Finding your first new Job in Canada

I'm surprised I haven't thought about a guide to help people find their first job in Canada!  I'm thinking about it these days because I am job hunting myself again now.

I think it is very hard to find a job before you get here.  Canadians really life to find people with Canadian experience, I'm not very sure about what that means and what you can do about it. I can only imagine they prefer you have experience working with Canadian and not making cultural gaffs.  From a broad perspective you want to find Jobs on LinkedIn, Indeed or Job Bank.  These are the primary sites that Canadian Employees use to post their vacancies.

The second thing you need to get sorted is your resume.  C.V.'s are not the term and the resume needs to be short, only two pages.  Remember that a recruiter is only going to spend a few seconds on it so you want the important information right up front and on top.  A good summary at the top under your name is a good place to start.  Getting too fancy with the formatting is not a good idea because you can make it hard for a recruiter to read the information.  Even for a bot to read it too, because lets face it, there are a lot of recruitment bots now these days that score resumes.

Hunting for a job myself reminds me how important Network is. That is obviously hard to deal with as a person new to Canada.  The good news is that Canadians are always willing to help.  Remember, no-one is going to give you a job out right, but if you ask them to be a reference, or to put your name forward, you will certainly get more opportunities.  I reach out to people on LinkedIn and try to connect with them, also go to networking events and ask people to connect with you on LinkedIn.  You might be able to find someone in a company you are applying for and then you can ask them to put your name forward.  The other day just finding the recruiter helped me get an interview.  The Government helps and there are many "Bridging" programs out there!  They have two advantages, they help you perfect your Resume and they give you Canadian experience!  For me I used the office in Markham from JobSkills.  Their address is 4961 Highway 7, Units 100-101, Markham, L3R 1N1.

Personally it took me a full three months to find my first job.  I also got lucky, I had a specific skill match in the field I was looking for.  A friend of mine took a bit longer, but did some volunteering at her local church to get that Canadian Experience.  I do hear of a lot of people doing ride sharing or food delivery.  These are ways to earn quick cash, but take away from the time you spend trying to find work.

Finally I want to share there are definitely seasons in the Job hunting market here in Canada.  Summer and January are very quiet periods.  Summer is when everyone is taking vacation, it takes a while to line up interviews with line managers and then the recruiter is on holiday, you will need to be extra patient in the summer months of July and August. Then on top of that people are quite slow the end of December and in January, this is the same around the world.  The end of the year is often a time for family and reflection.

All the best of luck to you!  I hope you find what you're looking for soon!