OTTAWA – The headhunting firm Egon Zehnder International has been hired by the federal government to look for a new president and CEO of CBC, to replace Robert Rabinovitch, whose second term ends in November.

CBC insiders say Egon Zehnder, which has offices in Calgary and Toronto, has been instructed to provide the federal government with the names of the top three contenders, a break from the usual hiring process, which has been criticized for being overly political. The Prime Minister’s Office will make the final decision.

Rabinovitch indicated in a note to staff that CBC chair Timothy Casgrain ‘will be actively participating in the search process.’

A description of the full-time position, based in Ottawa, appears on the CBC website and the job was also advertised in newspapers this week. The job posting notes candidates must be financially literate, innovative, aware of good management principles and proficient in both English and French.

‘I’m thoroughly impressed with the way the government is handling the appointment process. It is a step in the right direction,’ says Ian Morrison of the watchdog group Friends of Canadian Broadcasting. ‘This kind of thing never happened when Rabinovitch was hired unilaterally by the government.’

Rabinovitch, who has been president and CEO of the CBC since 1999, is a career bureaucrat whose reign has been fraught with clashes with politicians.

He was called before the standing committee on Canadian Heritage in 2000 over his decision to scale back on local newscasts. Rabinovitch’s cuts, which at the time he called ‘fiscally responsible,’ ran counter to the CRTC’s then just-released new conditions of licence for the public broadcaster that called for a strengthening of regional programming.

He was again called on the carpet when the French-language network, Radio-Canada, pulled Montreal Canadiens hockey games in 2002, and again in 2005 over the lockout of 5,500 CBC employees. His tenure has also been marked by the development of Internet services and the launch of several digital specialty TV channels.

A network spokesperson would provide no further details about the search process. ‘It’s a federal appointment, so we’re really not involved in the process at all,’ says CBC spokesperson Katherine Heath-Eves.