Agency Overview

In the fall of 2001, the Government of B.C. mandated a change to the way common services were delivered, including human resource management. The goal was to be more cost-effective. After extensive consultation and consideration at many levels, the BC Public Service Agency was created as a way of consolidating human resource services across the BC public service into one organization for all of Government. When it opened in April 2003, the Agency replaced the Public Service Employee Relations Commission (PSERC).

The BC Public Service Agency provides human resource management services to ministries and public service organizations in British Columbia. It incorporates the BC Leadership Centre that provides development services for executive and senior managers from a corporate-wide perspective. The Centre is also responsible for learning services. The Agency works in partnership with a small group of Strategic Human Resource Units within public service ministries and organizations. This group is referred to as the human resource organization. The human resource organization creates a shared service for which the Agency is accountable to the Province's Deputy Ministers' Council through a Memorandum of Understanding, and to individual ministries through Service Level Agreements. The Agency is a client-centred organization with its sights set on the retention, motivation, recognition and attraction of the workforce needed for public service excellence.

The Agency's headquarters is in Victoria where there are approximately 280 employees; 100 of those work for the Client Services Division in Victoria. An additional 100 staff work for Client Services in regionalized locations that are close to its clients in Prince George, Nelson, Kamloops, Abbotsford, Burnaby, Vancouver and Nanaimo.