Continuous Audit of Learning and Development Commitments

Executive Summary

The Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission (CNSC) is committed to fostering a high-performing workforce through effective learning, development and performance management practices. Central to this commitment is ensuring that employees are equipped with the skills and knowledge required to meet current role expectations and prepare for future opportunities, while also maintaining compliance with training requirements.

In 2025–26, in their performance contracts, management committed to ensuring that:

• 100% of branch/directorate employees have a documented Individual Learning Plan (ILP) aligned with their performance requirements in their current role and/or to prepare for future roles
• 100% of employees completed one professional development learning activity (e.g., formal course, stretch project or assignment, job shadowing, mentoring)
• 100% of required compliance training has been completed by the deadline
• 100% of branch/directorate employees have a performance agreement and receive feedback, at a minimum, 2 times per year

The audit objective was to provide reasonable assurance that management commitments to staff learning and development are being fulfilled. More details about the audit objective, scope, approach and criteria are set out in Annex A, About the Audit, at the end of this report.

Why is this important

Strong learning and performance management practices help ensure that employees have the skills, knowledge and feedback needed to effectively support the CNSC’s mandate and adapt to evolving organizational priorities.

Key Findings

This audit provides reasonable assurance that these expectations are being met and that management practices are consistently applied across the organization. Overall, the audit concluded that shared performance commitments related to learning, development and performance management were substantially met.

The results for each commitment were as follows:

• The introduction and ongoing implementation of the new ILP tool during the audit period supported consistent documentation across the organization for the majority of staff. Employees sampled who did not use the tool largely did not have a documented ILP.
• Most employees participated in required learning, professional development and performance management activities; however, opportunities were identified, primarily in the areas of clarity of requirements and ease of tracking results.
• Compliance (mandatory) training completion rates were generally high, with the clarification issued by the Human Resources Directorate (HRD) during the audit period expected to support more consistent identification of required training.
• The commitment to have performance agreements in place was substantially met.

Conclusion

The CNSC has established frameworks, tools and guidance to support ILPs, mandatory training and performance management. The audit identified opportunities to strengthen the understanding, accountabilities and application of the functions available in the ILP tool introduced in 2025–26, as well as opportunities to continue clarifying expectations of commitments. Given the importance of these development activities, these commitments have been included in management’s 2026–27 performance contracts to support the organization in achieving its objectives.

The CNSC is preparing to implement a new HR-to-pay system, which should improve how performance assessments and training activities are tracked and reported longer term.

The results support the monitoring of learning and development commitments for 2026–27 through the continuous audit approach.

Findings and Observations

The audit expected that management commitments to staff learning and development were fulfilled and that documentation and supporting evidence were complete, accurate and retrievable. The continuous audit assessed performance against shared learning and development commitments for the 2025–26 fiscal year.

Overall, the audit concluded that shared performance commitments related to learning, development and performance management were substantially met.

This audit provides reasonable assurance that these expectations are being met and that management practices are consistently applied across the organization. The observations and results of testing for each commitment are detailed in the table below:

Assessment	Observations and results
Staff have a documented ILP	The majority of staff used the new ILP tool introduced in 2025. Of the 183 staff members who did not use the ILP tool, 16 of the 25 employees sampled did not have a documented ILP. Some of the employees sampled who did not have a documented ILP reported access and technical challenges – 2025 was a year of transition to the new MS 365 Lists ILP tool, and there were delays in onboarding some divisions to SharePoint. In the new ILP tool, there were 4,502 training entries for 2025–26, with 2,174 approved, 2,298 pending approval and 30 rejected as at the end of the fiscal year. HRD highlighted that approvals revert to pending if a change or comment is inserted on an approved entry.
Staff have completed one professional development learning activity	49 of the 50 employees sampled provided a professional development learning activity for the period of review. 4 of the 49 activities did not have supporting documentation of completion.
Required compliance training has been completed by the deadline	21 of the 25 employees sampled (84%) completed mandatory training. In 3 cases training was rescheduled to 2026–27, and in 1 case a course had been selected by the employee in error. Not all mandatory training had deadlines. Training is not consistently classified. The 2026–27 commitment wording was improved, replacing “compliance” with “mandatory”.
Staff have a documented performance agreement	49 of the 50 employees sampled (98%) had a performance agreement, although access to the document was not provided in 4 cases (8%) at the time of this report. The timeliness of having the documented performance agreement varied. Application of commitment in the case of employees on leave for a portion of the year: 7 of the 50 employees selected were replaced, as the employees were reported as being on leave for a large portion of the year.

What We Heard

During the course of the audit, employees expressed the following:

• Confidentiality: Concerns about sharing performance management information, beyond learning objectives, with internal audit.
• Training expectations: Lack of clarity as to whether ILPs are commitments or “wish lists”, and about accountability for completing ILPs.
• Tools: Need for practical systems to track training completion.
• Mandatory training: Confusion about what is considered mandatory, and responsibility and ease of access for monitoring whether training has been completed.

The Internal Audit, Evaluation and Ethics Division (IAEED) noted that, in April 2026, an email was sent by HRD to provide information about mandatory corporate training, which is supported by details on the CNSC Hub.

In some cases, managers expressed positive feedback that IAEED is verifying learning and development commitments.

Next Steps

As this engagement was conducted as a continuous audit, IAEED retains the ability to perform similar testing in future fiscal years. At the request of the Executive Committee, IAEED may conduct follow‑up or repeat testing to monitor progress, support management oversight, or assess the maturity of learning and performance management processes over time.

Appendices

Appendix A: About the Audit

The continuous audit of learning and development commitments is under CNSC authority and was requested by the President of the CNSC and endorsed by the Executive Team on April 27, 2026.

The objective of this audit was to provide reasonable assurance that management commitments to staff learning and development are being met.

The scope of the audit included employees at the CNSC during fiscal year 2025–26. The population of indeterminate employees, based on a February 2, 2026, extract, consisted of 1,010 employees across 93 divisions, 22 directorates and 6 branches. Employees excluded from the population and scope were students, term employees, employees no longer with the CNSC as of April 20, 2026, employees on leave or on interchange outside the CNSC, and the Executive Team. Once the samples were selected, any employee with a start date before September 2025 were removed and replaced by the next eligible employee in the sample.

The audit approach and methodology included the following:

• Interviews with key senior management and staff
• Review of relevant documentation, including learning plans, training records and performance management documents
• Analysis of completion of ILPs, learning activities and performance management for samples of employee files across the CNSC

The audit criteria established were as follows:

• Performance management has been established
• Employees’ ILPs have been documented
• Employees completed at least one learning activity
• Employees completed mandatory training within the required deadlines

An overview of the testing performed is outlined below:

Shared performance commitments	Testing to be performed
100% of branch/directorate employees have a documented Individual Learning Plan aligned with their performance requirements in their current role and/or to prepare for future roles.	Test 25 of the 183 employees without an ILP in the SharePoint tool/Hub to check for ILPs documented elsewhere.
100% of employees have completed one professional development learning activity (e.g., formal course, stretch project or assignment, job shadowing, mentoring).	Test 50 of the 1,010 employees, asking the manager to identify the completed learning activity and the evidence available if applicable, and use the same sample of employees for performance agreements.
100% of required compliance training has been completed by the deadline.	Test 25 of the 1,169 employee-flagged mandatory training activities to validate completion (certificate, Learning Management System, HRD), each for a unique employee.
100% of branch/directorate employees have a performance agreement and receive feedback, at a minimum, 2 times per year.	Test 50 of the 1,010 employees to ensure that a performance agreement is in place. Testing to include a minimum of one employee per directorate.