Canada Immigration Visas

THERECORD.COM | INSIDER | Employers hard-pressed to fill tech jobs

More than 90,000 technology jobs will be created in Canada in the next five years, but the pipeline of IT grads from colleges is not keeping up, a new series of reports suggests.

In Waterloo Region, there are 2,000 technology job vacancies at any given time, according to Communitech, the region’s technology industry group.

The Tech Labour Market reports, released yesterday by the Information and Communications Technology Council, suggest that industry executives and government leaders need to find ways to fill the growing needs of Canada’s technology industry.

The issue here is how and where are the twin cities going to locate their new recruits? Torontonians and Ottawa residents will generally not move once they have put down roots. The other possibility of going to California and Boston is not likely going to be of any help at least in the long term as Americans in general do not move to Canada in big numbers. How many Canadians would actually leave California’s climate and job possibilities to come back to Canada?

The real solution in finding people for this quaint tandem city just 45 minutes west of Toronto is to go overseas to Europe and Asia on a recruiting mission. More specifically the number of UK grads and experienced skilled workers in England, Scotland and Wales would more than likely fill the gap since their educational system is similar to ours at the university level, business conducted in a similar manner and of course they speak English.

For an industry that continually thinks outside the box in terms of technology, it is time they start thinking outside of the box in terms of their markets for recruitment. They may just be pleasantly surprised.