The talent cloud is an experiment by a select few public servants who thought that we could look at a different model for bringing employees into the Government of Canada. We tend to take a decent amount of time to bring employees in, and the goal is to bring staff and employees into the Government of Canada within about 30 days. It's still the goal. It has not been achieved yet, but we're working towards it.
By using some of the techniques that my colleague Mr. Snow mentioned, they were able in the last year to launch a beta, open-source, very low-cost prototype where we're now hiring people within roughly 40 to 50 days. We're addressing the need to bring people in quickly in government.
The system also looks at the concept of the gig economy that's out there, where people in the technology field are increasingly choosing short-term assignments as opposed to a 35-year career with the public sector, which makes their coming in and out very difficult.
What we're trying to do with the talent cloud, which is still experimental, is to facilitate that trend and give otherwise contract employees the rights to have access to pensions and benefits. They may choose to come to work for six to 12 months at a time with our talent cloud solution, then leave for a few years and come back in. In the technology space, that's extremely useful, because it means that people stay relevant, people work in different sectors, and they're bringing in different perspectives. We're making that concept of a porous public sector increasingly a reality thanks to the work of the talent cloud team.