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A CanPrep Success Story: Archana and Vivek

Photo of Archana and Vivek with text "A CanPrep Success Story"Each year, the CanPrep pre-arrival program helps hundreds of newcomers start preparing for employment before they arrive in Canada. Through one-on-one support, e-learning modules, online mentoring and webinars, each participant builds a Canadian-style resume, learns how to conduct a job search in Canada, and connects with employers with the help of our highly trained Employment Specialists.

Archana and Vivek are two such participants.

The couple, from Bangalore, India, both had successful careers in IT and dreamed of moving to Canada. But without family here or a professional network, the task of finding meaningful employment seemed daunting. As part of their research into immigration, they found the CanPrep program.

With the guidance of a CanPrep Employment Specialist, the couple were able to identify and address the gaps in their resumes, understand how recruiters would screen their applications, and how to highlight their professional accomplishments in order to stand out among the competition.

Through the program they were connected online to mentors in Canada who taught them about the culture of the Canadian workplace, how to reach out to consultants and recruiters on Linkedin, and to implement practical job search strategies specifically relevant to jobs in Software Development and IT Management. Archana and Vivek finished the program well-prepared to find positions that fully utilized their skills and education.

The couple arrived in Canada in August of 2017 and, within a few months, both had found exciting new jobs in their industry and a sense of support from their new community.

The secret to their success? “Understand the job market. Start the online mentoring at the earliest and spend as much time as possible in the mentoring sessions. Have [your] resume modified to suit the Canadian market and apply for jobs before arriving,” advised Archana.

Vivek added, “The e-learning modules helped me understand the [Canadian] resume format and understand how to approach finding a job. Mentoring gave me confidence. Thanks for the support.”

CanPrep’s expert employment preparation program and personalized support can help you arrive to Canada job-ready. For more information and eligibility requirements, please visit our program page or contact canprepreferrals@jvstoronto.org

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Spruce up Your LinkedIn Profile with these 5 Steps

Bank screen of laptop on wooden table with blur background of share space office cafe.

With a reported 11 million unique jobs posted on the site, LinkedIn has become a key source of opportunities for its over half a billion users. The social media platform provides users a myriad of ways to be noticed by recruiters and potential employers. And if you are going to be noticed, you need make sure that your LinkedIn profile is in as good a shape as possible, especially in these five key elements:

1. Career Headline

Your headline is the first line of text a potential employer reads on your profile. It plays a marketing role — it’s your opportunity to tell them what you want them to know about you, your professional skills and experience.

Avoid simply using your job title as your headline, and don’t use the default LinkedIn one. Use this valuable opportunity attract attention and impress the reader. Try adding some relevant descriptive keywords to your job title. You can use multiple short terms to describe yourself, combining professional and personal terms: e.g.” Administrative Assistant | Microsoft Office | Customer Service | Committed to Excellence” or “Accounting Clerk | Bookkeeper | Advanced Excel | Detail-oriented”.

2. Profile photo

LinkedIn tells us that “great profile photo (…) can get you up to 21 times more profile views”. But profile views are not enough; to make an impactful and positive impression, a photo which communicates information about the your professionalism and confidence is best. There’s no need to pay someone to take a professional photo. LinkedIn offer some good tips on taking your own “work selfie”:

3. Summary/About

Your About section is an opportunity to further introduce yourself, explain your employment history, and give potential employers an opportunity to learn what makes you unique. It can be less formal and more wordy than a resume profile — just make sure that the tone is appropriate for your industry.

You can include in your profile:
– your professional title, years of experience and expertise, e.g. “Over 10 years’ progressive HR experience working in the non-profit sector”
– relevant educational achievements and/or professional designations, e.g. “University educated and a Certified Human Resource Professional (CHRP)”
– core skills and achievements, e.g. “Skilled negotiator, having successfully handled and resolved union disputes; knowledgeable on issues regarding payroll; designed and implemented professional staff development training”
– work values and principles, e.g. “Strong commitment to inclusive non-discrimination hiring practices”
– relevant personal characteristics, e.g. “Highly energetic, enthusiastic and confident”
– knowledge such as relevant languages and computer software

For ideas on what to include, read through job postings you are planning to apply for and identify the qualifications listed by the employers. Use them as your guide — try to echo the employers’ priorities.

4. Background photo

A background photo can brighten up a profile. It shows that you’ve made an extra effort to make the profile stand out.

The ideal photo would be of you at your workplace or job – even better if it’s one of you doing your job. Remember that regardless of what photo you use, you should have permission to use the photo. If you search for an image, make sure it is labelled free for re-use. Google offers clear advice on how to find such photos.

5. Media

One of the features that distinguishes a LinkedIn profile from a resume is the ability to add links or media, such as PDFs, videos and slide shows, Word documents or images, to the summary and to each job. Use this function to share video clips or photos of you at work, slideshows that you have produced, newsletters where you were mentioned, or samples of your work.

For ideas and inspiration to spruce up your resume, use the LinkedIn search bar to find profiles of fellow professionals in your field and review their profiles; find the ones that look impressive and look at their photo, headline, summary, media and background photo, and learn what you can from them. Try something new. Remember, you can always change things up if it doesn’t feel right — no one will judge you for trying new things. That’s the advantage of social media.

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Video interviews: How to impress Canadian Employers

Group of business partners looking astonishingly at laptop display at meetingWe don’t need to tell you that interviewing for a new job is stressful. The experience of having to sit down in front of an employer and answering unknown questions can raise the anxiety of even the most confident job seeker. Interviewees worry about what they are expected to say, and whether they will mess up and make mistakes. For an already anxious job seeker, online video interviews brings a whole other level of unnerving challenges. CanPrep has assembled a panel of experts who share their advice on how to prepare for video interviews including:

  • Do’s and don’ts during the interview
  • What employers focus on during online interviews
  • The right way to follow-up after an interview
  • Personal success stories of being hired through online interviews

[Read more…]

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References required! How to gather references that’ll help you get your next job

Woman holding a phone and smiling

You know you have successfully passed the interview stage when the employer finally asks for references. It’s an exciting moment. And it’s a little frightening, as well, because at this point you no longer have influence over the job application; you are dependent on other people being available, willing and able to talk about you convincingly.

Employers’ expectations regarding references aren’t necessarily consistent (just like every other aspect of the hiring process). Sometimes, employers ask for them at the end of a good interview, sometimes they call for the reference list after the interview, and other times they don’t want them at all. Sometimes, employers ask for references up front, in the job posting.

So what is a job seeker to do? [Read more…]

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Feeling lonely? You deserve better. There are things you can do.

Man sitting alone on a bench in the rain

It’s often said that we spend more time with our colleagues than we do with our families. Working people don’t think twice about the benefits of walking into work every day and being greeted by familiar faces, joining colleagues for lunch or a coffee break, or taking a moment for a chat as they walk by in the hallway. They also might not appreciate the value of feeling useful and needed by colleagues, customers or clients. If you find yourself unemployed — whether by choice (such as retirement), or through job loss or illness — you might have discovered that losing that social contact and the sense of purpose that comes with work can leave a painful gap, often becoming a barrier in and of itself toward moving forward to find another job.

With Britain’s recent decision to appoint a Minister of Loneliness, there has been a lot of discussion about isolation as a public health concern. Professor John Cacioppo, a neuroscientist who studied loneliness (and who sadly died recently at age 66), described it in The Lancet as “a condition that makes a person irritable, depressed, and self-centred, and is associated with a 26% increase in the risk of premature mortality,” where, “in industrialized countries around a third of people are affected (…) with one person in 12 affected severely.”

For those who are unemployed, isolation isn’t just a result of losing colleagues and a workplace. People who are not working often find themselves withdrawn from their existing social circles due to the stigma of unemployment, not being in the mood to socialize, or simply having to cut back on socializing because of increased financial pressures. In addition, job seekers often face ongoing and relentless pressure and judgments from family and financial demands to continually job search, which increases stress and reduces their willingness to engage in the kind of self-care necessary to avoid job search burn out. [Read more…]

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