Government Operations Committee on Nov. 2nd, 2023

[Kristian Firth]

Yes.

[Garnett Genuis, Conservative, Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan, AB]

Okay.

I want to drill down on the résumé issue. I know this has stuck in the craw of many members.

You sent two false résumés that we know of, and you've admitted as much. You said it was an accident. We have no way of knowing how many false résumés you've sent. What we know is that we have two whistle-blowers, and we have two instances of false résumés. That's a pretty abysmal record when it comes to submitting accurate résumés.

Can I ask whether you would be willing to table for the committee all the different versions of the résumés for Ms. Dutt and Mr. Morv that you have?

[Kristian Firth]

Yes.

[Garnett Genuis, Conservative, Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan, AB]

Okay.

Would you be able to table them within 24 hours?

[Kristian Firth]

I can do 48 hours.

[Garnett Genuis, Conservative, Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan, AB]

I think the committee would agree to 48 hours.

This alleged “accident” with the résumé.... I want to understand the anatomy of how these alleged accidents happened.

How does this process unfold? Do you create multiple résumés—the true ones and the false ones—and try to remember to submit the true ones, as opposed to the false ones you created for some unknown reason?

Walk me through how that mistake got made, allegedly.

[Kristian Firth]

Yes.

There are two versions. You have the one sent in by the resource. You then have the one that is compliant against the matrix, which is also the evaluation grid. Those are the two versions you have. Then there will be one in between, which is where you've gone back and forth and authenticated that the technology is correct—if there is technology missing, because, again, no single résumé ever matches completely with a government matrix. There are always conversations back and forth between a resource and a recruiter or sales, in order to identify things they may not have put down.

We deal with résumés with 190 pages' worth of experience for some of our consultants. We have others that—

[Garnett Genuis, Conservative, Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan, AB]

Let me jump in, because there are some things you're saying that make sense, but there are some things that don't.

I would understand if you got a résumé that was too long, that contained errors or that didn't contain important information, and you said, “Hey, we need to get more background on your educational experience. You missed identifying specific skills.” If that's what you mean by “fit the matrix”, maybe that's a conversation you had with them.

What seems to have happened here, though, is that, in order to make it compliant with the specifications they were asking for, you changed some numbers. Asking someone to provide further information is one thing. Massively inflating a number associated with a particular field or taking someone with a bachelor's degree and editing that to say “Ph.D.” is not just making it systematically compliant. That's making substantive data changes.

How did it happen that you made substantive changes to the data on a résumé and, in this case, didn't consult with the resource?

[Kristian Firth]

Again, the second version is making it compliant. Even back and forth, you can identify that they would never be compliant, that they don't have that time.

At that point, you then go back to the sub and ask, “What other categories do you have that are level 2 and would have seven years or five years?”

[Garnett Genuis, Conservative, Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan, AB]

Okay, so you enter the false information that would make it compliant, and then you send it back to the resource to ask, “Is this true?”

Is that your process?

[Kristian Firth]

It's a conversation. You phone them up, and you say.... You go back and forth because phoning is going to be quicker than going back and forth—

[Garnett Genuis, Conservative, Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan, AB]

I know, but your first step is entering false information that would be compliant with the contract—or at least different information—and then you go back to them and ask, “Can I submit this revised version?”

Is that your process?

[Kristian Firth]

No. You need the back-and-forth, because the revised process would be—

[Garnett Genuis, Conservative, Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan, AB]

Okay. You go back and forth and say, “Okay, we've changed the numbers. Is that okay?” If they say it's okay, you send it, and if they say it's not okay, then you negotiate, but your initial step is to change the number they put in. Is that correct?

[Kristian Firth]

It's to make them compliant, and then you start a conversation.

[Garnett Genuis, Conservative, Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan, AB]

You make them compliant by changing the number in terms of the amount of experience or the amount of time. Is that correct?

[Kristian Firth]

It's also an exercise for—

[Garnett Genuis, Conservative, Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan, AB]

No, it's not “also” anything. I want you to answer the question.

[The Chair, Conservative, Kelly McCauley]

We have to end it right there.

Mr. Jowhari is next, please, for five minutes.

[Majid Jowhari, Liberal, Richmond Hill, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

The résumés of two subcontractors came to you, and you looked at those résumés. You compared them to a Government of Canada standard template, and you started filling those templates.

Then you transferred some of that data over, and then there was some information that was missing. You sent it back to the subcontractor, and that's the back-and-forth that you are talking about. Is that correct?

[Kristian Firth]

That's correct.

[Majid Jowhari, Liberal, Richmond Hill, ON]

Okay.

In the process of sending these back and forth and having your conversation with those two consultants on the phone—because it's much faster—how many other points on the metrics, or what you call a scorecard, needed to be discussed or were missed?

[Kristian Firth]

Again, because of haste and because of pressure from CBSA on Coradix and down to me, the conversation never happened, and the wrong version was sent.

However, I can tell you that the information included in there would be a small bullet point, like, “gave presentations to senior executives”. These are things that go in there that are harmless, which need to be qualified.

[Majid Jowhari, Liberal, Richmond Hill, ON]

That's fair enough.

That information was transferred into the government standard template. In haste, the résumé was sent over, with no conversation back and forth between your office and the consultants. That's understood.

What is the implication of a change from two months' experience to 52 months' experience in determining the rate? What does that do? Does it increase the rate? Does it qualify? What does it do?

[Kristian Firth]

This was a fixed-price contract. This was not based on per diems, so whether it was this grid or this category or a different category or a different grid—a level 3 or a level 2— they are fundamentally costing the same.