The TJ is reporting this morning about the efforts to attract skilled workers back to New Brunswick. The Minister of BNB is leading a delegation of economic development guys/gals and business leaders to Montreal and Toronto to highlight “Up to 500 jobs that pay between $40,000 and $80,000 a year [which] are available in New Brunswick’s information technology sector”.
I like this initiative. When I was in Ontario two weeks ago there were billboards in several cities telling people about the wonderful jobs available in Saskatchewan.
But I sincerely hope they have actual jobs and not theoretical jobs. Don’t forget that former Premier Lord did these road trips and they were met with outright scorn by some and frustration by others. The media reported at the time about several people who went to the session and then went to the jobs web site that the Premier was promoting only to find call centre jobs.
There is nothing wrong with call centre jobs per se, but don’t go to Toronto and try to woo IT workers back to call centre jobs – it won’t happen. If you really need call centre workers, there are ways to find these folks – although it is harder. You could recruit in places like Winnipeg and Sudbury (I often see advertisments in the T&T for call centre jobs in Nova Scotia and PEI). You could target Indian immigrants, etc.