Canadian HR Reporter

CANADIAN HR REPORTER October 16, 2017 NEWS 7 Employers see upside of kids at work RCMP, Deloitte, Toronto Hydro among those participating in annual event BY SARAH DOBSON IMAGINE a day at work where you learn how to handle canine teams, a submachine gun and counterfeit bills. at's just what Grade 9 students got to do when visiting an Ontario RCMP detach- ment as part of Take Our Kids to Work Day last year. e day began with an intro- duction from the officer in charge and details on the gruelling re- cruitment process, according to Cpl. Louise Savard of the Toronto West detachment in Milton, Ont. The students went on to learn about how to identify counter- feit bills and the dangers of street drugs, while a tactical troop did a "use of force" presentation. "It's a very full day, it's educa- tional because a lot of the kids don't know what their parents do, and there's so many things they can do within the RCMP, so it was good day," she said. Take Our Kids to Work Day is an annual event organized by edu- cational consultants the Learning Partnership in Toronto, where kids spend the day at the workplace of a parent, relative, friend or volun- teer to experience and learn about the world of work. Held on the first Wednesday of November, the program "supports career explora- tion and career readiness," helping students to make informed educa- tional decisions. e event first started about 20 years ago around the notion of experiential learning, getting stu- dents more familiar with what's happening, "and as people start- ed to appreciate the need for this type of contact and interaction between the private sector and education, it developed more and more momentum," according to Ron Canuel, president and CEO of the Learning Partnership, add- ing that about 200,000 teens are now involved each year. "It gives them that type of ca- reer exploration; it gives them that opportunity to start to explore, to understand more about careers and what it takes to be successful in a career like that." For employers, Take Our Kids to Work Day establishes a connec- tion to youth, he said. "(Employers) start to under- stand a little more about 'How do these kids think?' 'What are their expectations?'... Looking at this generation of Grade 9 kids, who are the ripe age of 14, 15, they're formulating a very differ- ent paradigm on life, and what their expectations are. So from an employer point of view, it gives them that opportunity to say, 'OK, this is a future workforce that has certain expectations, or appears to have those expectations. What are we as employers going to do to respond to this and try to enhance that experience for them?'" Overall, the best thing employ- ers can do is allow the students to integrate in a way that feels comfortable, but also encourages questions from kids, said Canuel. "(It's good if ) employers have more strategic questions for kids, where they're almost doing a bit of mining themselves, in terms of knowledge mining, and hearing what they have to say… Also, it's a golden opportunity for employ- ers to signal a type of support for education and demonstrating that support. Too often, we criticize public education for missing this or missing that but, in effect, I think it behooves everybody, especially employers, to be active partici- pants in this whole process." Variety of programs It's really important for kids to experience the workplace, ac- cording to Sarah Cobourn, direc- tor of corporate responsibility at Deloitte in Toronto, "especially for Deloitte, where people may not understand all the things and services we have here. So for them to come into our offices and walk the halls and meet with people, it sort of demystifies what would be a very scary workplace for kids." Typically, the students have a tour of the Deloitte offices, she said, "and then we bring them through a series of hot topics or workshops whereby they get exposed to different services, whether it's our cyberteam going through a fun 30- to 40-minute workshop about password secu- rity and the importance of build- ing a secure password, or even our marketing team who comes in and runs a fun rebranding exercise." It's also about getting employ- ees involved, said Cobourn. "Our own people are excited to get engaged and feel like they can share with students — who are like sponges and absorb it — so I think (it's about) engaging your own people and making it feel val- ued in terms of volunteering their time to help." At Toronto Hydro, the best way to get people engaged is to have them market what they do, ac- cording to Dave Clark, director of organizational effectiveness, "so it allows some of our employees the pride of talking about all the great things that are happening." e actual day involves a "ca- reer round robin," said Jennifer TEAM-BUILDING > pg. 9 Labour Reporter Canadian Canadian Labour Reporter is a weekly newsletter that is designed to provide labour professionals, lawyers and the industrial relations industry with valuable information and strategies on how to assess, monitor and approach labour collective bargaining agreements. This weekly newsletter provides summaries of recent collective agreement ratifications, labour arbitration digests, analysis of new and amended legislation and regulation, statistical tables on unemployment and inflation, as well as news and analysis of new and amended legislation and regulations. 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