Working in Canada

sonofsam

Hello,

First time on this board, looking for some advise. Myself and my partner are both thinking of moving to Canada to live and work for a year (or possibly more). We are both in long term IT roles at present (ops Mgt and system testing).

Basically, what do we need to achieve this ?
What is the IT job situation in Canada like, whats the Visa situation ?
Finally, what City do people recommend, we were thinking Toronto, vancouver or Montreal (not too far from USA).

Are we mad ??

All opinions welcome.

The Insider

Lived in Toronto for a year, just got a 1 year Visa through the USIT program, if I wanted to stay longer I would have had to apply for a work visa, most likely would have got it but it takes anywhere from 6 months to a year to apply. Found it tough enough to get an IT job in Toronto, had about 3 years expierence in IT at the time in support/network admin roles and a diploma in IT. Definetly not as many jobs as in Dublin. At the moment most IT jobs in Canada are in Calagri that city is booming.

Definitely not as many jobs as in Dublin, took me nearly 2 months to just get a cr** call centre job. Their is a huge amount of immigrants in Canada and most of the young ones seem to have an IT degree. I also found they did not rate my IT experience as much as I had not worked in Canada before. Also had no contacts like you would have in Ireland, had to figure out what recruitment websites where good, what recruitment companies where worth using etc this all takes time.

Found their working conditions much more rigid and formal for the call centre job I had to were Shirt, Slacks and a Tie!! Only lasted their a couple of weeks and then landed a job in IBM again found they expect a lot more out of you then in Ireland they really believe in the job over their "go team" and all that American corporate culture cr**... not for me.

Toronto is a nice city but is very Americanised, only an hour and 30 minutes from the US border. If you are going to live their make sure to live downtown and not in the suburbs. Rent can be expensive downtown expect to pay about 1600 dollars for a standard two bed apartment which might not be that nice. Winters are harsh can be -30 or below with the wind chill for long periods in the Winter you are really confined to the indoors I found that really tough. Snowed at the start of May when I was over there!! Never went to Vancouver or Montreal but if I had a choice of where to go again definitely would go to Vancouver very good quality of life, good attitude to life etc. Montreal would be a more European city and I would not recommend going to live there unless you can speak good French as it will be a requirement for a lot of jobs etc.

Toronto was not for me as its just like any other North American city like Chicago, Boston etc. However there are lots of positives good quality of Health Care, standard of living is high, nice weather in the summer. I would like to go back to Canada but out to the West Coast. Just my 2 cents!

Jean05

I'd recommend jobboom.com for Canadian jobs

sonofsam

excellent feedback so far folks, anyone got links to visa applications and additional job sites.

Also, anyone else on these boards attempted this ??

underworld

not too sure about visa applications but check out www.workopolis.com for jobs in toronto,there is a thread in the travel/holidays section on toronto u might want to have a look at that...

The Insider

For the visa I had....

http://canada.usit.ie/nonstudent_programme/index.html

For a longer work visa...

http://www.cic.gc.ca/english/skilled/work-1.html

The only job site I found useful

http://www.workopolis.com/

In fact I found applying for a lot of jobs in Toronto was through the old fashioned way of paper advertisements, so you would have to send in a printed CV/Cover letter.

Mrs. MacGyver

i've applied for my visa i'm hoping to teach there. I went there on holidays and it broke my heart to leave. I'd say the jobs situatio would be ok. i got a solicitor on the other side (Canada)to help me with my visa application and alls going ok so far.

sonofsam

thanks for the opinions so far.
Has anyone from the IT sector made the move, be very interested to hear ?

zuutroy

Myself and a mate went there with physics degrees and literally couldnt find a THING for months. I got a ****ty painting job for a couple of months, then an Irish guy hooked me up with a painter that paid reasonably well for a couple of months. Eventually, through another Irish guy we got work with a builder earning $600 a week under the table. That was a LOT of money for a single bloke over there (in 2001 anyway). You should really try to have a few prospects before you go. Even the competition for jobs in coffee shops is fierce there.

sonofsam

thanks for all the help folks. Sounds great but not exactly booming economy ?