Yesterday Career Edge Organization President & CEO Anne Lamont returned to Toronto after an exciting weekend in Halifax, attending the 2010 ALLIES Learning Exchange: Putting Ideas into Action.

ALLIES stands for “Assisting Local Leaders with Immigrant Employment Strategies” and is a project jointly funded by our friends at Maytree and The J.W. McConnell Family Foundation.

This project offers resources, networks and expertise to cities across Canada providing the support needed for local initiatives around finding suitable employment for skilled immigrants (a really informative backgrounder on ALLIES is available here through the Maytree website).

Anne Lamont was really impressed with project leader Peter Paul’s efforts at this year’s event, which brought together 150+ participants from more than 10 city regions including our partners from TRIEC (Toronto Region Immigrant Employment Council) and their equivalents in other Canadian cities such as Edmonton and Calgary.

Anne Lamont and other guests were greeted with a warm welcome from Gordon Nixon, president and CEO of Career Bridge host employers Royal Bank of Canada.

Keynote addresses included:

• Don Drummond, TD Bank Financial Group – Changing Face of the Canadian Workplace

• Alan Broadbent, Maytree – Making your Immigrant Employment Council Work for your Community

• Will Kymlicka, Queen’s University – The Future of Multiculturalism in Canada

• Naomi Alboim, leading immigration expert – Immigrants and the Economic Recovery

And last (but not least) Ratna Omidvar, President of Maytree, provided closing remarks.

Other highlights included panel discussions on hiring practices, mentoring and engaging employers, in-depth workshops and a “marketplace” where Anne Lamont participated to provide information about our Career Bridge paid internship program for internationally qualified professionals.

As in previous years, we are happy to be ALLIES and participate in this wonderful event – it was a great opportunity for Anne to see familiar faces and meet new champions that stand alongside Career Bridge and Career Edge Organization to help launch careers and put talent to work!

We look forward to seeing what they have in store for 2011.

After a tough couple of years and a crawling recovery in recent months, finally, some great news!

A record 108,700 jobs were added to Canada’s economy in April according to Stats Canada, signalling growth and better times to come. A large portion of this increase (approximately 2/3) was men over 25 years old returning to the workforce. 65,000 of the jobs were part-time and 44,000 were full-time!

This has taken everyone by surprise, as the growth is four times the consensus forecast. And while increases were seen in all provinces, Ontario, Quebec, British Colombia and Manitoba had the most job growth.

Jobs aren’t the only thing that went up – wages have gone up as well, by about 2%.

So who is doing all the hiring? Retail and wholesale companies were the industries that led the pack, according to an article in Business Week this morning, which also goes on to report:

The International Monetary Fund said April 21 Canada will grow the fastest among Group of Seven countries this year and next, with an expansion of 3.1 percent in 2010 and 3.2 percent in 2011.

Go Canada!!

This morning the Center for Students with Disabilities at Centennial College, Progress Campus arranged for an information session for students about employment prospects after graduation. Scotiabank and Career Edge Organization were invited to give presentations.

Scotiabank was represented by Sophia Dritsas, Assistant Manager, Diversity Initiatives and Kay Leslie, Manager Workforce Diversity. Career Edge Organization was represented by Rizwan Abdul, Client Relations and HR Manager and Rima Dasgupta, Recruitment Sourcing Specialist.

Kay and Sophia from Scotiabank spoke to the students about the opportunities their organization offers to persons with disabilities and the framework they have around providing workplace accommodations for persons with disabilities. They also talked about the partnerships Scotiabank has established with various agencies including Career Edge Organization that work with persons with disabilities to make Scotiabank a more inclusive workplace for persons with disabilities. They also mentioned that internships through the Ability Edge program are a viable way to establish a career at the Bank.

Rizwan from Career Edge Organization in his presentation spoke about the benefits of Ability Edge paid internships for students with disabilities. Some of the benefits are:

• Internships provide option to break through the frustrating cycle of “no experience, no job; no job, no experience”

• Interview concentrates on abilities versus disabilities as disclosure concerns are minimized – All employers have understanding from the beginning of recruitment process that applicants have a self-identified disability

• Reasonable workplace accommodations are provided to interns during the internship

• Interns can reach potential by removing stereotype concerns

• All interns have a designated Coach who assists them to gain valuable work experience

• Win-win experience for the intern and the Host Organization as both get an opportunity to decide if the internship can potentially lead to permanent employment

Rima concluded the presentation by explaining the registration process on the Ability Edge website to students.

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