Guidance Document on the Assessment and Consideration of Departmental Priority Persons within HRSDC

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Background:

  • Within the context of the current and future public service labour market environments, it is important that the Department ensure that its obligations to priority persons are being met.
  • Persons entitled to a priority for appointment pursuant to the Public Service Employment Act (PSEA) or the Public Service Employment Regulations (PSER) shall be appointed to positions for which they meet the essential qualifications and are entitled to be marketed through the Public Service Commission Priority Information Management System (PIMS) and the Departmental Vacancy Management System.

Role of Managers in the Assessment of Priority Persons and the Management of their Own Priorities:

  • Sub-delegated managers have an individual and corporate responsibility for respecting priority entitlements and are responsible to ensure that priority persons are assessed in a fair, transparent and timely manner and, if the person meets the essential qualifications and conditions of employment (i.e. priorities are not required to meet asset qualifications), that they are appointed before any other appointment process is initiated to fill a position. This includes the consideration of retraining for within a period of up to 2 years as provided for in WFA agreements.
  • Priority persons should be provided with timely information, by managers, about the position being staffed and the means of assessment and allowed reasonable opportunity to prepare. Hiring managers are responsible to provide timely feedback to priority persons about the results of their assessment, with clear and full explanations of the reasons if they are not being appointed.
  • Surplus/laid-off priority persons must be assessed against the essential qualifications only. HRSB has developed an Attestation of the Assessment of a Surplus/Lay-off Priority template that will be used to simplify and streamline the documentation process for managers who are hiring surplus and laid-off priorities. 
  • Departmental priorities with affected status should be hired via deployment which requires only that the person meet education, security and language requirements of the position. 
  • Managers should be meeting regularly with priority persons regarding their referral activity and support required to facilitate their placement (HRSB to provide managers with reports of priority referral activity from both the Departmental Vacancy Management System and the PSC Priority Information Management System (PIMS)).
  • Managers should also have follow-up discussions regarding specific referral situations/outcomes and challenging where appropriate.

Process for Consideration of Departmental Priorities:

a. Departmental priority persons (employees with affected or surplus status, and employees impacted by a Relocation of Work Unit situation during their 6-month decision period) requiring placement are eligible to be registered within the departmental vacancy management system to be referred to hiring managers across the portfolio.

b. In support of the guiding principles to manage transition collectively, as outlined in the Department’s Workforce Management Strategy, when a vacant position is to be filled, priority persons (affected and surplus persons) at the group and level of the position to be staffed must be provided the opportunity to be considered for the position prior to any advertised appointment process being initiated. Such referrals will be made via the departmental Vacancy Management System.

c. In the event that there are no departmental priorities identified for placement to the position, branches may initiate an internal advertised appointment process; a request for Section 43 (exemption from GoC referrals from the PSC) will be made provided the branch is able to clearly demonstrate that the appointment of a priority from another Department would result in a new surplus priority being created within HRSDC.

d. The area of selection for internal advertised processes should be determined in accordance with departmental policy.

e. An organizational need criterion is recommended for internal advertised appointment processes as follows: Placement of Human Resources and Skills Development Canada (HRSDC) employees affected by work force adjustment. The “affected by work force adjustment” statement includes affected, surplus, laid off, and relocation of a work unit status and can be used as a right fit selection criterion when selecting from a pool of qualified candidates.

Note:

  • In exceptional circumstances, ADM/EHSM may submit a business case to seek an exemption from the consideration of departmental priorities at level. Such business cases will be reviewed by the ADM, HRSB. All cases where a request for exemption is accepted must have the effect of permanently eliminating a position.