Bsidebaby

Hi has anyone successfully applied for jobs in the UK and got one while still living in Canada?

How easy was it and did you have to fly back for an interview or did you do a telephone interview?

How many jobs from those you applied for did you get a positive response from?

Does being in Canada put employers off responding to your application?

I want to start applying now from in Canada as we are moving back to the UK asap and just want to fell that it wont be a waste of time and should I just wait till getting back to the UK?

Obviously having a job to go back to would be a great start.......

Dessiree

Hello, i don't have experience doing it from Canada, but my husband did it from Spain. For the first 3 months nobody wanted to know because of where we were, so in the end he booked a flight back to england for a week and we started again applying here there and everywhere but this time we had a date that he was available for job interviews. This time people actually paid attention and he got 5 interviews and after that, 2 job offers.

I know flying back for a week is not ideal and is a lot harder from Canada than from Spain but it really seems to be the only thing that got their attention. The feedback that we got is that they just can't take you seriously if you don't have a definite date when you will be available.

ann m

That seems to be the same in the reverse situation. When people gave employers in Canada specific dates they were over, it immediately sounded more serious and they were offered interviews. Depending on the kind of job and the level, I suspect that might be your better option Bsidebaby.

g_is_for_canada

I had an interview some years ago when I was considering a move back and this was by telephone. We were at loggerheads as the company wanted to meet me in person and couldn't understand why I didn't want to fund this. They subsequently withdrew their interest and have now included a disclaimer on their careers pages saying they're not prepared to pay people to fly in for interviews.

You may find employers more likely to take you seriously than employment agents. The latter seem to go only for the low hanging fruit. Being abroad and looking puts you near the top of the fruit tree, and not too ripe either.

Employers like to meet people in person. You might find using video conferencing quite productive though. I used Skype a couple of times, and the companies I spoke too quite enjoyed being high tech and 'with it'.

You being abroad might naturally filter out only the better, more open minded employers. So while the response rate may be lower, it's probably higher quality, if that's making sense.

Good luck and let us know how you get on.

livermanl

I have been head hunted whilst in canada all i did was put my CV on a job agencies web page and i got 6 people call me at 2am asking me to do an interview.

I have also e-mailed companies with my CV and they were all very responsive in the end i never really had the financial means to jump back but in terms of getting an interview it is possible i guess it probably depends on the line of work also.

Bsidebaby

Wow what line of work are you in?

sans

My OH emailed 5 companies in the UK, between xmas and New Year 07. By the end of that wk he had 2 emails and 3 phone calls all but 1 offering him a job. Admittedly 2 of the companies new him.....But none were advertising vacancies. We just got the yellow pages up and emailed on the off chance

Bsidebaby

Again you must have been in a desirable line of work??

sans

OH is a welder/fabricator by trade, but had been working for a piling company for the last 5 yrs up untill leaving for Canada. When your good at your job, word gets out.....
He ended up going back to his old job, after his old boss found out he was coming back. With a pay rise and afew more extra's

Bevm

That's an excellent compromise!

One of my sons got a job by e-mail and phone interview only. That was within Canada, but still without a face to face interview, so it can happen. That was in a tech company, though. So perhaps they're more comfortable with it, and they mainly wanted to know if he had the technical skills, not if he was a people person or anything.

Bev

gotoronto

When we decided to go back, I started applying for jobs from Canada. However, even though we had only been out of the UK for a few months, it was really hard to get agencies to take me seriously until I gave them a date when I would return to the UK. I then managed to line up 3 interviews after that return date and landed a job a few weeks after coming back. That was in September.

I don't know what it is you do, but the UK had changed a lot since September. Hubby is still unemployed (has not had an interview in 4 months despite being highly qualified in his field) and lay-offs are everywhere (my company just dumped 5% of its workforce today). I may be entirely wrong, but in this market, it may be tough to get an interview whilst abroad.

I should add, though, that for me it was the right decision to come back and the middle paragraph is not meant to be a whinge, but merely stating the facts. :-)

livermanl

I was a signal design engineer for the railways. it is a very big but specialised type of engineering not for the everyday engineer.

Generally in this line of work the worse the economic picture the better as the government like to fund things like the railways because it is a safe bet that the money wont be wasted.

I would say that if you have a 'specialised' job then there will be a 'specialised' recruitment agency.

I would try the type something into google such as "'job description' recruitment UK"

sans

Hi... Good to hear your ok and are pleased you made the move back....