nudda

Hi all,

Interested in moving over to Canada. Preferably BC but open to where I can find jobs.

Does anyone know if there is possibility to immigrate as a skilled worked if I have specialised IT Security skills with strong education and experience ?

Having looks on some websites there doesnt seem to be much but I'll eat my hat if SOMEONE out there isnt desperate for my kind of skills (not being a big head) because in the UK I get calls every day after people have ready my LinkedIn page.

thanks

christmasoompa

You can't immigrate as a Skilled Worker unless you have a job offer approved by HRSDC, and of course an employer prepared to wait 18 months or so for you to get PR!

So I'd look at getting a job offer and going over on a TWP first personally. Do you get headhunted from Canada? That's a good indication of it your skills are in demand if you are on LinkedIn - my husband is on there too, and gets headhunted from the US and Canada regularly.

Failing that, best thing to do is get out there, have a read of the Job Hunting section of the Wiki if you haven't already.

HTH, good luck.

dbd33

What are they?

(back in a while, in the meantime I am, no shit, interviewing someone for a role in IT involving security)

exenglishman

experience in Canada for IT. (I have foun at least) means nowt. You need the quals. I worked in a secondary school in UK as a IT guy as well as supporting 5 other local schools, not the most advanced in the world but definitely requires a ton of networking, server and mid level technicial skills. All learnt from experience. In Canada I couldnt even get a job fixing computers in Futureshop (Currys equivilent). All they do is remove viruses, replace stuff and fix screens, so the most basic crap in the world. Yet they wanted me to have this A+ Qualification I think it was called. Was going to cost me near $1000 to get (just for tests) only paid $12/hr. No thanks.

pdarwin

For some reason the entry level A+ certification is hot in Canada. For the tests and study book it should cost maybe $400 total ?

reeni

The thing is Qualifications are easier to come byin the job population in Canada. About 10 years ago they offered alot of people on assistance retraining. Many of them took the low to medium level IT courses. got the quals and have jobs ever since. So when a company has hundreds of applications - it is basic time management to immediately dismiss the peeps with no educational background. the company will still have hundreds left they will have to read thru and will have a high % that will do just fine! It is about making yourself attractive to them...they don't owe the applicant anything.

Unfortunately, low to medium level IT guys in canada are as common as pizza delivery guys and just as disposable.

We have a very IT-centric household and deal with this kind of stuff all the time. Good luck :-)

To the OP, my hubby is a senior engineer at Deloitte National Networks team in Toronto, they have an excellent career site and have no qualms about hiring outside of the country. http://mycareer.deloitte.com/ca/en

jandro

Having left the UK 7 years ago I still get emails from recruiters there asking me if I'm interested in various IT roles. The only way I got an IT infrastructure job here was through an internal reference. Also be prepared to work unpaid extra time and to be let go at the drop of a hat.

dbennett9

After reading the posts I will weigh in with my experience in Alberta, not sure if you have considered there.
I managed to get in with a company who has an IT dept, I have no formal degree other than college in the UK. I had applied for a job with a town but missed it by one person, then this job came along and have been there for approx 18 months.

Southern Alberta seems desperate for good IT techs, all levels, we have hired 4 in the last year and each time its been a hard time weeding through the masses. Each one of them has been hired on personality other than raw skill. Lots of people with 7 pages over padded resumes were never even called back.

My experience proves to me that, like any other job, if you are ready to learn and work in a team, companies will consider you - whatever your qualifications.

AS for working standards, we do overtime when we need but are expected to take time off to compensate, and there is good job security also.

Just my 2 cents.

delsol79

I think your best bet would be securing a job and going for a work permit as IT is no longer on the skilled worker list. You may however want to eat your hat at some point as the security market here is quite different from the UK - you might find work but desperate? No.

I work in IT Security for a large company so PM me your details and I will see if i can help.

Steve_

Not without a job offer, IT was removed from the NOC list for FSW1 back in 2010.

Steve_

If there ever was a period when you could learn IT on-the-job it is now over. Speaking as someone who has a training certificate in switchboard operation and maintenance, I'm not sure it ever existed.

My experience of hiring people with no formal qualifications in IT is that they might have been good on their network - doesn't mean they're any good on yours. Plus they have bad habits, for example they spend all their time rushing around trying to sort out problems rather than using a GPO to lock down the computer and prevent the problem from ever happening. Because they never learned how to do it.

Lost count of people who said to me they know XYZ and then when the question is posed they clearly don't know it in enough detail: "I know TCP/IP", okay genius, name all the components of the stack. "I know networking", okay, what are the seven levels of the OSI model?

The main way I weed out the chaff is to ask them to calculate a subnet mask. Or stuff they should know but I suspect they've never encountered, e.g. explain the difference between stateful and stateless DHCP IP v6 address assignment - which is simple but if you've never used IP v6 you wouldn't know through "experience".

As someone else mentioned, you've got to have some sort of qualifications really, because otherwise your résumé just goes in the bin. Who has the time to sit there and interview every single applicant?

Having said that there's such a shortage of people willing to go to Fort Mac and do say, networking work that you can get jobs in Alberta, but it certainly is an advantage to have qualifications. In any profession, I would have thought.

The reality is that IT is way too broad to learn it all on the job.

nudda

life sucks - i got absolutely no where with this