BeenTrainingDogs

Hi all,

I am beginning to look for civil engineering jobs in Canada and I wondered if I could ask a few questions of people.

I have identified a selection of companies to which I want to apply. I picked up the phone to their recruitment departments last week (I found the names of people on LinkedIn and tried to contact). Generally, the responses I received were I must apply for a specific job on their website and then we could talk about things.

- Is it better to bypass recruitment departments and send messages to the likes of department heads or senior engineers who you would work for in the workplace, or is that considered rude?

- Do engineering companies use recruitment agencies very often and if so, will recruitment agencies even accept a resume of an engineer with 5 years UK experience and no PEng? I'm looking specifically at Toronto and Vancouver (and around those areas).

Thanks for any help.

JonboyE

It is worth reading the section in the wiki on job hunting. Particularly on informational interviews.

The basic etiquette is that when applying for specific jobs you follow instructions. Do as HR tell you.

A more productive approach is to contact department heads and senior engineers and ask them for some help in gathering information for your move to Canada. You do NOT ask them for a job - just information about working conditions, valued qualifications, interesting projects, maybe even starting salaries someone like you could expect.

Then come to Canada for a trip and invite these people for lunch or coffee where you continue the conversation - maybe start selling yourself gently. Finally, when you are ready to move you can ask them if they know anyone that is hiring someone with your skills and experience. The end result is that you want to be able to introduce yourself to a firm that is actually hiring by saying something like, "John Smith ox XXX Engineering suggest that I should contact you about the YYY position as he thought I would be a great fit."

ExKiwilass

You could try sending in your resume to department heads - probably they will just forward it to HR anyway. In larger companies everything has to go through HR.

bigshark

I was in a similar situation a few months ago - however at the time we were only toying with the idea of moving to Canada but we were also flying out to see our friends in van city.

Before we flew out i sent mass emails + my resume to all potential employers explaining the situation etc and if possible organise an informal visit, usually to their general enquiry email address (ie info @ email dot com), but never directly to the managers \ directors etc. And what I noticed is that those companies that were genuinely interested usually forwarded that email to the managers anyway who ended up responding. I ended up meeting up with 3 of them whilst I was out there, which is a start as apparently getting a job in canada (well in vancouver anyway) is all about networking.


Also, one of them actually didn't recommend going down the recruitment agency route and it would be much better than to deal with the prospective employers directly.

smivers

Get contacts (current job) or get lucky (previous/first job). If you go down the recruitment/HR route, really sell yourself in the cover letter and resume to show that you meet the job requirements they state, and even then be prepared for it to take a long time before you hear anything.

Each time I have applied for jobs here in Red Deer, I had applied to Stantec, the largest Engineering company here in town. I did eventually hear back from them each time, but the first time it took five months (just trying through their website), and the second time four weeks (this time through a friend of a friend), by which time I had found another job each time.

Aviator

This is the best advice you are going to get.

If you are told by HR to apply for a specific job, you then ignore this and send unsolicited resumes in, it rather looks like you cannot follow instructions and is more likely to go against you.

Networks and build up contacts, come here and meet them and see where it goes. I got offered my first job through contacts, I was not even looking for a job or to move countries.

JGK

You should also check on the P.Eng designation. Engineer is a regulated profession in Canada.