Serving Canadians with Excellence

Introduction

I am pleased to submit my first Annual Report on Public Service Renewal as the new Commissioner of Revenue and Chief Executive Officer of the Canada Revenue Agency (CRA). Since joining the Agency in August of this year, I have had a chance to visit with employees in various parts of the country. I have been impressed with the professionalism, dedication, and the level of engagement that I have witnessed among our employees. These visits have allowed me to see our employees living the Blueprint 2020 vision in their everyday activities.

I have been struck by the diversity of this large organization, both in terms of background and demographics. I have met employees with many years of experience and a vast knowledge of the operations in which they work, and I have met a promising cadre of younger employees with a passion for innovation and engagement, which has given me great confidence in the future of our Agency. Regardless of background or age, one thing is clear: the abounding commitment to serving Canadians expressed by our employees. From the cooperation and leadership of our senior management team, to the knowledge and professionalism of our frontline employees, this is an organization committed to excellence.

As an organization with over 40,000 employees from coast to coast to coast, our operational scope is very large. Our employees understand that each encounter with Canadians matters and I have witnessed their devotion to making the client experience respectful and fair.

In general I am pleased with the overall culture at the CRA, and by no means am I an expert on it, but I have had some insight into it. In the coming year we will focus our attention around communications and innovation. Communication is vital to a healthy workplace. At the CRA, we are committed to making sure employees have the information necessary to be productive, connected, and respected in the workplace. We will continue to put emphasis on open, clear, and respectful communications within the Agency and the outside world.

After meeting with employees and hearing them share their experiences, I was inspired to share more about myself and my own experiences with all employees across our organization. To emulate that personal interaction, I created a five‐part video series to allow Agency employees to get to know me better.

I am pleased to present the following sections which showcase our accomplishments around Healthy Workplaces, Recruitment and Onboarding, and Other Actions to Renew the Public Service.

Original signed

Bob Hamilton
Commissioner of Revenue and Chief Executive Officer

Respectful Workplaces

We are committed to building and maintaining healthy and respectful workplaces that support employee well‐being, diversity, and inclusion. We recognize that healthy and respectful workplaces support our people in delivering services to Canadians. With so many of our employees interacting with the public on a daily basis, ensuring a respectful and safe work environment is paramount in achieving our Agency priorities.

Mental Health & Well-being

Supporting the physical and psychological health and safety of all CRA employees is an Agency priority. To demonstrate our commitment to healthy workplaces we have appointed one of our Assistant Commissioners as the CRA Respectful Workplace and Wellbeing Champion. The role of this champion is to plan various wellness‐related events and be a senior management voice for healthy workplaces and well‐being at the CRA.

We are proud to report that we have recently developed our Agency Respectful Workplace and Well‐being Strategy, which reinforces and enhances our commitment to building a healthier workplace that is collaborative, inclusive, and respectful. Our well‐being model includes five interrelated workplace well‐being factors: business practices, individual health habits, physical environment, personal resources, and psycho‐social environment. The goal of the strategy is to make improvements in all five well‐being factors in order to create a work environment where everyone can thrive.

While great strides have been made, and we are on the right path, we know that this journey does not have a set destination or end point; rather it is one of continual improvement. As part of our Agency Respectful Workplace and Well‐being Strategy, we have developed a three‐year plan which focuses on mental health. Year one of the plan aims to raise awareness of mental health issues in the workplace and build on capacity, engagement, and commitment. Years two and three of the plan will build on successes from year one, make necessary adjustments based on results from evaluations, and will continue cross‐functional collaboration in order to continue building a healthier workplace.

In October 2016, we launched a new section on our intranet site devoted to well‐being. This is a one‐stop shop for raising awareness and highlighting learning opportunities for our employees. It also provides a central access point for the various support programs and services related to respect and well‐being in the workplace. This new site serves as a forum for our Respectful Workplace and Well‐being Champion to engage with CRA employees – a central venue where important messages can be communicated, and updates can be provided.

Our Well‐being webpage includes a series of videos on civility and why it plays such an important role in a healthy workplace. Civility – being courteous, respectful, polite, and considerate of others – is something we often take for granted because it seems so obvious. These videos feature stories illustrating the importance of civility in our everyday interactions and the impact and cost of incivility on an organization.

The Agency continues to offer a suite of resources aimed at informing employees on mental health, short term counselling services and workshops. Over the past year, the CRA Employee Assistance Program delivered 234 workshops to over 4,000 employees and union representatives, over half of which related to mental health.

To complement existing processes and to ensure a more consistent and effective resolution process, the Discrimination and Harassment Centre of Expertise (DHCE) was launched in May 2016. This neutral office offers a safe place for employees to discuss incidents, or formally submit discrimination or harassment allegations. The DHCE is accessible to all employees and managers through a confidential National Enquiries line or by submitting a confidential electronic request.

Recognition and Awards

We are in tune with the various elements that contribute to a respectful workplace, including recognition, which is a key factor in creating and sustaining motivated, satisfied employees. Recognition helps us build supportive working environments and is linked to increased productivity, and ultimately has a positive effect on the service we provide to Canadians. We recognize our employees formally, for example, our annual CRA Awards of Excellence and Long Service Awards, and in less official ways, but nevertheless important, our online Thank You Certificate. Since the implementation of our online Thank You Certificates in June 2015, this user‐friendly tool has been very successful – over 8,800 certificates have been shared among colleagues.

As an Agency, we are proud of the work we are doing to create and maintain a healthy workplace in all our offices and we showcase this pride by recognizing our people through our Employees Stories. Employee well‐being is part of our commitment to fostering a culture of integrity. These employee‐submitted stories are examples of that commitment and showcase the personal and corporate successes of our people. Stories submitted from employees, with a variety of topics and themes, are posted to our intranet on a weekly basis.

Our Intranet site also includes the Kudos from the Public page, which features real submissions from Canadians commending Agency employees for the outstanding service they provided.

Recruitment and Onboarding

Recruitment and Development: As our work evolves, so do our people

As the nature of our work continues to evolve, and as our experienced employees and leaders become eligible for retirement, succession planning remains a priority for our organization. We continue to invest in our internal workforce through training and providing opportunities for growth within our organization, but this is only one aspect of our recruitment strategy. The way we work is changing and this requires a new way of thinking, doing, and leading. To ensure we have the technical skills and leadership capacity required to serve Canadians with excellence into the future, we are seeking a balance between our internal recruitment and a much broader strategic recruitment. We are taking calculated risks with our recruitment strategies and hiring people we can develop and grow in order to meet the challenges of the future.

In light of the changing and emerging nature of our workload, we have strengthened our commitment to recruiting specialized professions to proactively replenish the workforce with the talent we will require in the future. Among these recruitment initiatives is the Auditor Development Program, which provides practical work experience and on‐the job coaching and mentoring for participants. Since launching this program in the fall of 2014, we have hired over 120 auditors.

We also recognize the importance of recruiting skilled and dynamic information technology (IT) professionals. Several of our recruitment initiatives target this segment of the workforce, including:

• The Information Technology Apprenticeship Program (ITAP) which targets recent graduates of postsecondary IT programs. In 2015 and 2016, a total of 87 employees were appointed through this program, of which 76 were promoted to higher level positions; and
• The Recruitment of Experienced Candidates (REX) Program which focuses on the recruitment of experienced IT professionals. These recruits are offered positions within the Agency that are above entry level.

In April of 2016, the Agency appointed two Strategic Recruitment Champions. These co‐champions are Assistant Commissioners in the Agency and their role is to support CRA management and our Human Resources Branch in recruiting the best talent and branding the Agency as a top employer in Canada.

Given the size and geographical reach of the CRA, our recruitment strategies must be dynamic and diverse to meet the needs of our entire organization. We recently created a network of Regional Strategic Recruitment Advisors to advance national initiatives while maintaining regional priorities and realities. We have been utilizing this new network to leverage perspectives in the areas of recruitment, sharing of best practices, and ensuring consistent recruitment branding across the CRA.

Strategic partnerships and collaborations continue to prove mutually beneficial for the Agency and our partners. The CRA and the Chartered Professional Accountants (CPA) of Canada have established an agreement specifying that CRA work experience qualifies for the work component in achieving the CPA professional designation. This partnership has allowed the Agency to recruit and retain employees pursuing an accounting designation and has made us more competitive with private accounting firms.

Over the past year, we have continued to pursue student recruitment as a means of attracting tomorrow's workforce. Our Student Ambassador Program – a network of students who represent and promote the Agency through peer‐to‐peer marketing – has been growing in scale since its inception in 2002, increasing our visibility on postsecondary campuses across the country. The program started with 10 student ambassadors on 7 university and college campuses and has expanded to 52 representatives on 35 campuses across the country. Between September and December of 2016, the CRA will have had representation at some 62 different recruitment events with over 100,000 participants.

As the Deputy Minister Champion for Western University, I work with the university to find shared priorities and collaborative projects, to create exchanges over public policy, programs, and university research and to build awareness about opportunities for careers in the federal public service.

In order to communicate with the next generation of Agency employees, we have been tailoring our recruitment messaging using various social media outlets, including LinkedIn and YouTube. In September 2016, the CRA launched, as a pilot project, a recruitment‐specific Twitter account, which focuses on post‐secondary recruitment, job opportunities, and the work culture at the CRA.

Ensuring that we have a diverse and inclusive workforce is a priority for the Agency. We have launched several campaigns to promote the CRA as a diverse workplace with an inclusive workforce. Campaigns thus far have highlighted Indigenous History Month, LGBTQ+/Pride communities, and Official Languages. Furthermore, we have successfully established a network of LGBTQ+ community members whose goal is to effectively promote the community and give it a stronger voice at the CRA.

The CRA has conducted various outreach activities to attract and recruit members of designated employment equity groups. At these career fairs, the Agency's Indigenous Student Employment Program was promoted as part of the Federal Student Work Experience Program. Recently, the CRA developed an Indigenous Recruitment, Retention and Promotion Strategy, as well as an Indigenous Mentorship Program, to support employees, offer career advice, and provide opportunities for learning and culture‐to‐culture exchanges between Indigenous and non‐ Indigenous employees.

To simplify the staffing process, the CRA launched its Integrated Staffing System in December 2015 which includes a redesign of the Agency's external Careers website. Improvements include a more user friendly and visually appealing website where anyone, both current and future CRA employees can create their own candidate profile, get job notifications by email, and apply to CRA job postings.

Recruiting the right leaders and developing the leadership skills of our current employees is key to our sustained success as an organization. Adoption of the new Key Leadership Competencies (KLCs) as part of the Executive Qualification Standard in January 2016, introduced more flexibility for executive staffing, while reducing the number of assessments for executives.

We have been collaborating with other government departments, central agencies and external service providers to ensure our leadership strategy reflects current and emerging trends in leadership development, as well as with our external partners, such as the Association of Professional Executives of the Public Service of Canada, to leverage leading practices. In order to make best use of our available talent, the CRA is using the Leadership Development Program (LDP) to target high‐potential employees whose accelerated development will help address the CRA's business objectives and succession needs.

Agency Onboarding: A smooth and efficient transition into the CRA

We embrace the importance of ensuring a positive transition into the Public Service and the CRA for our newly recruited employees. Onboarding a new employee involves extensive work on behalf of the employee and their manager, including: IT systems, work location and systems access, performance management, compensation, and training, to name a few. To support the recruitment initiatives, while assisting managers with their need to quickly and effectively onboard new hires, the CRA launched an Agency wide employee onboarding system called My Guide in June 2016.

My Guide was created to support our thousands of new hires each year, and provides each new hire a customized onboarding experience. It is comprised of interactive task lists, media‐driven orientation and job‐specific learning, all personalized to their circumstances.

With its user‐centric design, My Guide not only simplifies the administrative and learning aspects of onboarding, but also allows new employees to interact with others within the onboarding community, fostering a sense of belonging and engagement during their formative first weeks in their new job.

My Guide is proving beneficial for managers and training coordinators in terms of time savings and consistency. Supervisors are provided with a centralized list of interactive tasks outlining what they need to do during the onboarding process, they can delegate onboarding plans, and they can customize the content of their employees' plans. From the launch on June 21, 2016 to the end of August, 475 new employees were onboarded with the aid of My Guide.

Other Actions to Renew the Public Service

A Culture of Engagement

At the CRA, our Blueprint 2020 journey began in 2013 with a large‐scale engagement initiative using our own online tool – Destination 2020. We offered a virtual seat at our senior management table, and involvement in the decision making process, to some 40,000 employees to seek their ideas to shape the future of our organization. This was the beginning of a shift in culture at CRA, giving way to numerous other engagement initiatives. By embracing the importance of involving our people in the decision‐making process, we have achieved greater outcomes and better service for Canadians.

We continue to use our online engagement tool in various initiatives. We recently used the tool to seek employee opinions on the Agency's new Service Vision. Over 1,000 Agency employees used the tool to provide feedback on the proposed Service Vision. This feedback helped the Agency refine the service vision, ensuring that perspectives from a broad range of employees were considered.

The CRA is committed to being a fair and transparent organization that offers first class services to Canadians and our businesses. Building on the success of our previous external engagement with small and medium business in 2012 and 2014, the Agency has recently launched the Serving You Better consultations which give small and medium businesses, and professional accountants, the opportunity to share valuable insights so that we can better serve their needs.

In addition to this external engagement exercise, we will once again deploy our Destination 2020 tool to ask our employees to share their ideas about what the CRA could do to further improve services for Canadians, in particular small and medium businesses. We asked Agency employees what works, what doesn't work and what we can do to make our programs and services for small and medium business more helpful and easier to use.

In fall 2015, we used our online engagement tool to solicit ideas from our management community on how we could improve the way managers work and alleviate administrative time constraints. This engagement resulted in an action plan with 12 priority areas that address the ideas and suggestions raised by team leaders and managers. One of these priorities was the creation of a Management Group (MG) Network. This network is comprised of team leaders and managers from across the Agency and provides a forum in which members can openly discuss management related issues amongst peers, consult with their constituents, and make innovative recommendations for solutions.

The MGN is supported by an Executive Group Network (EXGN) whose mandate is to provide opportunities to network, collaborate, share leading practices, solutions and ideas and influence positive culture change. The EXGN activities are aligned with the strategic direction of the Agency and support current and further leadership.

The Agency also has a thriving Young Professionals Network (YPN) which focuses on engagement, collaboration and supporting employee learning opportunities to help advance our strategic plans and priorities.

In addition to these formal networks, we also have numerous informal networks established between offices with common program goals and objectives. These networks give our employees an opportunity to collaborate and share best practices, between offices and even regions, with a common goal of improving program delivery.

An Innovation Network has been established to give branch and regional representatives an opportunity to share best practises, discuss different approaches to problem solving, and provides a forum to showcase innovative initiatives.

CRA demonstrated its commitment to improving service by appointing a Champion of Service Culture. This is an acknowledgement of the importance of culture in achieving the service goals set out by the Government of Canada. To launch the culture shift, CRA leaders participated in a 'Let's Talk Service' initiative in the spring. Plans are underway for grassroots engagement from coast to coast to coast to create a service vision and then work together to make that vision a reality.

As part of our Year 4 Blueprint 2020 strategy, we recently held employee conversations across the Agency to check‐in and gauge the success and awareness of our Blueprint 2020 initiatives with our regional employees. Participants highlighted the positive impacts that Blueprint 2020 has had in their work area and how it has resulted in better outcomes for Canadians.

Serving Canadians Better

Throughout our organization we are continually looking for ways to better serve Canadians and deliver better outcomes.

Transformation and Modernization – we are making a difference

In our last report – Living the Vision at CRA – we highlighted a number of initiatives featured in our e‐Interactions Strategy, which aims to make it easier for Canadians to interact with the CRA. We are pleased to present an update on the impact of these initiatives.

Online Mail for individuals provides Canadians with the option to sign up to receive their correspondence online rather than in the mail. Once registered for this service, we will send the taxpayer an email notification when there is correspondence in their mailbox. In just under two years there are already over 4.5 million individuals registered for Online Mail and this number is growing rapidly.

Auto‐fill My Return is a secure service allowing individuals and authorized representatives to electronically request and receive certain information to fill in parts of their tax return using information already on file with CRA. As of October 2016, tax information was automatically delivered to 5.6 million returns.

Our Submit Documents service offers a secure method for taxpayers, benefit recipients and their representatives to submit documents electronically. Canadians are quickly shifting to electronic submissions with yearly increases in participation.

We have conducted an Agency‐wide review of our external correspondence to improve the structure and design of numerous CRA issued letters and notices. We have improved our Notice of Assessment and Reassessment – this simpler format displays the most important information about the assessment on the first page and introduces plain language to help taxpayer get the information they need.

Canadians can now connect with the CRA anywhere, anytime with our mobile app for individuals – MyCRA. Monthly visits to the app have tripled compared to last year proving that this is an increasingly attractive option for Canadians to connect with us.

In October of this year we held our Digital Services Week where we invite employees to learn about CRA's current and upcoming digital services, including how these services support a variety of life events, to better serve Canadians. Increasing our employees' knowledge and awareness of the e‐Interactions Strategy better equips them to serve Canadians and be ambassadors for the Agency.

Since launching our Liaison Officer Initiative (LOI) in 2014, officers have contacted 42,700 taxpayers and attended over 13,300 visits, with consistently positive impacts and feedback. In April 2016, the LOI was expanded to all Tax Services Offices and an additional 40 full‐time officers were added to the program – over a 50% increase from the previous year.

Using Lean to Improve Services

The Agency has developed a centre of expertise in the use of Lean methodology for government which focuses on improving service delivery to Canadians and Canadian businesses. Lean is a continuous improvement methodology that engages and empowers employees to take ownership of their jobs and seize opportunities to eliminate waste. The core values of Lean are respect for people and continuous improvement, shared by all employees, at every level, in their daily work and relations with others. The Lean model equips our employees with tools and problem solving skills to find creative and innovative solutions to improve services. We use four key performance indicators to measure our progress: employee development or time invested in learning and training; quality improvements; wait time improvements; and capacity/productivity improvements.

Outreach Initiatives

In our offices we are collaborating with various organizations to strengthen our ties in communities. Our offices have increased their partnering with various organizations and are focusing on five vulnerable groups: seniors, indigenous peoples, new Canadians, peoples with disabilities and young Canadians.

Our Outreach program has been working to create new connections with Indigenous groups and organizations in an effort to strengthen and maintain existing partnerships within the Indigenous communities. As a result of this collaborative effort, the Outreach program was able to partner with 11 new organizations which represents a 16% increase in participation for this year.

Through our Community Volunteer Income Tax Program (CVITP), community organizations host free tax preparation clinics and arrange for volunteers to prepare income tax and benefit returns for eligible individuals who have a modest income and a simple tax situation.

Innovation (and Nudges)

Launched in 2015, the CRA's Innovation Lab supports Agency and government priorities by using innovative approaches – including advanced data analytics and behavioural economics (nudge) – to undertake evidence‐based projects with a whole‐of Agency scope and strategic importance. The Lab is composed of a strong team of individuals with specialized and diverse knowledge and skills that are vital for innovation, creative problem solving and design thinking. The Lab collaborates with program branches and regions on a project‐by‐project basis, seeking opportunities to integrate and apply innovative techniques to various aspects of our operations.

In particular, behavioural economics or "nudges" has become central to advancing the Agency's innovation priorities. Nudges have been proven to significantly improve societal and economic outcomes in many different areas through their use in public policy. The CRA is a leader in the use of nudges within the Government of Canada, and we continue to
expand and improve our efforts. Recently, we have undertaken projects that make it easier to correct tax mistakes, encourage Canadians to switch to e‐Services that help them get their taxes done quicker (like the new Auto‐fill my return feature), and help businesses "get it right from the start."

Coinciding with this commitment to using innovative techniques to address longstanding challenges is an acknowledgement of the importance of experimentation to determine what works and to assess the efficacy of the CRA's efforts. Consequently, the Agency has devoted more resources to experiment with new ideas on a smaller scale before deciding to scale up. This helps ensure that our initiatives are focused, efficient, and cost‐effective for taxpayers.

The Blueprint 2020 Journey: As it changes us, it challenges us

Since we began our Blueprint 2020 journey we have witnessed a remarkable change in our organization and our people. Engaging our employees has now come full circle – from the front lines to management and back – it is now the way we work, and it has given employees at all levels in the Agency a voice.

We have progressed from our initial large‐scale engagement and the implementation of numerous initiatives that were brought forth by our employees in 2013, to the present stage where we live the vision and apply it on a smaller scale. As an organization we continually draw linkages between the Blueprint 2020 vision and the changes we make to improve the services we provide Canadians.

For an organization of this size, the journey has indeed been a challenge, but we embraced it and saw it as our success. We have advanced past the point where we feel the need to label our success 'Blueprint 2020' because it has become ingrained in our organization, in the way we make decisions, and in the way we work to serve Canadians. Our culture continues to grow and with that the Blueprint 2020 vision remains alive at the CRA!

The concept of engagement as being "business as usual" will be an enduring legacy of Blueprint 2020 at the CRA. We have built a dynamic workplace culture that supports and encourages the free exchange of information and ideas. As our organization moves forward we want to ensure that all our employees realize that their ideas for change, whether big or small, matter and that they have a forum to bring these ideas to the forefront. We will continue to be active participants in achieving the vision of Blueprint 2020 and we will continue to be proud of the work we do in serving Canadians.