CIMM – Digital Platform Modernization – March 3, 2022

Key Messages

• In order to remain a world leader in managed migration and maintain immigration as a strategic asset for Canadians, Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada (IRCC) has embarked on a multi-year transformation journey to bring the Department into the digital era.
• The Digital Platform Modernization programme will deliver redesigned and optimized business processes, with modern capabilities that will gradually replace our legacy Global Case Management System (GCMS) with a new digital platform that is stable, secure and reliable.
• The Digital Platform Modernization programme will enable IRCC to engage with clients at any time, from anywhere and from any device.
• The COVID-19 pandemic demonstrated that a shift to a digital organization is critical to our ability to effectively respond to a crisis, better support client needs and expectations for digital services, reduce the Department’s reliance on outdated paper processes as well as ensure long-term resilience of the immigration system.
• An enhanced digital platform will enable us to manage increasing application volumes, and will assist in supporting Canada’s post-COVID economic recovery.
• The redesigned and optimized business processes along with the enhanced digital platform will ultimately mean clients will see improved processing times, experience reliable, user-friendly seamless online services, and have access to timely and relevant information about their application status.
• IRCC recognizes that new processes and technologies can have disparate impacts on Black, Indigenous and racialized groups, if they are not designed with appropriate care. The Department is adopting an equity-by-design approach through the active inclusion of diverse views and review and monitoring of related IT, operations, policy, and corporate activity for factors that could lead to potential bias.

Supplementary Messages

• The Digital Platform Modernization (DPM) programme is the key enabler for IRCC business transformation.
• DPM will deliver a new operating model with redesigned and optimized business processes and a new supporting digital platform, with modern capabilities, that will gradually replace GCMS and other legacy systems.
• The DPM programme will accomplish this by delivering three consecutive and overlapping phases.
• Phase 1 (Stabilize), now complete, focused on stabilizing GCMS so that it can serve us well until it is retired. Equally important, cloud technology supports new capabilities that we need to have in the future and Phase 1 began work on some foundational cloud elements and Technical Debt Reduction.
• Phase 2 (Standardize), currently underway, continues to standardize operations and reduce technical debt to prepare the department for modernization. For example it is creating the foundational cloud elements we need for the new digital platform that will eventually replace GCMS during Phase 3.
• Phase 3 (Enhance), now in its Definition stage, will transform the way that IRCC works and delivers its services to clients and Canadians around the world through the delivery of a new digital platform and the processes and policies that will support it.
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  • In support of Technical Debt Reduction, funding will be used to remediate architectural deficiencies within the department as the initial and foundational goal for the DPM is preparing the platform for transformation. Cloud funding supports aligning with Government direction, making significant progress towards cloud adoption with the intent to make cloud the primary delivery model for solutions. Finally, funding for BPO supports business transformation through the review and modernization of the way that IRCC currently delivers its services, products and processes.
  • Within FY 2021-22, IRCC has completed Phase 1 activities and is undertaking activities for Phase 2 according to its detailed implementation plan.
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Supporting Facts and Figures

• The Global Case Management System (GCMS) was implemented 20 years ago to support “9-to-5” operations for a single department in a world where information was mainly paper-based. Since then, operations have evolved and GCMS has needed to evolve significantly from its original purpose.
• Our immigration system currently depends on information technology infrastructure that is aging and increasingly failing, with significant consequences for Canadians and the Canadian economy. IRCC cannot further modernize its operations with legacy systems (e.g. GCMS) and it permits limited flexibility for new program measures.
• The delivery of Canada’s immigration programs currently depends on information technology systems with global reach. These mission-critical systems:
  • hold more than 60 million personal records on Canadians; permanent residents and foreign nationals;
  • support 24/7 operations at IRCC offices around the world;
  • support decision-making for visitor visas, study and work permits, permanent residence applications, and citizenship issuance;
  • help screen and detect security issues, health issues, fraud, and program integrity risks to Canadians; and
  • include the Integrated Retrieval Information System, which is the legacy passport issuance system and is the repository for all past passport decisions.
• IRCC is making good progress on the Digital Platform Modernization programme. Phase 1 was completed in November 2021 and Phase 2 continues to expand on the work completed in Phase 1 in both the Technical Debt Reduction (TDR) and DPM Cloud projects. In the coming months, TDR and DPM Cloud will focus on specific sub-projects that will advance us forward towards achieving our goals and objectives and enable us to support Phase 3.
• Our goals and objectives are clear as we go forward – DPM is an incremental programme. The first two phases are focused on stabilizing and preparing the parts of GCMS that will be required in the new platform. Furthermore, these first two phases establish new cloud services through the Cloud Centre of Excellence which will be foundational to the introduction of the new digital platform during Phase 3 of DPM.

Background

• Demands on, and expectations of, our legacy immigration system are increasing. Compounding the rise in client expectations for personalized, fast and intuitive digital service, application volumes have been increasing (a trend expected to continue after COVID-19), which adds pressures on an already overtaxed, highly paper-based system.
• Canada’s current processes are heavily reliant on a technology backbone (i.e. GCMS) that has been in place since 2001 and is no longer able to meet emerging needs or heightened client expectations.
• GCMS is Canada’s integrated and worldwide web-based system used to process applications for immigration, citizenship and some passport services. It was first introduced to process applications for citizenship services, and has since extended its immigration-related functions to include the Canada Border Services Agency and other federal organizations, such as Service Canada and the Immigration Refugee Board. Each partner, whose responsibility also lies in the application of the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act, is granted access to the System based on their specific responsibility.
• Without investments to stabilize IRCC’s information technology infrastructure and bring it up to current technology standards, the Department will be required to hire resources at a rapid rate to keep pace with the rise in volumes manually, and will experience both growing structural costs and rising processing times as a result.
• Enabling the next-generation operating model with a suite of digital and operational levers will allow IRCC to begin improving its existing business processes rapidly with effective scaling.