Career Edge Org

It has been unusually quiet in the office this week.

Over the past few days, Career Edge Organization has had a strong presence at the National Consultation on Career Development and Workforce Learning conference, better known as NATCON.

Having attended in the past as delegates, this year we were invited by the Conference Board of Canada to deliver two engaging presentations on subject matters within our areas of expertise.

On Monday, our President & CEO, Anne Lamont, delivered an informative and practical workshop on measuring diversity initiatives. Deanna Matzanke, Director, Global Employment Strategies at Scotiabank partnered with Career Edge Organization and presented alongside Anne.

While Anne Lamont gave an overview of diversity issues in Canadian employment, as well as 7 key factors in measuring diversity success, Deanna was able to provide an employer perspective, using Scotiabank as a case study for championing, measuring and improving diversity and inclusivity initiatives.

Yesterday we were treated to an energetic, fun and yet informative presentation from Gen Y authority, Dr. Karyn Gordon, who helped the audience understand the notorious millennial cohort in their cultural, familial and professional contexts.

This was a perfect segway into our second presentation. This morning, our Director, Marketing and Communications, Janice Rudkowski, built on the foundation set by Dr. Karyn’s keynote presentation, by providing the audience with insights derived from our Canadian Gen Y study which we conducted with Angus Reid Strategies last September.

For those who are not familiar with it, NATCON is considered a major industry conference in Canada that brings together professionals representing business, labour practitioners and policy makers from across the country. Simultaneously taking place were the “Global Best Awards” for education and business partnerships, also held by the Conference Board of Canada.

To learn more about it, visit their website: www.natcon.org

This afternoon our Vice President at Career Edge Organization, Donna Smith, sent out a fun but serious call to action to all staff:

Since today is Earth Day, this is a great opportunity to think about how we can each contribute to making this a cleaner, greener planet.

Here is my challenge to each of you…

Please propose one idea easy to implement idea that will make our offices  greener. I just know this creative team will come up with some fabulous ideas.

Donna’s promise? Starting today, she will only bring her early morning tea into the office in a reusable travel mug.

The rest of the staff quickly chimed in:

“Carrying a shopping bag with us all the time, so that we don’t use plastic bags!!” – Rima

“Order environmentally responsible office supplies…recycled paper clips anyone?” – Sydney

“How about keeping a stash of scrap paper for taking notes instead of using new paper every time” – Paula

“We can recycle our broken or old electronic devices by taking them to stores like Best Buy or Staples” – Ramtin

“If you take electronic devices to the green living show on the weekend you get in for free!” – Rory

“We can start using stairs instead of the elevator. (Yes, applies in my case too!)” – Rizwan

“Support our local farmers market, for example the one at Metro Hall (in Toronto)” – Janice

“Save trees by printing less – instead, save important emails and documents in electronic files for future use.” – Michelle

Talk to us! What does your workplace do to make the world a “greener, cleaner” place? How did your organization acknowledge Earth Day?

Are you in the loop?

Each quarter, Career Edge Organization sends out our e-Newsletter to up to 25,000 of our closest friends – host employers, partner organizations, interns and alumni all receive the Career Bulletin. Our next issue is scheduled to be sent out tomorrow, and will feature an update on Canada’s economic recover, spring cleaning tips for your office and workspace and an inspiring story of a recent Career Bridge intern who is now a Vice President at United Way in Toronto.

Click here to subscribe now!

Our newsletter provides our partners and stakeholders with updates on our organization as well as the greater business community as it pertains to employment in Canada. Our regular sections include:

• A letter from Anne Lamont, our President and CEO
• Updates on our internship numbers, new Host organizations, staff and alumni
• Inspiring success stories and profiles of real people who have been touched by our programs
• Industry news – what’s going in the Canadian economy, labour market and business community
• Workplace trends – the latest trends in hiring and talent management
• Career management – professional development tips for everyone including job seekers, human resources professionals and senior hiring managers

Our previous issues can be found on the Career Edge Organization website’s “Information and Resources” section.

If you haven’t been receiving our newsletters, make sure you have subscribed with your up-to-date contact information. You can subscribe here.

Subscribe now to stay informed about the latest updates, success stories, industry news, and workplace trends in Canada’s employment landscape. Don’t miss out on valuable insights and opportunities to connect with Career Edge Organization!

Are you a good writer and wish to contribute to the Career Bulletin? Talk to us and let us know by leaving a comment below!

A couple of days ago I read that female executives in the federal public service are on the rise.

This prompted Maria Barrados, president of the Public Service Commission, to state that “given the representation of women, I think it’s fair to look at the act.” The act she is referring to, of course, is employment equity law.

The bureaucracy’s watchdog is saying that now is the time to consider whether women should still receive preferential treatment under the law, and many agree.

This prompted the National Post’s editorial board to write, “just hire the best person for the job” on their blog this morning, saying that while parliamentarians are reexamining policies around women, they should take the next step and repeal protections for the other three “favoured” groups – aboriginals, visible minorities and the disabled.

The article went on to say, “If a general mentality of prejudice in favour of men – i.e. a systemic discrimination – ever existed, it is long gone.”

Is it?

While women have made strides in Canadian government, they are still underrepresented in corporate Canada, particularly in executive roles and on boards.

Aboriginals, persons with disabilities and visible minorities continue to be underrepresented in all sectors.

Most importantly, while diversity can perhaps be measured in numbers, inclusion is a different story.

Equity laws should be looked at as training wheels for organizations it looks like the Federal Government is ready to have them removed, where hiring practices for women are concerned. But this should be done with caution and each of the protected groups deserves its own careful considering.

Anyone who remembers learning how to ride a bike knows that if the training wheels come off too soon, well, down we go!

What do you think? Tell us by leaving a comment below.

by Markus Stadelmann-Elder, originally posted on The Maytree Foundation blog “Maytree Conversations”

http://maytree.com/blog/

In a speech at the Canada@150 Conference held in Montreal on March 26-28, 2010, Sherri Torjman, Vice-President of the Caledon Institute of Social Policy, argues that Canada will face three main social challenges:

• Canada as productive society;
• Canada as caring society; and
• Canada as aging society.

From a social perspective, the productive society focuses on a learning agenda and on measures to reduce poverty and assist the unemployed. Canada as caring society is concerned with early childhood development and high-quality affordable child care. The caring society should also take action on supports for informal caregivers and the reform of health care, including investment in home care. Canada as aging society must tackle pending labour shortages and shore up the retirement income system. The aging society must be concerned as well with creating accessible communities to ensure the active participation of all citizens.

For those who hear nothing but cash registers when they hear the term “social agenda,” Sherri also presents various revenue options. These include tax reform, shifting spending from expensive late-stage interventions to preventive actions and tapping into markets that are not well recognized, such as the social economy.

Equally important is a discussion about the distribution of revenue to tackle the current fiscal imbalance among orders of governments. Provinces face high and rising costs related to health care. Municipalities throughout the country are assuming an increasingly significant social role.

While the voluntary and private sectors are active players in the social agenda, governments are vital to help alter the unequal distribution of income, goods and services in society. They are conveners of important national conversations. Governments are the primary vehicle for translating into action core ideas – and ideals.

Read Sherri’s speech “Canada at 150: The Social Agenda“.

Somebody in one of my LinkedIn HR groups posted this as discussion today and I thought I would take the opportunity to share my thoughts, not only in that forum, but on here as well.

As always, we are very interested in hearing your opinion –  share your comments (see below, at bottom of post) and we’ll post them on our blog.

Here’s my two cents:

Unfortunately, even in this day and age, some employers overlook talent because of disability or some other barrier, such as a lack of Canadian work experience.

Educated and skilled professionals are sometimes passed over simply because they lack experience in this country. Often they possess adequate business communication and interpersonal skills but never get the opportunity to demonstrate this because their resumes are dismissed immediately because they lack local experience and in some regrettable cases, because of prejudices within the individual or the organization as a whole.

I have spoken to employers (in previous roles) who have confided that they are apprehensive about hiring persons with disabilities due to concerns over potential legal issues, sick days, costs or turnover. They are surprised then when I am able to produce facts that debunk these myths and show that accommodations usually have little or no financial cost and that sick days and turnover typically go down significantly for employees with disabilities. Of course, persons with disabilities also bring a valuable and unique set of abilities to the workplace, often skills acquired as a result of adapting to and overcoming their disability.

Employers may also make the mistake of underestimating the value inexperienced youth – particularly recent graduates – can bring to the workplace, not taking into consideration the transferable skills acquired in university. The work ethic required to excel in school is a major asset to an organization, as is the experience gained in group projects (team work) and extra-curricular activities.

Persons with disabilities are largely underrepresented in Canadian workplaces, and immigrants are often underemployed – their skills underutilized. Youth in Canada currently have a higher rate of unemployment than the general population, and many turn to unpaid work to gain experience.

The good news is that these mistakes are easily corrected – a paid internship is a low-cost, risk-free and effective way to try hiring outside of the usual talent pool, and it increases the opportunity to find top-quality talent.

A news story on the Toronto Star website has sparked some heavy and heated debate. When I read the article this morning, I didn’t think much of it. But as of now (3:30 PM EST) there are over 93 passionate comments, the majority touting anti-immigration sentiment.

It is clear from these comments that the frustration described in the article is shared by multiple groups within Canada, including those who are internationally qualified as well as Canadian-born job-seekers who have recently graduated or worked all their lives.

Some posters identifying themselves as newcomers have been fighting back, offering their perspectives, but their comments have been met with overwhelming disagreement.

“Canada likes to think of itself as open and accepting. However, one can see by many of the comments posted here that is not the truth…It’s also obvious from some of the comments here, that many Canadians don’t know anything about or understand the immigration process — or how much time and money it takes to come here.”

The article, Facts back up job-search frustration felt by newcomers, comes in anticipation of findings from a study conducted by the province’s Office of the Fairness Commissioner, set to be released on Tuesday along with recommendations. It points out that immigrants are finding it “impossible to crack through regulatory barriers” and that “skilled immigrants earn less than half, on average, of what their Canadian-educated counterparts earn.

In a Country that is so proud of its multiculturalism and diversity it is surprising to read some of the comments which are riddled with sarcasm, frustration and anger.

What is troubling to see is that many of the comments contain inaccurate statements about key topics such as immigration policy, government processes and the Canadian economy.

One commenter stated that our unemployment rate is over 10% – this is not true. Another posited that the Ministry of Citizenship and Immigration “should be sued” for letting the newcomer mentioned in the article (an experienced civil engineer from Kenya) into the country. Of course, we know that the Ministry is a Provincial-level government department that provides services to immigrants and promotes inclusion while it is the Federal government which oversees immigration.

It was shocking then to see that within a couple of hours over 10 readers have clicked “agree.”

Not everyone expressed frustration.

“Employers don’t care about where you got your education, it’s how you think…It’s not about having a Canadian education or work experience, it’s about integrating into Canadian culture,” said one immigrant who managed to successfully land a career in his field.

Of course, we cannot assume that the comments are an accurate reflection of what Canadians or Torontonians believe. All we can conclude is that many groups are frustrated in the aftermath of a recession that has changed our Country for years to come and that where immigration is concerned, many are misinformed and more education is required.

Tonight TRIEC is celebrating their annual Immigrant Success Awards,  which includes recognition for companies for integrating newcomers in the workplace, an award sponsored by the Toronto Star.

Earlier this year we were honoured to nominate St. Michael’s Hospital for the Toronto Star Award for Excellence in Workplace Integration, and we were thrilled to learn that they won!

St. Michael’s Hospital was honoured by TRIEC, in partnership with the Toronto Star, for going beyond visionary but actually implementing and embedding practices – in this case, the Career Bridge paid internship program for Internationally Qualified Professionals.

Click here to see the video via the Toronto Star’s website

Other winners include Samtack and Pitney Bowes for the RBC Immigrant Advantage Award, Fraser Milner Casgrain LLP for the CBC Toronto Vision Award for Immigrant Inclusion and Michael Bach, National Director, Diversity, Equity and Inclusion, for the KPMG Canada, Canadian HR Reporter Individual Achievement Award

Today the Toronto Star also featured a “special section” showcasing successful Internationally Qualified Workers, including Career Bridge alumna Patricia Simeons from St. Michael’s Hospital who also mentored and nominated recent Career Bridge Intern-of-the-Year-Award winner Richard Ballesteros.

The article headline reads: “Patricia’s adventure needed a dose of excellence.”

Click here to read her full story.

Congratulations to St. Michael’s Hospital for earning this recognition, and thank you for your continuing support of our program.

Many thanks to TRIEC for a wonderful evening and for recognizing leaders in diversity such as St. Mike’s.

On Sunday night, the Paralympics came to a close in Vancouver with a dazzling ceremony and 6,000 spectators, athletes, officials and dignitaries in attendance.

Canada placed third (following Russia and Germany respectively) with ten gold medals, 5 silver and 4 bronze.

While things wind down in Vancouver, here in the GTA we’re just getting started. This week is so jam-packed with exciting events that the folks here at Career Edge Organization are calling it March Madness!

On Monday, our Client Relations and Human Resources Manager, Rizwan Abdul, attended “WIN 2010: Workplace Integration for Newcomers.” Hosted by the Newcomer Centre of Peel (NCP) through the sponsorship of Citizenship and Immigration Canada, the event aims to be “a platform for engaging in open dialogue and devising real world solutions.”

This morning, Rizwan is supporting host employers KPMG and their diversity leader Michael Bach at “Beyond 2010: What’s next in HR and Diversity.” Hosted by Global Learning Initiatives, the breakfast event features topics on demographic data collection, AODA and eLearning.

Our President & CEO Anne Lamont is also keeping busy this week participating in two important roundtable discussions hosted by the Toronto Region Immigrant Employment Council (TRIEC). This morning they will gather at the Japanese Canadian Cultural Centre to discuss the growing Engineering Sector. On Friday, Anne will be joined by our New Business Development Specialist Lisa Carnevale in Mississauga as TRIEC turns its attention to the Biotechnology Sector.

On Thursday we’ll be attending TRIEC’s annual Immigrant Success Awards ceremony and networking event, sponsored by RBC, Canadian HR Reporter, Toronto Star and CBC.

While some of us celebrate with TRIEC Thursday evening, others will be “Networking with the World” with Toronto Board of Trade at their “Multicultural Mega Networking” event.

Finally, as in previous years, we will be exhibiting at the Spring National Job Fair for two full days this week on Wednesday and Thursday at the Metro Toronto Convention Centre. This is a definite highlight for us because we get to come face to face with job-seekers – the tremendous and diverse talent that truly is at the core of our organization.

Come visit us there at booths #423 and #425!

This year at the Vancourver 2010 Winter Olympics, Canada showed the world that we truly have a heart of gold – we topped the podium more than any other country ever. I’m not sure which I heard more of,  I Believe (CTV’s offical song of the Olympics) or O Canada. We should all know both by heart now.

Now, the celebrations continue in Vancouver as the coveted torch arrives again, this time for the 2010 Paralympic Games. The Paralympic Flame will once again be brought into BC Place for the Opening Ceremony this evening which will be broadcast live to Vancouver, and aired again by CTV tomorrow for the rest of Canada.

Here at Career Edge Organization, we have been promoting Abilities in our own way, by creating internship opportunities and launching the careers of graduates of Canadian high schools, colleges and universities with disabilities through our Ability Edge paid internship program.

Last week, Ability Edge participated in two excellent events at post-secondary institutions.

On March 3rd, we were at the University of Toronto Mississauga campus participating as panelists, alongside representatives from TD Bank Financial Group, PepsiCo, Ontario Public Service, National Education Association of Disabled Students (NEADS) and IBM – many of whom are Host Employers to our paid internship programs. In fact, RBC was recently awarded with the Ability Edge Program of the Year Award at our annual Achievement Awards.

The following day we were at George Brown College presenting at “Future Directions 2010,” which was a very well organized and well attended event aimed at connecting students who have disabilities with employers, advice and resources.

As the games carry on in Vancouver, we applaud the champion employers and partner organizations who carry the torch in their organizations!

We’ll be watching the games closely – be sure to check back for updates on the Opening Ceremonies,  Sledge Hockey and other major Paralympic events!