IRCC Anti-Racism Strategy 2.0 (2021-2024) – Change management

Addressing systemic racism is a complex and non-linear process. There are multiple levels and intersections at play involved in unravelling racism. For this reason, the Strategy adopts a systems approach that will enable a transformative culture change at IRCC. One way of doing so is through the Equality and Anti-Racism Systems Change Framework (Annex D) that has been developed in collaboration with IRCC stakeholders and partners. This Framework aims to identify the conditions that hold racial and other inequities in place, and shift these conditions through actions of allies, change agents and “systems change entrepreneurs” to implement systemic change across three levels:

1. Structural change in IRCC policies, practices and resource flows;
2. Relational change that looks at relationships and power dynamics across the Department;
3. Transformative change in mental models, thought processes and cultural paradigms that keep systemic discrimination, including racism, alive.^{Footnote 1}

The objective of the Equality and Anti-Racism Systems Change Framework (Annex D) is to gain a deeper understanding of the IRCC systems change landscape, and to guide the Department on a journey toward the following goals: Creating an anti-racist, diversity, equity and inclusion culture; achieving true representation; designing equitable systems and processes; and building inclusive environments for employees and equitable outcomes for clients.

Since the Clerk’s Call to Action on Anti-Racism, Equity and Inclusion in January 2021, IRCC has implemented a number of actions in support of identifying and addressing biases and inequities in our policies and programs, the external services we deliver to our clients, and our people management practices. These actions toward equity and Anti-Racism systems change include:

At the level of structural change in policies, practices and resource flows

• Embedding Anti-Racism work within our departmental reports (i.e. Departmental Plan, Departmental Results Report, and Annual Report to Parliament);
• Starting the process of reviewing program information profiles (PIPs), specifically the Citizenship Program, using Anti-Racism, GBA Plus and other intersectionality perspectives with the aim of incorporating additional indicators to ensure the program is free from systemic racism and discrimination;
• Including an Anti-Racism lens in all audits within our annual departmental audit plan.

At the level of relational change that looks at relationships and power dynamics

• Asking our executives how they are advancing Anti-Racism and identifying sponsors for racialized executives and managers during the performance and talent management assessment cycle;
• Outlining specific Anti-Racism commitments by business line to achieve within the next three years and tie them to their performance management agreements;
• Creating venues for fostering dialogue among employees and with senior management (e.g. trust circles, working groups, engagement sessions with middle managers, diversity, inclusion and equity networks, town halls) to challenge and discuss ways of addressing racism;
• Starting to engage with external stakeholders to generate more insight into the inequitable outcomes of departmental policies, programs and service delivery, and develop relationships to co-create solutions.

At the level of transformative change in mental models and cultural practices

• Establishing a coaching program to increase cross-cultural competencies of our senior leaders, as well as providing Anti-Racism foundational training for middle managers;
• Requiring employees and executives to take mandatory unconscious bias training and having anti-racist objectives included in performance agreements;
• Mandating our senior executives, as per the Performance Management Corporate priorities for 2021-2022 issued by the Clerk, to incorporate Anti-Racism Commitments into a three-year plan that focuses on the recruitment, retention, career advancement of equity seeking groups;
• Publishing our employee Anti-Racism Focus Group (PDF, 443 KB) results on Library and Archives Canada’s website. This has led to much media attention which in turn holds the Department to account;
• Conducting or sponsoring research such as the Racism, Discrimination and Migrant Workers in Canada: Evidence from the literature (PDF, 1.5 MB) and the Environics Institute’s research on Social Norms and Racism in Canada to inform public policy.

Each of these incremental steps form the building blocks toward achieving bigger systems change across IRCC. These actions have prompted us to examine how we can effect change at a system level.

The wheel of privilege and power

The wheel of privilege and power provides an example of a tool adapted by diversity, equity and inclusion networks at IRCC that can be used to identify intersectional locations of power.^{Footnote 2} Identifying the forms power takes allows us to design systems in different ways to correct power imbalance or to level the proverbial playing field.

Long-term and sustainable change at the system level unfolds through the interplay of structural conditions and actions of change agents, resulting in successive phases of transformation, with each phase building on and sustaining the durable results of the previous one. From this perspective, systems change is premised on a theory of change that builds upon a foundation of creating awareness of the issue; generating a new set of values to address the problem; expanding the shifts in cultural constructs from the domain of awareness and re-think to formal policies and procedures of the organization; implementing change through new accountability mechanisms and power redistribution. The phases of anti-racist culture change might be formulated as:

1. increasing race awareness;
2. designing a culture of Anti-Racism based on clearly articulated values;
3. embedding racial equity throughout policies, procedures and practices both internally within the organization and externally;
4. rethinking leadership accountability in relation to the first three steps; and
5. changing the organizational design so as to better distribute power throughout the institution.

It is our hope that the completion of these five phases will enable IRCC to achieve the culture change it requires to become an organization with embedded strong anti-racist practices in people management, policy development and service delivery domains.

Wheel of privilege and power (PDF, 0.5 MB)