Canadian HR Reporter

CanaDian hr reporTer november 3, 2014 8 news April 22, 2015 Unthink Erik Wahl Internationally recognized graffiti artist, author and entrepreneur April 22, 2015 Host Misha Glouberman Communication expert, teacher, and author April 23, 2015 Give and Take Adam Grant Award-winning teacher, researcher, and professor at Wharton School World's economies 'dependent on mobile talent' canada < pg. 1 (CERC) found Canada ranked third, tied with Australia, as a fa- voured destination for jobseek- ers — the U.S. and U.K. ranked first and second, said Stephen Cryne, president of CERC in Toronto. "It's a leading democracy in the developed world, we do have political stability and it places a lot of emphasis on human and civil rights," he said. "We protect minorities, we've got great social services, we've got one of the best education systems in the world, our environmental record is excellent, our quality of life — who would not want to live in Canada?" Even so, there's still work to be done if we want to remain com- petitive, he said. "Part of the challenge for us is we ought not to be complacent about that. Yes, we have those things going for us but the tal- ent that we're seeking gravitates to where talented people are," he said. "We are competing with those other destinations and when peo- ple have the opportunity to work with other highly talented people, I think that carries significant weight. And we need to keep our eye on that ball by making sure that we do have programs that encourage highly skilled people to come here." Competition for talent e BCG survey found 64 per cent of respondents were willing to relocate internationally, mean- ing employers will have to com- pete for the best talent. "What we've seen is the job markets have become more glob- al in the last couple of years, and we expect that they will become more global," said von der Linden. And as birth rates in Western nations decline and older work- ers begin to retire en masse, there will be an increasing reliance on foreign-born talent. "Many of the world's success- ful economies… will be depen- dent on the movement of talent, of people into the countries to be able to fulfill their GDP growth rates that they aspire to. So we think that's definitely one aspect — there will be much more move- ment, and companies, countries and also cities will probably have to compete in a global attractive- ness market," he said. "And we believe cities, coun- tries and companies will have to consider how can we establish a 'talent magnet' culture, as we call it, where people say, 'is is an extremely livable city.'" Canada has something of a headstart because it is an attrac- tive and welcoming destination for immigration, said Sarah An- son-Cartwright, director of skills policy at the Canadian Chamber of Commerce in Ottawa. "A lot of immigrants look at Canada's economy and they see that we're doing well and we're stable and, compared to their home country, in many cases we don't have the political unrest or other factors that make life more challenging," she said. "Immigration has always mat- tered to this country and to our economic success, but I think as we look to the near future, it's go- ing to matter even more." ere are a couple of different factors behind that, she said. "First of all, our labour force needs immigrants… potentially more than we've ever needed them in our past. And that's be- cause, as we all know, we've got this tsunami of baby boomer re- tirements and then the low popu- lation growth… and, in addition, we've got these skills gaps that are happening in various sectors and parts of the country, so that really has the potential to affect our eco- nomic growth. So we have to recruit and keep foreign talent in our workforce, in our labour force, if we're going to fully realize all of that economic opportunity." We're also facing grow- ing competition from the U.S., Australia and Europe, which are facing similar issues, said Anson-Cartwright. "We simply can't be compla- cent because we think of our- selves as an immigrant nation. We have to think of it in the context of what are other countries doing in terms of their tactics? Because they're facing all those same is- sues in terms of the lack of labour force growth and the need to supplement it very aggressively." Areas to improve To compete for talent, we need an effective, streamlined system, said Cryne. "Our immigration programs, we like to say how good they are… but we just don't have (and did not have) an immigration program that meets the modern realities of a global economy, so that it's efficient, effective at getting the skilled talent into the country as quickly as possible," he said. The controversy around the Temporary Foreign Worker Pro- gram probably didn't help mat- ters, said Cryne. "It probably stopped some people in their tracks, who said, 'There's a certain amount of stigma here. I'm a temporary foreign worker, and the message that's in the media over the last 12 months is that temporary foreign workers are taking jobs from Canadians… I might not be as inclined to look at Canada favourably,'" he said. "I don't think the impact has been huge but I think it's prob- ably had some people take a sec- ond look." ere's also potential for the government to create initiatives like tax incentives to encourage more international talent to relo- cate here, said Cryne. But the federal government has made some moves CERC applauds. "In fairness to the federal gov- ernment and Citizenship and Immigration (Canada), we've got great hopes for this new express entry system, which is suppos- edly going to target the very skills that we need and move them rap- idly into Canada. So we're very pleased with that. ere is also the recently announced intent from Minister (Chris) Alexander to develop a pilot skilled trades immigration program," he said. If the express entry system does address the timeliness issue, that would be a key improvement, said Anson-Cartwright. "If somebody is looking to come to Canada and they are highly qualified in a high-demand field that we need, where we need talent, we've got to be timely in processing their application and making sure they do in fact ar- rive," she said. "e idea of being able to know one way or the other within six months of putting in your appli- cation — six months is a much better timeframe than 18 to 24 months. And, of course his- torically, (in some cases) we had people waiting six or eight years, which is just untenable."

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