
Chart 5
Use of French at work among employees, by the size of the organization employing them, Ottawa–Gatineau census metropolitan area (Ontario part), 2015/2016
Chart 6
Use of French at work among employees, by the size of the organization employing them, Greater Sudbury census metropolitan area, 2015/2016
The relationships between organization size and the languages used at work varied by industry sector and province
The use of languages at work sometimes varied considerably by industry sector (tables 1 and 2). For example, in Quebec, the predominant use of French at work was more common in the primary sector (92%) and less common in the private services sector (76%).
The relationship between organization size and the languages used at work also varied by industry sector. For example, in the private services sector in Quebec, the predominant use of French was less common in companies with 100 or more employees (73%) than in those with fewer than 100 employees (between 77% and 79%). Conversely, in the other sectors, the rates of predominant use of French among employees of organizations with more than 100 employees differed little from the average by sector.
These dynamics could vary from province to province, and depending on whether the predominant or the broader regular use of a language is considered. This suggests that there are complex relationships between organizational characteristics, regional context, the language characteristics of workers and the use of languages at work. Further research may be required to better understand these dynamics.
The use of Indigenous and other non-official languages at work was more common in smaller organizations
In 2015/2016, 0.4% of people employed in Canada regularly used an Indigenous language at work. Among employees who knew an Indigenous language, however, this proportion was 58%.
These proportions varied depending on the size of the organization employees worked at (Chart 7). Around 0.5% of employees of organizations with fewer than 100 employees regularly used an Indigenous language at work, compared with 0.3% of employees working in organizations with 100 to 499 employees and 0.2% of those working in organizations of 500 or more employees. However, this was related to the fact that workers who knew an Indigenous language were underrepresented in larger organizations. Among only those who knew an Indigenous language, the regular use of an Indigenous language at work was similar among employees of smaller and larger organizations (56% in organizations with fewer than 25 employees, and 54% in those with 500 or more employees).
Chart 7
Regular use of an Indigenous language at work among employees who know an Indigenous language, by the size of the organization employing them, Canada, 2015/2016
In addition, 3.8% of all employees in Canada used a non-official and non-Indigenous language at work regularly, and 14.0% among those who knew one of those languages. This proportion varied considerably by organization size. Among employees of organizations with fewer than 25 employees, 6.3% used such a language regularly at work, compared with 2.0% of those working in an organization with 500 or more employees (Chart 8). The trend was the same when only those who knew one of these languages were considered.
Chart 8
Regular use of a non-official and non-Indigenous language at work among employees, by the size of the organization employing them and their knowledge of languages, Canada, 2015/2016
Note to readers
Data source
The data come from a linkage between the Canadian Employer–Employee Dynamics Database (CEEDD) and the 2016 Census data. Information on the size of the organizations that employ workers comes from the CEEDD, while information on languages spoken at work, knowledge of languages, place of work and industry sector comes from the census.
Population
The population includes the people who worked in Canada in 2015 or 2016 as employees, i.e., excluding self-employed and unpaid family workers. The information pertains to the job held during the reference week for the census (from May 1 to 7, 2016) or, for those who did not work that week, the longest held job since January 1, 2015. People whose usual place of work was outside Canada were excluded from the population.
Place of work
The place of work is the usual place of work. For those without a fixed workplace address, the place of residence was used instead.
Organization size
Organization size is derived from an estimate and corresponds to the number of "average labour units" (ALUs). The number of ALUs (i.e., the estimated number of employees) is obtained by dividing an organization's annual payroll by the average annual earnings of a representative worker in the same industry, province and size class. The average annual earnings for the various industry, province and firm size class combinations are determined by using the monthly Survey of Employment, Payrolls and Hours. It is the most common approach used to estimate the number of employees in an organization.
The approach estimates the number of employees in an organization across Canada, but also in each of the provinces considered in isolation. In this case, organization size is defined by the number of employees of the organization in the province where the employee works, excluding employees of the organization in other provinces or countries.
In 7% of cases, information on organization size was missing. These cases are set aside for statistics that take organization size into account but are kept for totals.
Of those employed in Canada in 2015/2016, 24% worked in organizations with fewer than 25 employees, 8% in organizations with 25 to 49 employees, 8% in organizations with 50 to 99 employees, 17% in organizations with 100 to 499 employees, and 43% in large organizations with 500 or more employees (Table 3).
Languages of work
The 2016 Census question on languages of work had two components. The first component concerns the language used most often at work. The second component concerns the other language(s) used regularly at work in addition to the language used most often, if applicable. For both components, multiple responses are accepted.
The most often use of a language refers to all those who reported using that language the most often. The equally most often use of languages refers to those who reported using more than one language most often. The predominant use of a language refers to those who reported using only that language most often and excludes those who reported using more than one language equally most often. Regular use of a language includes both those who reported using that language most often and those who reported using it regularly, but not most often.
Knowledge of languages
Knowledge of a language refers here to the self-declared ability to conduct a conversation in that language.
Contact information
For more information, or to enquire about the concepts, methods or data quality of this release, contact us (toll-free 1-800-263-1136; 514-283-8300; infostats@statcan.gc.ca) or Media Relations (statcan.mediahotline-ligneinfomedias.statcan@statcan.gc.ca).
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