Meeting between Patrick Borbey, PSC President, and Mr. Iain Stewart, President, Public Health Agency of Canada

*Information valid as of February 2021

Introduction

Deputy Head

Mr. Iain Stewart was appointed as President of the Public Health Agency of Canada (PHAC) on September 21, 2020.

Mr. Stewart is exercising the Public Service Commission’s (PSC) authority for the first time as Deputy Head (DH). A copy of the New Direction in Staffing (NDS) highlights for DHs is attached as Annex A.

Organizational Context

Mandate

The PHAC helps protect the health and safety of all Canadians. Its activities focus on preventing chronic diseases, such as cancer and heart disease, preventing injuries, and responding to public health emergencies and infectious disease outbreaks. The PHAC is responsible for emergency preparedness and response for issuing public health notices, and for immunization and vaccines.

Through research, programs and services, the PHAC’s goals are to bring about healthier Canadians, reduced health disparities, and a stronger capacity to deliver on and support public health activities. As part of the PHAC’s program activities, it uses grants and contributions to fund community, volunteer and not-for-profit agencies to support government policies and priorities.

Challenges

In its 2020-2021 departmental plan, the PHAC focuses on three aspects of public health: health promotion and chronic disease prevention; infectious disease prevention and control; and health security.

To achieve expected results, the organization is seeking to attract and retain the best possible medical and scientific candidates. As the PHAC is competing with other governments and the industry, hiring and promotion practices are continuously reviewed. As the more classic recruitment approaches proved to be a deterrent to valuable candidates, the organization is looking at more innovative and simplified application procedures, and using talent management to promote individuals, as it is the practice by employers in scientific and medical industries.

The PHAC will continue to examine the level of resources required for priority initiatives. With the COVID-19 crisis, the organization had to shift its resources to be dedicated to the crisis response. This was established through the reassignment of existing capacity and the recruitment of additional resources, especially in the NU (nursing) classification, dedicated to community health and epidemiology response.

As part of a shared services model, all Human Resources programs and services are provided by Health Canada (HC). The PHAC is continuously in search of the best and brightest public health specialists and pandemic prevention authorities. In the recruitment of these professionals, obtaining timely confirmation of official language results and the recognition of foreign education credentials can be a challenge.

The PHAC must also ensure an agile approach to recruitment when facing emergency situations. This became even more important with the COVID-19 pandemic, where the PHAC hired 717 employees specifically dedicated to Canada’s response to the pandemic between January 1, and November 1 2020, and has since continued to hire more staff.

Experimentation

The PHAC is working with HC on making talent management and performance appraisal practices more compatible for use in staffing processes, as valuable information to assess merit. For the hiring of doctors (MD group), the PHAC has adapted its advertisement approach. They now simply ask candidates to submit their resume, and the hiring manager contacts them to ask for any pertinent additional information. Various outreach initiatives were also launched, including developing brochures, banners, videos, and social media campaigns. All of these initiatives have increased the number of applications for the MD group. The approach has proven successful, leading to an increased recruitment.

Population and Staffing Activities

Population

The PHAC is a large organization that has a population of 2,346 employees (as of March 31, 2020). In the 2019-2020 fiscal year, it performed 1,394 staffing actions.

Staffing Activities

In 2019-2020, the PHAC proceeded with a total of 1,394 staffing activities:

• 695 appointments to the public service;
• 279 promotions;
• 160 acting appointments; and
• 260 lateral and downward movements (deployments, secondments and assignments).

The tenure distribution of these activities is as follows:

• 779 indeterminate;
• 148 terms;
• 197 casuals; and
• 270 students.

Please refer to Annex B for additional details on staffing activities.

Time to Staff

The PHAC has a median time of 201 days for internal appointments, which is higher than the median of the public service, which is 175 days.

The data is insufficient for providing results on external process times for the PHAC. We cannot determine if the median is higher and lower than the median of the public service, which is 203 days.

Staffing Framework

New Direction in Staffing Implementation

As the PHAC is becoming more familiar in experimenting with NDS, there is less risk aversion from human resources (HR) advisors and hiring managers. The organization has regular Staffing Community meetings to discuss staffing practices, obligations and flexibilities. These are aimed at having a more agile HR advisory complement to assist managers in their staffing activities. They are also aimed at being more strategic than process oriented.

The organization would like to continue implementing the NDS culture and help more HR advisors think “outside the box”, and foster creativity in staffing processes. To support this cultural change, the PHAC has implemented a “Safe Space” innovation corner to give all HR advisors of the organization across Canada a forum to share their ideas. The goal is to foster innovation and fight the aversion for creativity.

The PHAC staffing policies (direction for the choice of appointment process, policy on the area of selection, and requirements for the articulation of the selection decision) were updated in 2016 following NDS.

As part of an overall departmental policy review initiative that took place in 2019, the PHAC is currently taking this opportunity to refresh their staffing policies. They are working on clarifying the DH direction on the choice of appointment process and provide additional guidance to hiring managers concerning advertised and non-advertised appointment processes.

In February 2019, at the request of the organization, the PSC examined the PHAC’s sub-delegation instrument. The PSC identified some issues and the organization implemented PSC’s suggestions when updating their sub-delegation instrument, which was approved by PHAC’s President in June 2019.

Appointment Delegation and Accountability Instrument Annex D Reporting

Use of the Public Service Official Languages Exclusion Approval Order and the Public Service Official Languages Appointment Regulations

The PHAC reported that the organization did not make any use of the Public Service Official Languages Exclusion Approval Order and no use of the Public Service Official Languages Appointment Regulations for the period of April 1, 2019, and March 31, 2020.

Approved Deputy Head Exceptions to the National Area of Selection Requirements for an External Advertised Appointment Process

The PHAC reported that the DH did not approve any exceptionto the National Area of Selection.

Results of Organizational Cyclical Assessment

The first PHAC cyclical assessment is due by October 1, 2021.

Inquiries and Trends

As the PHAC and Health Canada share the same HR services provider, inquiries are often common to both organizations. The inquiries are therefore accounted for as either specific to one organization or common to both.

From April 1, 2020, to October 20, 2020, the PHAC made 17 inquiries specific to its organization.  In addition, during the same period, there were 22 questions common to both the PHAC and Health Canada, which brings the total inquiries to 39.

Of those, 18 were related to COVID-19 (14 were on the use of second language evaluation alternatives and 4 were related to the special arrangements for extending the allowed period for casual employment).

Oversight

Audits

The PHAC was included in two horizontal audits that were recently completed, including the Pilot System-Wide Staffing Audit (SWSA) that was published in 2018 and the Horizontal Audit on Credential Validation (HACV) that was published in 2019.

The SWSA was a review of system-wide compliance in staffing. In all, 25 departments and agencies participated in the audit, providing a sample of 386 appointments; 7 of these appointments were from PHAC.

The HACV explored whether public servants had obtained the necessary level of education for their position when they were hired.  The audit examined a representative sample of 278 external appointments across 15 departments and agencies; 6 of the appointments in this sample were from the PHAC.

The PHAC is not included in the audit projects that are currently underway.

Investigations

There was one founded investigation related to political activities. An employee under the Federal Student Work Experience Program (FSWEP) at the PHAC was not in compliance with subsection 115(1) of the Public Service Employment Act (PSEA) when he sought nomination and was a candidate in the 2018 municipal election, without having first sought and obtained the PSC’s permission to do so.

Table 1- Investigations

Nature of Issue	Cases Received	Cases Referred by Organization	Closed - Not Accepted	Completed Unfounded	Completed Founded	Ongoing
s.66 External Appointments (Merit, Error, Omission, Improper Conduct)	2	0	3	0	0	0
s.69 Fraud	1	1	0	0	0	1
s.118 Improper Political Activities - Employees	1	0	0	0		0
Total	4	1	3	0	1	1

Note: The numbers may not add up as discontinued cases, and cases resolved via early intervention are not included in this table.

The ordered corrective action included that the employee participate in an individual awareness session on the political activities regime applicable to federal public servants and that a letter be sent by the PSC to the employee to inform him that he failed to comply with subsection 115(1) of the PSEA and to remind him of his obligations.

Staffing and Non-Partisanship Survey Results

The survey results for the PHAC shows that managers are less satisfied than similar large size organizations and the overall public service concerning the quality of services they received from their HR advisor. Below are key findings from the PHAC’s 2018 Staffing and Non-Partisanship Survey (SNPS) results:

• 59% of employees indicated that people hired in their work unit can do the job, as compared to 52.3% in similar size organizations and 53.8% across all organizations in the federal public service.
• 9.6% of managers agreed that that they felt external pressure to select a particular employee, as compared to 13.3% in similar size organizations and 12.7% across all organizations in the federal public service.
• 57.3% of managers reported understanding of the provisions that help veterans gain employment in the federal public service, as compared to 65.6% in similar size organizations and 65.8% across all organizations in the federal public service.
• 90.5% of managers felt that staffing is burdensome, as compared to 88.6% in similar size organizations and 87.9% across all organizations in the federal public service.
• 67.3% of managers feel staffing is not quick enough, as compared to 64.5% in similar size organizations and 62.4% across all organizations in the federal public service.

Diversity Profile

The PHAC is above workforce availability (WFA) for women, and members of visible minorities. However, the organization would like to focus on addressing certain employment equity gaps in specialized fields, such as in the MD and SE (Scientific Researchers) groups. The PHAC is below WFA for Aboriginal Peoples and for Persons with disabilities.

Table 2 - Diversity Profile

Designated Group	Public ServiceWork Force Availability (WFA)	Public Health Agency of Canada	PHAC EE data from previous year	Representation across the Public Service of Canada
Women	52.7%	68.3%	68%	54.8%
Indigenous peoples	4.0%	3.1%	3.1%	5.1%
Persons with Disabilities	9.0%	5.5%	5.5%	5.2%
Members of Visible Minorities	15.3%	21.4%	20.3%	16.7%

Source: Employment Equity in the Public Service of Canada 2018-2019, Treasury Board of Canada Secretariat

Priority Entitlements and Veterans

Appointments of Persons with a Priority Entitlement

From April 1, 2019, to January 14, 2021, the PHAC appointed 4 persons with a priority entitlement (PPE). They all had a Leave of Absence Returnee priority entitlement from the PHAC.

Appointments of Persons with a Canadian Armed Forces Priority Entitlement

Since the coming into force of the Veterans Hiring Act on July 1, 2015, until January 14, 2021, PHAC has not appointed any persons with a Canadian Armed Forces Priority Entitlement.

Priority Clearance Requests

From April 1, 2019, to January 14, 2021, PHAC submitted 1,519 priority clearance requests. Of these, 391 have been submitted to staff 806 positions related to Covid-19 with 82 of these submitted in the past month (Dec 14th to Jan 14th) to support the federal government’s approval of COVID-19 vaccines.

Table 3 - Priority Clearance Type

Priority Clearance Type	Amount	Percentage
Internal advertised processes Internal advertised (116) Appointment from a previously established pool (120)	236	16%
Internal non-advertised processes	325	21%
External advertised processes External advertised (212) Appointment from a previously established pool (207	419	28%
External non-advertised processes	371	24%
Appointment of persons with a priority entitlement (includes term and indeterminate appointments)	5	0.3%
Student bridging	156	10%
Section 43	7	0.5%
Total	1519	100%

Source: Priority Information Management System

Persons with a Priority Entitlement

The PHAC had 16 active PPEs in the Priority Information Management System on January 14, 2021:

• 14 have a Leave of Absence Returnee priority entitlement; and
• 2 have a Relocation of Spouse priority entitlement.

Non-Partisanship in the Public Service

One PHAC employee was granted permission by the PSC to be a candidate in a 2018-2019 municipal election. However, the employee was not elected.

The results of the SNPS demonstrate that PHAC employees are aware of their rights and obligations for engaging in political activities to a moderate and great extent (78.9%) which is slightly under the public service in general (80.1%).

Public Service Commission Initiatives

In response to emerging needs resulting from the Covid-19 pandemic, the PSC supported PHAC with the recruitment of Screening Officers and Nurses to staff positions at various entry ports across Quebec (Stanstead, Lacolle, St-Armand, Pierre-Elliot-Trudeau and Jean-Lesage Airports).

Candidates were sourced using various methods, including leveraging PSC inventories (Post-Secondary Recruitment and the Indigenous Career Pathway). Targeted outreach efforts with alumni candidates from universities in difficult to staff locations, a call-out to nursing associations, and support with reference checks was also provided. As of October 13, 2020, a total of 20 candidates from these initiatives were retained by the PHAC, 13 of which had received employment offers.

Recruitment Programs

Federal Internship Program for Canadians with Disabilities

Although the PHAC is currently not participating in the Federal Internship Program for Canadians with Disabilities (FIPCD) Program, this program is a great initiative to contribute to the Government of Canada’s Accessibility Strategy by having an intern and support them in skill development to increase their employability.

The program also offers a 50% salary reimbursement to hiring departments for the duration of the internship period. The program provides managers and interns with career coaching services and tools to support the interns’ development such as recommended training offered by the Canada School or Public Service.

Should the PHAC wish to hire interns by funding the salary and program costs directly, they may contact the PSC to explore this option at: cfp.diversitedetalent-talentdiversity.psc@canada.ca

Student Employment Opportunity

The PHAC has submitted 6 requests for referrals for the Employment Opportunity for Students with Disabilities (EOSD) and 16 requests for referrals for Indigenous Student Employment Opportunity (ISEO) through the FSWEP since January 1, 2020. Both programs are excellent recruitment options to increase diversity in the workplace by hiring students living with disabilities or indigenous students. Managers and students are provided with resources, such as onboarding tools, training, and networking events. The candidates from both these initiatives are available year-round in the FSWEP ongoing inventory.

• Number of available students in EOSD^{Footnote 1}: 4424
• Number of available students in ISEO^{Footnote 2}: 2511

Federal Student Work Experience Program

The PHAC has submitted 161 requests for referrals through the FSWEP since January 12, 2020. The FSWEP is a great program to help renew the workforce and bring new energy, ideas and approaches to the workplace. The number of available students in this program: 84,744^{Footnote 3}.

Post-Secondary Recruitment

The PHAC and Health Canada are leading an interdepartmental staffing process entitled: Build a career in Access to Information and Privacy (ATIP) – Analyst, through the 2020 PSR campaign launched on October 28, 2020, through November 18, 2020, inclusively.

The PHAC has submitted 23 requests for referrals from existing PSR inventories to staff a total of 50 positions in the AS, CR, EC, NU, NU-CHN, PM and SG-SRE categories.

Participation in initiatives related to the hiring of Indigenous Peoples

Although, the PHAC has not participated in any specific initiatives yet, the PSC’s Aboriginal Centre of Expertise (ACE) and the Treasury Board Secretariat’s Office of the Chief Human Resources Officer have developed an Indigenous Career Pathways (IPC) that may be of interest to the PHAC.

IPC provides information on Indigenous recruitment, career progression/development and retention:

• The Inventory of Indigenous Applicants facilitates the matching between hiring managers and candidates by sourcing indigenous talents from existing inventories of the PSC and proactively promoting their profiles to federal organizations.
• The Indigenous Recruitment Toolkit provides a repository of tools, resources and advice on indigenous recruitment, outreach and initiatives that PSC and other departments offer.  
• The ICP was officially launched in OCHRO’s newsletter of November 2020 and an event was held on December 11, 2020, in collaboration with the Canada School of Public Service (CSPS).
• 1,233 participants attended the webcast, which the CSPS has called the largest Indigenous tailored event in 2020.

Staffing Support

Public Service of Commission Representatives and Organizational Contacts

The Staffing Support Advisor assigned to this organization is Yannick Fortin, the primary organizational contact is Tammy Kardoes, Director, Staffing and Classification Policy Center and the Head of HR is Daryl Gauthier, Director General, Human Resources Services Directorate.

PREPARED BY:

Yannick Fortin
Staffing Support Advisor

APPROVED BY:

Lynn Brault
Director General, Staffing Support,
Priorities and Political Activities Directorate  

Patricia Jaton

Annexes:

• Annex A – A New Direction in Staffing, highlights for deputy heads Placemat
• Annex B – Data on Population and Staffing Activities

Annex A

A New direction in Staffing – A merit-based system that is effective, efficient and fair

Appointment Policy

New focus on core requirements to provide sub-delegated persons greater discretion in making an appointment

• One Appointment Policy, no duplication with legal requirements
• Broader focus on values-based system, away from rules-based system
• Appointments Policy supported by streamlined guidance:
• A roadmap to the requirements in legislation, regulations and policy
• Options and considerations for decision-making where there is discretion
• Clear expectations for priority entitlements
• No restrictions to assessment methods for EX appointments
• Exceptions to National Area of Selection approved by deputy head

Delegation

• New ability to customize organizational staffing system based on unique context and evolving business needs
• Deputy head establish a direction on the use of advertised and non-advertised appointment processes
• Deputy heads to establish requirement(s) for sub-delegated persons to articulate, in writing, their selection decision
• Clarity on requirements related to investigations
• Attestation form to reinforce the accountabilities of sub-delegated persons

All PSC monitoring and reporting requirements now found in the Appointment Delegation and Accountability Instrument

Monitoring and Reporting

Monitoring built by organizations, targeted to their needs

• Annual Departmental Staffing Accountability Report no longer required
• Annual reporting to the PSC limited to:
• Use of Public Service Official Language Exclusion Approval Order
• Exceptions to the National Area of Selection approved by the deputy head
• Results of any internal investigations
• Actions taken following any PSC investigations or audits.
• Deputy head responsible for ongoing monitoring of organizational staffing system based on the organization’s unique context
• Assessment of adherence to requirements, based on organization’s own risks, at the minimum every five years

PSC Oversight

System wide-focus

• Government-wide compliance audit every two years
• Renewed Survey of Staffing administered in alternating years with government-wide audit
• System-wide effectiveness and efficiency reviews to support continuous improvement
• Targeted PSC audits as a result of identified system-wide or organizational risks or at the deputy head request
• Investigations conducted when there is a reason to believe there was political influence, fraud or improper conduct in an appointment process

This document should be read in conjunction with the Public Service Employment Act, the Public Service Employment Regulations, the PSC Appointment Policy and the PSC Appointment Delegation and Accountability Instrument.

Annex B

Population by tenure as of March 31, 2020

Population by language requirements as of March 31, 2020

Population by occupational group as of March 31, 2020

Population by region as of March 31, 2020

External indeterminate hires by occupational group, 2019-2020

Staffing by region

• Regional distribution excludes unknowns

Staffing by process type

• Includes indeterminate and specified term appointments
• Excludes lateral and downward movements, deployments and acting appointments of less than 4 months
• Includes only appointments where the staffing process type is known (58% to 82% of appointments.

Staffing by appointment type

Staffing by tenure

Key findings - Staffing and non-partisanship survey (2018)

• 59.0% of employees agreed that people hired can do the job, compared to 52.3% in organizations of similar size, and 53.8% in the federal public service
• 56.7% of managers agreed that the New Direction in Staffing has improved the way they hire and appoint persons to and within their organization, compared to 54.4% in organizations of similar size, and 56.1% in the federal public service
• 90.5% of managers agreed that within their organization, the administrative process to staff a position is burdensome, compared to 88.6% in organizations of similar size, and 87.9% in the federal public service

Student program hires

External indeterminate and term hiring activities: Post-Secondary Recruitment Program and former student hires

Hiring of former students includes indeterminate and term hires with experience in a federal student recruitment program within the last 10 years.

Internal time to staff

Internal time to staff is calculated as the number of calendar days between the opening date of the advertisement and the date of the first notification.

The median internal time to staff for the public service (organizations subject to the Public Service Employment Act) for fiscal year 2019 to 2020 is 175 days

Internal time to staff for fiscal year 2019-2020

Public Health Agency of Canada’s median internal time to staff for fiscal year 2019 to 2020 is 201 days

External time to staff

External time to staff is calculated as the number of calendar days between the opening date of the advertisement and the date of the first estimated external hire.

The median external time to staff for the public service (organizations subject to the Public Service Employment Act) for fiscal year 2019 to 2020 is 203 days

External time to staff for fiscal year 2019 to 2020

The data is insufficient for providing results on external process times for Public Health Agency of Canada.

Technical notes:

• The Time to Staff - Internal Appointments (TTS-IA) is the median number of calendar days between the opening date of an internal advertisement and the date of the first Notice of Appointment or Proposal of Appointment (NAPA) from the Public Service Resourcing System for internal term and indeterminate positions. As NAPAs are not required for all internal staffing actions, this measure is limited to reporting on internal promotional appointments.
• The Time to Staff - External Appointments (TTS-EA) is the median number of calendar days between the opening date of an external advertisement and the date of the first estimated appointment of an individual from outside an organization subject to the Public Service Employment Act for term and indeterminate positions. Because data between systems is linked using a probabilistic match, errors in data linkage are a potential source of measurement error.
• Only estimated term and indeterminate appointments/notifications are included (deployments, casual and acting appointments are excluded).

Sources:

• Hiring and staffing activities data are derived from information received from the Treasury Board of Canada Secretariat Incumbent File.  The Incumbent File is extracted from the Public Services and Procurement Canada’s pay system.  The data constitutes an estimate of hiring and staffing activities to and within organizations.
• Information from the Priority Information Management System and the Public Services Resourcing System is also used to determine if staffing actions are advertised or non-advertised as well as for calculating time to staff.
• The data are not expected to match an organization’s human resources data, due to methodology and timing differences.
• The Time to Staff - Internal Appointments (TTS-IA) is the median number of calendar days between the opening date of an internal advertisement and the date of the first Notice of Appointment or Proposal of Appointment (NAPA) from the Public Service Resourcing System for internal term and indeterminate positions. As NAPAs are not required for all internal staffing actions, this measure is limited to reporting on internal promotional appointments
• Only estimated term and indeterminate appointments/notifications are included (deployments, casual and acting appointments are excluded)
• The Time to Staff - External Appointments (TTS-EA) is the median number of calendar days between the opening date of an external advertisement and the date of the first estimated appointment of an individual from outside an organization subject to the Public Service Employment Act for term and indeterminate positions. Only estimated term and indeterminate appointments/notifications are included (deployments, casual and acting appointments are excluded)
• Because data between systems is linked using a probabilistic match, errors in data linkage are a potential source of measurement error
• Hiring and staffing activities data are derived from information received from the Treasury Board of Canada Secretariat Incumbent File.  The Incumbent File is extracted from the Public Services and Procurement Canada’s pay system.  The data constitutes an estimate of hiring and staffing activities to and within organizations.
• Information from the Priority Information Management System and the Public Services Resourcing System is also used to determine if staffing actions are advertised or non-advertised as well as for calculating time to staff.
• The data are not expected to match an organization’s human resources data, due to methodology and timing differences.