In this Member Workshop with WES, enhance your knowledge in assessing credentials and skills to help you recruit, hire and retain immigrant talent.
Event Information
Unlock the potential of immigrant talent to address Canada's pressing labour shortages. As Canadian employers struggle to find qualified employees and fill job vacancies, the need for innovative recruitment and credential and skills recognition strategies becomes paramount. Join us for this impactful workshop where we will delve into the tools and strategies that help employers connect with immigrants and refugees who will move their businesses forward.
Drawing from 50 years of experience as a non-profit social enterprise dedicated to supporting the inclusion of newcomers, WES and its partners are excited to share invaluable insights, resources, and strategies. Discover how to effectively assess international credentials and skills, explore innovative tools for recruiting and retaining newcomers, and connect with like-minded organizations committed to building an inclusive and equitable Canadian economy.
Key learnings and takeaways:
- Enhance your knowledge in assessing the credentials and skills of immigrants and refugees.
- Uncover innovative tools, resources, and strategies to recruit, hire, and retain newcomers.
- Forge meaningful connections with organizations dedicated to fostering an inclusive Canadian workforce that drives economic growth.
Workshop Video
Thank you for your interest in our event! The event has now passed, but we are pleased to share that the recording is available for you to review. Catch up on all the valuable insights and information shared during the event. We hope you find it informative and useful.
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um wonderful
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good morning everyone and thank you for joining us here today for our member Workshop hosted by the world Education
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Services Wes my name is Jennifer O'Donnell I'm one of the senior managers
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of the membership engagement team here at the Toronto region Board of Trade
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as we begin I acknowledge the land that is home to many diverse First Nations
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Inuit and maybe's peoples our offices are located on the traditional territory
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of many indigenous Nations who believe in intergenerational responsibility for
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our well-being of today and tomorrow we have just a few housekeeping
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announcements before we begin I'd ask everyone if you feel comfortable uh turn on your camera it's always
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easier to present uh speaking to individuals but uh if you're if you're
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not in a position to do that we completely appreciate that settle in feel free to turn off your cell phones
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and ringers and lastly we'll be taking questions at the end of the presentation
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we have a q a segment however I would encourage everyone to add your questions as the presentation goes along that way
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we can it Spurs conversation you might be thinking something similar to another
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individual and it's just a really great way to start having dialogues of the
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content that's being discussed today enough of me talking let's get started
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today we are joined by several experts who will enhance your knowledge in
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assessing credentials and skills to help you recruit hire and maintain immigrant
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Talent without further Ado please join me in welcoming Helen
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Woodle senior program and policy advisor from Wes Helen
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thank you Jennifer good morning everyone and thank you so much for joining us
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today as Jennifer introduced my name is Helen seifualde I'm the senior program
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policy advisor on behalf of West I would like to thank the Toronto region Board
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of Trade for helping us organize this Workshop as an immigrant myself I believe that
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today's topic is so important and timely and I'm so pleased and honored to be
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moderating this session for those of you who are not familiar with West please allow me to say a few
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introductory words Wes is a non-profit social Enterprise dedicated to advancing the economic and
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social integration of immigrants refugees and international students in the US and Canada
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West has been a global leader in academic credential services for nearly 50 years
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and in addition to credential evaluation we also do social impact work through
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policy programming and philanthropy as Jennifer introduced we will have some
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presentations and we will also have time for Q a but before we proceed with the
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presentations please allow me to set some context to guide our conversation
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as you can see on this slide and as you may know several factors are reshaping
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the current labor market landscape when we look at our demographics we have
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low burst rate and aging population by 2030 nearly 5 million Canadians are
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expected to retire so this means that there will be fewer young people to replace them and
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immigration will be the key drive for labor force grows we all know note we also know the
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current labor shortage crisis across so many sectors in the first quarter of this year over
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800 000 job vacancies were reported and majority of the job vacancies were in
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healthcare and social assistance where we see a large number of newcomers immigrants and refugees
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and the unemployment rate is going up which is currently 5.2 percent
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I don't have to explain how technology and AI are impacting the labor force
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landscape in the next 10 to 15 years it's expected that AI will affect up to half of all
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Canadian jobs which will necessarily impact the skills required in the labor market
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the kovid pandemic is also another factor which is changing the labor force
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landscape including digitization of the workforce also as a nation we are competing with
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other jurisdictions such as Germany Australia and UK who are
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competing for new talents given all these new trends more than
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ever immigration is so crucial to address the chronic level shortage crisis and drive Canada's economy
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that's why the government of Canada continued to increase the number of newcomers each year as you can see on
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this slide this is the latest immigration levels plan announced by the federal government in November last year
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and ircc the ministry for immigration is planning to bring nearly 1.5 million
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newcomers over the next three years and when we look at the different categories almost 60 percent of new permanent
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residents will be admitted through economic pathways so this means that
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there is no shortage of talented people who want to move to our country Canada
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and when we look at the profile of these newcomers majority are young highly
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educated and experienced and they are ready to contribute to the labor market economy
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this provides employers with a unique opportunity to employ immigrants who
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hold prior experience and knowledge without lots of training so if we don't take advantage of this
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experience and skills of newcomers there will be a huge loss for our country according to the conference Board of
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Canada study as a nation we may lose almost 25 billion dollars in earnings
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due to underemployment and unemployment of newcomers so to this Workshop will highlight some
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Innovative tools and strategies that will be helpful for Employers in hiring Global Talent
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so now it's my pleasure to introduce our speakers first we have Kevin Kamal who
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is our director for institutional client relations and Kevin will be speaking on
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International academic credentials assessment next we have our colleague Daniel
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cervangiel who is the associate director for employer initiatives and Daniel will
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be sharing with us some Innovative tools and strategies to hire Global Talent
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last but not least we have basil rambly who is the co-founder and director for
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economic Mobility from jumpstart Refugee Talent which is one of our partners and
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basil will speak on solutions to the Global Talent crisis thank you so much and now I'll pass it to Kevin Kevin over
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to you uh good morning everyone Helen Jennifer thank you so much for that introduction
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and I will be speaking to our International academic credential evaluation services
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and the next year you may want to know we will be celebrating our 50th Anniversary uh initially we started in
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1974 in New York City um from beginning we were not for-profit
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organization and we continue to have that kind of a business model for our operation
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um we really want to get to uh your your section for your comments and your questions so I'm gonna kind of speak um
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for the to a few of the highlights that it affects um it kind of highlights our
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Canadian operations so um you may want to know that in 2000 um we we started the Toronto office and and
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actually we we started the business in Canada based on the RFP by the Ontario
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government then the ministry of training colleges and University so there was a
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RFP in 1999 this was one of the respondent and
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finally we got the contract to deliver this service in Ontario and because of
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that RFP we had a limited funding from the Ontario government and in fact that
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funding lasted about 10 years I think the next kind of a milestone in Canada
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is 2013 then we became a designated credential evaluation service provider
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for the federal government for immigration purpose and when I say immigration really it is uh I'm speaking
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about um the the economic class immigrants who come to Canada based on point system we
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are not used for family class and all of those other categories and we hopefully there will be time to explain this in
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comments and questions I think the next Milestone is 2018 in Canada when we
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launched our West Gateway program uh this is kind of a this is still
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credential evaluation however it is it is addressing the needs of displaced
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individuals and I will speak to this at the end of the session
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um some some I I thought you will be interested in these data really like we are looking at the 2022 uh profile of
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our applicants as you see the right in both Canada and us
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um Visa VSS very large number of applicants over 400 000 and the data on
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US and Canada they are kind of Stark um uh you see that in U.S we are mainly uh
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doing this uh this credential evaluation for higher education purpose that means
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international student really international student getting admissions in the US and in Canada 84 of our
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applicants or customers are using us for immigration purpose
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I really like the data on the other side of this of this slide it is giving you
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kind of a picture of okay from that 300 000 in Canada that we assisted where are
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they falling as far as the discipline as far as program of studies
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um the as you see a a large number it is a 25 business business and management 16
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engineering or stem and 14 in health health care and and all of that
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um this data really became even more interesting to me yesterday then ircc or
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federal government for the first time they had an Express entry draw strictly focus on Healthcare
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professionals although yesterday through Express entry they invited 500 individuals to apply or or what they
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call Ita and from that 500 there were 35
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separate Healthcare occupations that they invited a prospective prospective
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candidates candidates in the express entry to become permanent resident it is
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very these uh these disciplines these Majors or specializations are going to be even more relevant as far as
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immigration Trends again yesterday ircc announced that next week they may have
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their first draw for stem category that is engineering Science and Mathematics
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so we are the VR our services are used not just by employers also by
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Professional Licensing bodies like the engineers uh the the CPAs
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um or the teachers both at the elementary level and early childhood education also we are used by
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universities and colleges for admitting either International students or
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immigrant students you may have you have heard this before right very large number of immigrants those who land land
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in Canada as permanent resident they will do continuing education to kind of establish their their Canadian profile
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and Canadian experience and of course we are used by federal government for
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immigration purpose and we are not the only one by the way there are four other services that ircc has designated to
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provide this credential evaluation for immigration purpose
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I thought you'll be interested to know like when we say employers are using our
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service and we'll give you kind of a selected list of employers who are using Us in Ontario and this is again strictly
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limited to Ontario um kind of segmented by private and public I think generally you may say
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that we are most used by public sector and there is a reason for that most
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public sector kind of entities they have credentialing policy they want to be
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transparent on their hiring process they they will require credential evaluation
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that just to make sure that everybody is competing at the same kind of a level or
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at the same um kind of a entry level and all of that yes normally we are used
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more by by public sector especially at the federal level for hiring purposes
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um I we always look at the purpose of our operation really the purpose is to
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facilitate recognition of international academic credentials that is the purpose
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that is a bottom line like we believe we play a facilitative role
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to to facilitate the recognition of international academic credentials and
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the real recognition is that in fact belongs to employers or belongs to Professional Licensing bodies we play
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facilitative or role but when an employer hires uh someone partly not the
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whole thing right we know that partly because of the equivalency report we
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have provided that is a recognition and again that is what I mean that the true recognition belongs to employers
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Professional Licensing bodies and academic institutions I think here it is um it is it is good
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that I speak a little bit more about how we are used by employers first we are
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used for hiring purposes again the job application or the job posting will
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indicate that there is a requirement there's a education requirement and
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there is when there is such a requirement some employers will require credential evaluation another way we
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have been used by employers is for promotional opportunities they may have existing staff who are internationally
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educated and now there is a promotional opportunity in their company in their
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organization and they want to make sure everybody is competing on an equal footing so they will ask the candidate
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to submit a credential evaluation from this or perhaps from another service
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a third and very interesting um uh the kind of reason that we have been used by employers is uh is for
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Sally error salary adjustments um in fact I remember the very first few months that we started in Canada back in
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2000 we were used by a major public sector entity not to for not for hiring
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purposes they were using us to adjust the salary level for their existing
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employee if an employee provided what we call a so-called positive Canadian
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academic equivalency some employers call this salary adjustment I know in another
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Province actually they refer to this as wage support again
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um the the the exercises to make sure everyone internationally educated or domestic
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educated they are placed in a right grid for right salary level
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now I will speak uh to this slide here I'm giving you a very general a very
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general high level uh process How We Do credential evaluations again please bear
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bear in mind that this is a very high level there are a lot of details there there
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are a lot of steps there in each boxes and and if there is if there is time at
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the end we can talk about it so first uh how we do International academic credential evaluations is first really
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we have to start with the overseas institutions they are the one who has a repository of the academic documents
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normally especially post covid those documents are are transmitted to us
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electronically we made a huge effort after pandemic to make sure that we have
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digital partnership with overseas institutions the next step is we verify
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the academic documents we verify the authenticity of the academic documents
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and that is a very significant step in our operation if we determine that the
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documents are authentic we they are not authentic we stop there to that is their
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stop if the documents are fine we move to the evaluation kind of a stage where
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we look at the whole degree we look at the courses we look at the scope of the
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program we look at whether or not like there were there were how many courses
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were theoretical they were practical or internships and all of that and then we
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compare all of that information toward Canadian or U.S standards
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next the equivalency is determined normally and I'm going to show you a
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sample very soon that you will see at this the the kind of the format of our report the equivalency will determine
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because in Canada we have three years bachelor's degree and normally when we determine that it is a bachelor's degree
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in parenthesis we will emphasize that whether or not it is a three years or four years bachelor's degree we always
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share the evaluation Report with the candidate or with the applicant because
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we believe that is a kind of a passport for their settlement process in Canada
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and if a candidate selected an employer to receive their report we send the
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report directly to the employers this is a confidence building measure that we
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send the report directly to the employers that way there is a confidence that the report itself is legitimate
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believe it or not from last September we have seen a lot of our reports
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a lot of our reports are forged the names are Fords the different elements
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are forged so again when an employer receives the report directly from us
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there is that confidence that the report itself is legitimate
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sample evaluation report I'm terribly sorry if this is not very legible but as you see
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it is that the Canadian academic equivalency is highlighted and then we
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talk about the other elements of the credential especially especially we will indicate the major and I think that is a
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point of interest for a lot of employers when they are hiring job applicants
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especially like in in like say say like in medical labs when they are hiring a
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biochemist or biologist they really like to see that area of specialization
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this is our basic report and this is our detailed course by
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course report this is a kind of a report that Professional Licensing bodies will
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require for for for for putting someone's through licensure this is kind
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of a report that academic institutions at The Graduate level will require now
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the really the difference between the previous report is um as you see we will list all the
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courses um one has fulfilled through the whole program and then really the value the
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real value of this report are those credit columns and grades those credits
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are now as you see those are converted we use a method to convert credits we
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use different methods to convert grades the real value again it is those credit
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hours and and the grades those are converted Canadian semester credits and
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those are converted based on a 4.0 scale
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um 50 years in operation we have a very robust database really like everyone in
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this sector knows about vesus database and our database is automated and not
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very recently really we we automated our database in 1997 or 1998. I imagine uh
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in 50 years we collected a lot of data as I'm highlighting some we have
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information for we have information on on the education system of of over 240
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countries or jurisdictions if you are curious to know what is jurisdiction like for instance Hong Kong and Macau
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for us it is jurisdiction we have information from over 59 000
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institutions we have information from over 35 000 academic credentials and over 80 and
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about 84 84 100 grading scales are in
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this database to date in Canada we have we have assisted over uh 200 200 2.5
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million applicants um as as well as we have evaluated over
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3.5 million academic credentials
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you may be very interested in this tool we have and it is a very uh it is free tool by the way anyone can can go to our
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website and really test this tool um it is available for HR departments to use
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it for um or kind of pre-screening their job applicants this tool if you go to
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our website um by entering some key information about an academic credential from 160
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countries and these are degree level uh credentials not diploma level by
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entering some key information about the academic credential you will be able to
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instantly view our opinion I have to emphasize this is our opinion our
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opinion of a Canadian equivalency for an international academic credentials we
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know that this database is heavily used by applicants when they prepare for a job interview
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if they don't have formal evaluation reports from us they do this
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exercise and they get a printout and take it to a job interview just to show
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to the prospective employer that they have their academic credential from from
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another country is comparable to a Canadian degree the as you see there is that fine print
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in the the in the bottom of that um output that we are sharing with you and
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and that fine print is really bringing attention that we are providing this uh
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academic equivalency without reviewing any academic documents that is our
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disclaimer and this is uh this this Canadian equivalence is provided without
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reviewing any documents now about our Gateway program
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um it is really one of the most unique programs in North America both in Canada and U.S if you if you recall I was
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mentioning that for our standard evaluation process we receive academic
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documents directly from the source now we know in the real world there are so many individuals especially
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displaced individuals or refugees they will not have access to their official
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academic documents and for that this has designed this pathway that these
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individuals can get credential evaluation from this based on the
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photocopies of the documents they may have in their possession at this moment
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this service is limited to Canada studied in seven countries you see the
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list of the countries again this is very unique program for for those who who do
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not have access and I and I and I have to emphasize kind of a legitimate access
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they don't have legitimate access to their official documents if you know anyone any candidate a job especially
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job candidate job applicant from these countries refer them to us there is a
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limited subsidy on this too sometimes they don't pay the full fee to receive
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this credential evaluation thank you so much and I very much look
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forward to hear your comments and questions and now I'm gonna pass to my
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colleague Danielle to uh to speak thank you thank you very much Kevin and good
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morning everyone
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no you can go back to the last slide um that was not a
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um an audio issue those were six seconds that I passed six seconds is the average time that it
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takes a recruiter to review a resume that is it if you think about it we
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spend 30 times longer microwaving popcorn um and it is because research suggests
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that we are bombarded with 11 million of pieces of information at any given time
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however our brain can only handle 40. um so naturally our brain create
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shortcuts so that we can make decisions quickly without overwhelming the brain and this creates bias that we are
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unaware of this is what we know as unconscious bias have you ever found yourself as a
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recruiter saying I can't quite put my finger on it but it's just a gut feeling I have about
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this candidate I know that I have um and as recruiters and hiring managers
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we need circuit breakers we need these reminders to check on our shortcuts on
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our biases um West has developed in partnership with over 150 employers across the
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country and many organizations that have proven tested resources over the years an employer Playbook that provides
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employers with some of those easy to implement tips that can make a difference in the inclusion of
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immigrants in workplaces the Playbook is meal sized which is meant to be a go-to
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resource as needs arise uh next slide yes thank you
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um so in this slide you will see um that the employer Playbook includes strategies and tools throughout the four
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stages of the employment cycle recruiting hiring onboarding and integrating it includes a total of 20
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strategies and tools about 16 checklists and templates and we also have three
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localized versions for the employer Playbook those are for the greater mountain
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region Waterloo Region and Durham regions in Ontario and these are
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localized versions provide high level synthesis of community services and resources that are available to
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Employers in those specific communities so if any of you are currently working in any of the communities I mentioned I
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invite you to visit the specific versions of the of the Playbook because there's a lot of really good work that
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is available uh and resources that are available to Employers in those regions
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um it also includes employer testimonials and I know that many of you will also be those people that could be
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featured in our Playbook there's a lot of really good work happening across the country so if there's something that has
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worked for you in recruiting and more inclusive recruiting practices
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retention practices please post them in the chat because we're always looking for those best practices also feel free
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to share any pain points that you may face as an employer um we will be posting the link of the to
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the playbook in the chat uh an invitation to browse through the resource and also bookmark it so that
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you can access it as you need it um in this next slide uh you will see a
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screenshot of what the Playbook looks like so there is a very easy to navigate menu
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um and um we we did it in a way and we Workshop it in a way that it really provides you
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with the Nuggets of information that you need when you need it when you need it so for example if you click on recruiting uh you will see that
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automatically will take you to the section uh that's divided in three main categories so let's say for example you
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click on Essentials versus non-essential skills in there you will have a brief description of what we mean by it as
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well as a couple of resources that you can download and access easily on your devices whether that is mobile or laptop
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um I wanted to spend some time uh with all of you just sharing a few of the strategies and those that are contained
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in the Playbook um one of the first steps to recruiting immigrant Talent is learning to write
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inclusive job descriptions um The Playbook talks about how to separate essential from non-essential
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skills um and and and it is important to state which ones are not required but consider
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an asset and you may Wonder uh why does this matter specifically for uh immigrant populations
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um there's a study that was conducted in 2018 by Harvard Business Review that found that men will apply to a job if
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they have 60 percent of the qualifications whereas women will only apply when they meet 100 of the
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qualifications and our experience and my personal experience says the same is true for newcomers so it is very
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important to highlight what are those essential duties and differentiate them from the non essential that are they
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nice to have but do not directly impact the outcome of the roles Effectiveness an example
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will be being bilingual in both official languages essential for the job or not depending on the region where you're
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you're having operations um another thing that we mentioned in the Playbook is to avoid long
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um and or complex words uh technical terminology jargon and acronyms
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um in your job descriptions um if you see in the in the as we move
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into uh hiring moving beyond unintended buyer Slide the Playbook list several
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ways to address bias in recruitment so about the panel of interviewers and how different views Generations cultural
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backgrounds can help reduce bias I'll talk a little bit more about this in a minute also preparing questions in
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advance and sharing them with another co-worker to test them out for clarity this may help you see whether some of
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the questions may be indicating a bias or may require to be raised to be more culturally
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sensitive also using a competency-based test to assess the art skill I know that
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this is something more common for those of you in the in the trades and and more
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technical professions but there are lots of really good resources that are included in the
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Playbook to support you in in assessing different skills and not rely only on
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years of experience as a predictor of performance um in the next slide you we talk a
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little bit about the importance of diversity in the hiring panel
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um this is an invitation to consider how diversity in this screening panel may
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also actually offer a different perspective from yours um often we hear from small employers
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that this is not an easy thing to do because you know we're doing everything
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and finding a few colleagues to interview candidates is just not realistic uh there are some suggestions
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in in the Playbook about how to go about it in some communities employers are actually inviting some external Partners
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to be sitting at the interview sometimes it's a settlement agency that will be joining in the interviews to support
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with uh with questioning and with identifying some potential gaps and support as well the the employer in
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diversity I should say includes a range of factors anything from gender age live
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experience race cultural background and more um The Playbook also provides a very
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thorough checklist highlighting the important things to consider when reviewing resumes uh the first thing is
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about the overall readability spelling and grammatical errors um errors in resumes are often views as
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a lack of attention to detail as a sign of a potential work ethic that they can they may bring to your company
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however it is important to remember that there are different forms of English there is a UK the Canadian the UK the US
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the Australian and a person whose first language is not English may not have mastered the language fully but can
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still communicate at a level that is acceptable to com competently do the job
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this is an invitation to not Overlook a great candidate because of their perceived lack of English proficiency
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length of time at previous job is another very important consideration as
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I said measuring acquired skills um going beyond the the length of time
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spent at a job and focusing more on the hard skills and assessing those hard
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skills through other mechanisms uh type of positions held in the title of those
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positions also very important consideration when dealing with people that have been working and being
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internationally um and people candidates may not have
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necessarily held the same job in another organization but that doesn't mean that may not bring complementary skills that
36:30
broaden their expertise um gaps in employment history become very important uh when we're talking
36:36
about immigrant job Seekers uh often times um those cops may be perceived as the
36:44
candidate maybe being unreliable or maybe likely to quit their their job soon however the reality is that that
36:52
people leave the workforce for a variety of reasons um for example the Visa process for
36:58
immigrant professionals can be lengthy and there that can be delaying their
37:04
ability to secure work an employment gap um similarly refugees people in in
37:12
displacement situations may actually have to be my moving from country to Country and so that limits their ability
37:19
to have a stable job and Lease employment gaps so all of these things can be addressed uh during the interview
37:26
and an invitation on education Kevin mentioned how to the the free to use
37:33
tool that he shared can help employers understand the International Education or at least equivalency even though it's
37:40
not a full assessment report in those by West but also the Playbook is an invitation
37:46
to move Beyond education only for the that is required for the position and take into consideration both education
37:53
and work experience now moving on to retention uh there's
38:00
tons of research that shows how attrition levels are lower dramatically when
38:06
candidates are well on boarded so the six first months within a company are critical for retention
38:13
um and so there are um challenges that newcomers uh all
38:18
employees but specifically newcomer employees may be facing to learn the written and Unwritten rules of this new
38:25
community so orientation should be designed to set expectations clarify workplace policies
38:31
and procedures and and that's why the Playbook includes a whole section on mentorship and other peer supports model
38:38
um I wanted to spend a minute just to share a great uh way to enhance the new employee transition through a body
38:45
system which is an informal body that helps to ensure a successful integration into the workplace some interesting tips
38:51
around selecting individuals that are role models that can lead by example but
38:56
also are culturally sensitive and if possible who speak the same first language as the new employee
39:03
um now that you've hired a new staff member another critical consideration is how to approach the onboarding so the
39:10
the next resource that I wanted to share with all of you is what we call the three piece um the three pairs the three p's refers
39:17
to people performance and paperwork um this is important across the board for all of the the new hires however for
39:25
immigrant employees it may be particularly important to be intentional about all of these so people who should
39:31
they meet and why uh what would the meetings look like uh share all of that
39:37
with your with your new recruits so that they they know what to expect what is
39:42
what is uh to be expected out of these meetings because you cannot give for granted that this is something that will
39:47
happen in other workplaces uh they may have been part of uh in terms of performance so include job shadowing
39:54
setting expectations providing feedback HR checkings coaching and other training uh are things that uh oftentimes are
40:02
very um common in international work settings or in North American work settings but not necessarily across the globe and
40:09
same thing goes for paperwork so including the orientation a handbook on policies resources all of the forms I
40:17
always like to give this example because when I first came to Canada from Spain which is my home country
40:22
I I was told that I needed to fill in some forms for my benefits and I had no
40:28
idea what benefits were because that is not a thing in Spain you get everything covered through government
40:34
um employment programs and and Healthcare System so to me was something
40:41
new and and even the designation of a beneficiary form was like something I was not aware at all
40:48
um so very important to to highlight all of those things to your new camera employees the next slide uh is talking
40:55
about um and I think I will wrap uh wrap up with this one
41:01
um a very important consideration around what it means to include immigrant selling data workflows in the workforce
41:07
and this goes beyond recruiting and interviewing and onboarding because inclusion is equally about helping
41:15
your existing stuff grow with the new Talent as well as about helping the new
41:21
employee adjust to the team and the new environment basically inclusion requires
41:27
a two-way street right it's uh request leaders to meaningfully prepare the workplace to include and incorporate
41:33
this talent and I like to end this presentation with this consideration because successful retention that cannot
41:41
solely rely on the ability of a newcomer employee to adapt to them to the the
41:48
system they're entering is about or finding a place that is open to change
41:53
that is open to learning from the new skills and and culture and experiences
41:58
that the person is bringing into the company uh here you see a resource that is
42:03
adapted from higher immigrants Ottawas Employer Guide to integrating immigrants into the workplace an invitation to have
42:10
a look at it um I I feel like many of us have often worked in homogeneous models
42:18
um but the goal is to move to the diversity model in the workplace and and that is everybody's role and everybody
42:24
has a role to play um I will leave it there but I'm happy to answer any questions at the end of
42:29
the presentation and uh I'll turn things over now to uh bustle um for his side of the presentation
42:35
thank you great thank you so much Daniel for this really helpful presentation and I've
42:41
gone through this uh the booklet and I do advise everybody to really have an in-depth look into it uh so first my
42:49
apologies if there were any background noise I am actually in an airport but I will be taking you through a very short
42:55
presentation and hopefully just leaving a few minutes for some q a for any of these presentations uh so again my name
43:02
is Ambassador rubbing I am the director of economic Mobility with jumpstart Refugee talents
43:08
and uh Chris what are we trying to do here uh so apparently there are a little
43:14
over 100 million refugees around the world and in Canada alone we have right
43:20
now A little over one million job vacancies and what we're trying to do is really create this win-win situation as
43:27
employers look to tap and try to fill some of those gaps we want them to look at these refugees that are currently
43:33
stuck in countries where they do not have durable Solutions they're in places think of the Venezuelan in Colombia or
43:39
Assyrian and Lebanon they're in countries uh that where they face a lot of barriers they're always at risk of deportation and going back to the
43:46
country where they initially escaped and this is one program that we're doing in Canada in a very close partnership with
43:52
our sister organization that'll be on boundaries and we collaborate as part of a larger ecosystem so I'll be focusing
43:58
on Canada and on Toronto but there are also similar programs we're working on in the UK in the US and in other
44:05
European regions as well as Australia if any of you is interested in that as well I can introduce you to some colleagues
44:10
and one thing to keep in mind that we have helped prelocate a little over 1
44:16
000 refugees uh over the last couple of years to these different destinations
44:24
now the way that we do our work uh we really that we do it through a lot of
44:30
different facilitative measures and the program itself is in a very close partnership with ircc with immigration
44:36
Refugee and citizenship Canada in fact the program is really ircc's program well with penal battery and jumpstart
44:43
Refugee talents collaborating and helping Deliverance close partnership with the government so there are a lot
44:50
of facilitative measures that typically prevent refugees from accessing economic Pathways keeping in mind the way that we
44:57
do it is by accessing you can see them on the right some existing provincial Pathways in Ontario that would be the
45:03
oint but as of this month the federal government ircc has launched a dedicated
45:09
Federal pathway uh for just our program which is again it's called the economic Mobility Pathways pilot EMP
45:16
and we're very very excited about it because it has made our life a lot easier keeping in mind and that's when
45:23
they relocate to Canada through this program they actually arrive as permanent residents as PR so as an
45:29
employer the candidate themselves will not have to be concerned around long-term retention uh it's really a
45:35
great durable solution for both the candidate and the employer currently the processing timeline is taking a little
45:41
under six months which is incredibly expedited when especially when considering that this is a PR pathway
45:48
candidates also have access to various services including loans that are issued
45:54
by different partners that we're working with that do not require any previous credits and those include windmill micro
46:01
lending and some ircc options as well these slides will be shared with you so
46:06
you'll be able to view some of those other benefits that they can access through this pathway
46:14
questions now the candidate pool that we're working with we are working with a pretty large pool right now with over 65
46:22
000 candidates that have signed up to our database they do come from very diverse professional backgrounds you can
46:29
see their skilled trades we have almost 30 000 candidates but we have a lot of Engineers all the 6000 Engineers a lot
46:36
of tech professionals and we've really Source Canada's a variety of occupations and we've worked with companies of the
46:43
size of a CGI and Tech and where with or in one sector but we've also worked in
46:49
construction we've worked in manufacturing we worked in hospitality and then in the bottom left you can see
46:56
some of the regions where these candidates are currently residing and where they're coming from I saw a lot of
47:01
these refugees are coming from the Middle East from Latin America East Africa South and Southeast Asia
47:12
maybe now the process itself just like with any economic Mobility uh program
47:17
there are multiple steps but we've cultivated a lot of strong Partnerships to really ensure that as an employer as
47:25
well as the candidate you have all this all the support needed in every single step so typically we'll have a
47:31
one-on-one call and I'm happy to schedule those with all of you after this and we will go through all the
47:38
details here and we'll get into an agreement over all the details and then you would be assigned a recruitment
47:44
partner uh once once we've agreed all that you would just share with us the
47:50
job descriptions as simple as that then we will list shortlist some candidates based on the job descriptions based on
47:55
what you share with us we will put them forward we will ensure they're eligible for immigration before we put them
48:00
forward for you we will assess them for skill sets but as well as immigration
48:06
requirements from there we want to ensure that you're able to accommodate
48:11
your existing uh hiring process all these interviews are done virtually
48:17
the recruitment partner will help set up these calls as well and then from there once you've done these technical
48:22
assessments these interviews do issues job offers and we move into the third stage with the visa application some
48:29
employers do that in-house but we really work with uh one of the largest in fact
48:34
the largest immigration service provider in the world and that's fragment to have seconded they specialize in corporate
48:41
integration and that's a Content full-time staff on our team to help with that and offer incredibly discounted
48:48
rates at that started that really one thousand dollar per application which compares to their typical rate of over
48:54
six thousand dollars per application so fragment will typically file that visa application keeping you and the
49:01
candidate positive how things are progressing once the Visa is issued we transition into the settlement stage
49:06
this is where we connect the candidate with settlement local sponsorship groups settlement organization we want to make sure that they have access to all the
49:12
support we needed with things like getting their IDs for their kids at school maybe their parts are doing ESL
49:18
school and so on and finally with a post arrival we want to make sure that over the next 12
49:23
months that you have and the candidates both have all the support that you need and this and all these steps really
49:29
translate into a very high retention rate that we have right now globally it's at 92 percent for over 12 months
49:36
extension and in Canada number is actually a little bit higher at closer to 95 percent
49:44
and here are just some of the priority occupations that we've been finding a lot of success and that we're working
49:50
with like I mentioned a lot of Trades a lot of healthcare opportunities a lot of hospitality but by no means are we
49:56
restricted we actually are able to bring candidates to virtually most occupations that are available out there and we can
50:02
let you know beforehand based on that job description on whether this is an occupation that we can work with or not
50:09
and I believe uh yeah and that's really it from my end I tried to make it as
50:14
short as I can but happy to take any questions that I know you might also have some questions for Daniel and Kevin
50:19
but I'll take this back to you Helen thank you basil I would like to thank
50:26
all our speakers uh I know that we're running out of time but there are some questions already in the chat uh so
50:33
maybe we can take those two questions quickly one question Danielle I think it's directed to you uh based on West
50:40
observations what additional skills and experience do immigrants often possess that employers should consider during
50:47
the hiring process if you can quickly comment and also there is another
50:53
question here in the chat probably basil if you can take it this is around
50:58
negative perceptions surrounding refugees and how we can alter the perception so if you can quickly comment
51:06
on that that would be much appreciated Daniel over to you um I would say
51:12
um even even before going there um often newcomers and the uh under
51:19
misrepresent their their skills in education but because they've had negative
51:26
positive experiences in their in recruitment processes as they apply for jobs they feel that they may be over
51:32
qualified and they can get jobs because they don't have Canadian work experience so they the the reality is that
51:38
sometimes employers uh often randomly find out that
51:45
employees they've hired have a whole set of competencies and skills that they had
51:50
not reported that the during the interview process um out of fears that they may actually not get the job because it was a more
51:56
entry-level position and so forth um so the to me this is an invitation to
52:01
really have an honest conversation during the interview process around the skills and experiences that people are
52:07
bringing to the table beyond what is written on the resume and also once the person has been hired
52:14
um I have conversations you're if you have a human resources uh person uh in
52:20
your team or you're one of them have one-on-one conversations uh if you have some systems for the employee we do have
52:27
that address where you can actually fill in your own uh professional uh experience
52:33
um so that as other vacancies become available within the organization they can actually see that there is this
52:39
hidden talent pool that um that is already within the organization you can actually promote
52:44
people to different positions and roles uh so open conversation um without assuming that what you see on
52:51
the resume is all of the is the end of the story there's this much more
52:59
maybe I can jump on the second question quickly so yes uh the perception about refugees we always hear this every time
53:06
we're speaking with employers the image typically is that a refugee is someone who's living in a tent in a desert
53:12
somewhere and that's not not true right there are some refugees that are living in these statuses and there are but some
53:19
refugees were not I mean Refugee is not really an identity it's it's more of a status of where they are right now and
53:27
live and it's just an important status so a lot of these refugees are of course
53:32
you know very a lot of them are are professionals like I mentioned in healthcare and engineering and Tech and
53:39
so on and the idea of it is just all their need is an opportunity to bring
53:45
their skill sets and come here a lot of them are just living in these Urban settings in major metropolitan cities
53:51
all around the world and from Ukrainian refugees Syrian refugees the Venezuelan refugees and so on now once they're
53:58
hired yes they're you know we also see them that they can perform in very different ways some of them are a lot
54:03
more confident and they can ask and demand and showcase their skill sets and
54:09
look for ways to seek promotion but a lot of time and this is where that booklet and that guidelines that
54:15
Danielle was going after that can become really helpful is having maybe some mentorship in the in uh in the
54:21
organization itself to help encourage these refugees once they're hired uh to
54:27
be able to progress within the organization itself but I can tell you that they will be able to also showcase
54:34
their own skills ultimately and like I always tell people this is not a charity program iron refugees is not a charity
54:41
program it is a talent program it just comes with a great story
54:46
thank you basil and thank you Daniel uh so it's almost 12 o'clock so I don't want to take more time but once again
54:53
thank you so much everyone for joining us and we will be sharing some more additional resources uh from West we
55:00
have got your information from Jennifer so once again thank you and maybe Jennifer if you have a last word to say
55:07
thank you yes no thank you everyone for uh joining us today uh and thank you to
55:13
the West team for uh sharing that I know that uh Talent is uh something that is
55:20
across the board an issue for our members so this is uh very timely and
55:25
it's great to see the playbooks that you've shared um both playbooks that were referenced
55:31
in the presentation will be uh were included in the chat as well as we'll do
55:37
a follow-up email from Wes with that information so that you have their contact information should you have any
55:44
questions uh and then we'll go from so everyone have a happy Thursday have a
55:50
wonderful long weekend and thank you very much take care thank you thank you Jennifer thank you everyone have a good
55:57
day
Workshop Agenda
- 11:00 AM - Check-in
- 11:05 AM - Workshop Programming
- 11:50 AM - Q&A
Speakers
Kevin Kamal, Director, Institutional Client Relations, WES
Daniel Cervan-Gil, Associate Director, Employer Initiatives, WES
Bassel Ramli, Co-founder & Director, Economic Mobility, Jumpstart Refugee Talent – Grantee Partner, WES
Moderator: Helen Seifu Wolde, Senior Program & Policy Advisor, WES
This workshop is free to attend!
Join us for this informative session, complimentary to you.
About our member:
World Education Services (WES) is a non-profit social enterprise that supports the educational, economic, and social inclusion of immigrants, refugees, and international students. For nearly 50 years, WES has set the standard for international academic credential evaluation, supporting millions of people as they seek to achieve their academic and professional goals. Through decades of experience as a leader in global education, WES has developed a wide range of tools to pursue social impact at scale.
From evaluating academic credentials to shaping policy, designing programs, and providing philanthropic funding, WES partner with a diverse set of organizations, leaders, and networks to uplift individuals and drive systems change. Together with its partners, WES enables people to learn, work, and thrive in new places.