CIMM – Digital Platform Modernization – May 12, 2022
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Key Messages
- The digital modernization of our immigration system will ensure that Canada remains a destination of choice for global talent.
- Through Digital Platform Modernization, over the next five years, Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship (IRCC) will replace its aging IT platform, while redesigning business processes and advancing policy simplification, enabling us to:
- meet heightened expectations for client-focused services and improve the client experience;
- respond quickly to changing conditions and new priorities;
- reduce the reliance on outdated paper-based processes; and,
- better manage increasing application volumes while maintaining the integrity of migration programs.
- While we are in the process of defining our processing targets as part of our modernization vision, we expect that the future system will provide clients with faster processing, user-friendly and seamless online services, and more timely – information about their application status.
- IRCC knows that public confidence in a technology-enabled immigration system will depend on safeguards to protect against unintended bias and discrimination, and on ensuring accessibility for a diverse client population. We are committed to embedding the principles of diversity, equity and anti-racism into our modernization journey.
Supplementary Messages
- The Digital Platform Modernization (DPM) programme is the key enabler for IRCC business transformation.
- Demands on our immigration system are increasing. Clients expect personalized, fast and intuitive digital services. And application volumes have been increasing (a trend expected to continue after COVID-19), adding pressure to an already overtaxed, highly paper-based system.
- 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 IRCC’s aging IT platform (i.e., the Global Case Management System, or GCMS) and other legacy systems.
- Our goals and objectives are clear as we go forward — DPM is an incremental programme. The DPM programme will accomplish this by delivering three consecutive and overlapping phases.
- Phase 1 (“Stabilize”), was designed to de-risk and stabilize GCMS in advance of phases 2 and 3, with a focus on reducing the technical debt that had accumulated over the years in the legacy system. Additional investments included cloud technology and capacity that will be leveraged as part of Phase 2. Phase 1 is now complete.
- Phase 2 (“Standardize”), currently underway and building upon elements of Phase 1, continues to standardize operations and reduce technical debt to prepare the department for modernization. Ongoing maturing of the cloud elements we need for the new digital platform during Phase 3 is also underway.
- 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 support it.
- As part of this Definition stage, IRCC is refining its processing targets as we crystallize our vision and plans for significant improvements in the area of client experience.
- The modernization of IRCC’s IT platform and business systems is expected to benefit our diverse client base, including by providing a user experience that is easier and more transparent.
- As we embark on the Definition stage of the Digital Platform Modernization programme, IRCC is applying an intersectional approach, i.e., anti-racism and Gender Based Analytical lenses, to its work.
- The enhanced digital platform will ensure digital solutions account for disparate impacts on Black, Indigenous and racialized groups, take into account diverse realities and intersectionality by active engagement of diverse stakeholders. This enhanced platform will include review and monitoring of analytical model building process to ensure that bias is not replicated or imitated in data-driven automation.
Supporting facts and figures
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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.
- Phase 3 is supported by the announcement of $827.3M in the 2021 federal Budget. [Redacted].
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Background
- The Global Case Management System (GCMS) is Canada’s integrated and worldwide web-based system used to process applications for immigration, citizenship and some passport services.
- 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. It 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.
- 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.
- 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, and will experience both growing structural costs and rising processing times as a result.
- The Digital Platform Modernization (DPM) programme aims to stabilize and standardize our current information technology system, and to build the foundation for a new digital platform for the GCMS used all over the world by IRCC and other partner agencies for managing the status of visitors, temporary residents and immigrants.
- 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.
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