The Canadian Job Market – A Daunting Challenge For Skilled Immigrants

Job challenges of skilled immigrantsIt can be very difficult to migrate a new country, not only for meeting the new people also adjust to totally distinctive environment, culture, norms and language. Every year Canada accept a largest bunch of economic class immigrants, which include professional skills workers and their dependents with high educational qualifications and foreign work experiences. Newly immigrants’ skilled workers face significant barriers to employment opportunities, workplace retention, adjustment and advancement related to the recognition of their credentials, previous experiences, official licensing requirements and discrimination based on race, ethnicity or language. This paper will argue that new immigrant's skilled workers face significant barriers entering employment. The paper will apply critical self-reflection to change the roles, responsibilities, and contribution of social work professionals in ways that promote a sound environment for immigrants.

There are multiple challenges faced by new immigrants who wish to be employed in Canada: Bhuyan et al. , (2015) argues that every year Canada receives skilled immigrants from different countries through the migration selection process. Even though Canada had a huge level of redundancy due to the misfit between the immigrant workers and the job market. Making the first step in Canadian job market for new immigrants seems like a daunting challenge which is multifaceted, however, the skill immigrants arrive in Canada in search of better lifestyle, good job, and better income. In reality, finding a meaningful job for the new immigrants that exploits their previous experience and skill is more challenging than ever relation to the non-recognition of the foreign credential’s and skills, lack of Canadian job experiences, requirements of professional licensing, lack of language proficiency and discrimination of racism and ethnicity.

In Canada, skill immigrants are chosen as permanent resident-centered on their capacity to settle down in Canada and take part in the economy, on the basis of their language ability, educational background, and professional experiences. These immigrants are considered as the model of the socially mobile group which means that their knowledge and experience could be used in any appropriate job market. In spite of the copious ability and experience that immigrants bring here in Canada, they still face barriers to entering to job market related to credential recognition, Canadian job experiences, and language proficiency. When credentials are nor fully recognized new immigrants may spend a significant amount of time enhancement their education and skills, which can result in employment gaps. To obtain Canadian experience, volunteering and internships are often critical opening points for immigrants to gain significant experience, connections, and social networks in the community. Chaze & George (2013) identifies that these new immigrants face unemployment because of their race and ethnicity. Branker (2017) argues that it may be difficult to measure the precious effect of race and gender on job market outcome, but many immigrants believe that Canadian companies don’t treat the immigrants equally, immigrant’s race or gender may actually be more noteworthy features to get into the job market more than skills and experience. Therefore, many of the immigrants ended up with survival jobs which are less paid and underutilizing their skills, tend to be dissatisfied, disappointed and hoisted level of stress since of money related hardship and fear of losing their individuality and social status, as a result for their physical and mental condition become more vulnerable to different health issue. Subedi & Rusenberg (2017) identify that one of the conceivable causes of disintegrated wellbeing status of immigrants in Canada, which is often neglected, is the stretch related with underemployment, low salary and seen misfortune of social status of the immigrants who are underutilizing their capability, abilities, and expertise in a low skilled work.

In this section, as a social worker, I will critically analyze my social location and will try to explore the ways of changing the oppressive reality of the skill immigrants into greater social justice. Carniol (2005) explains that subjective reality makes little differences to one’s social location which lead towards changing oppressive circumstances into social justice. As a new skill immigrant from a developing country, I am actively engaged in critical reflection to challenge racial oppression. While analyzing my own social location, I found a mix of both privileges and disadvantages circumstances. I entered Canada under the point system in skill immigrant category, internationally educated professional, female, and heterosexual, without a disability, brown color as I am Bangladeshi, living with my family. Before migrating to Canada, I possessed multiple privileges due to being from an upper-middle-class family with a decent income. These privileges come from my social location, never having to wonder about my brown color skin, any language barrier. Conversely, religion and gender-based discrimination are the disadvantages that I faced over there. As Bangladesh is an Islamic country and I represented a minority religion group, I had to challenge some social issue since my childhood.

On the other hand, the oppressive side of my current social location, as an immigrant here I am not fortunate yet to get a job in my educational field. Despite my family income, I am not personally solvent that I was before. Personal certainty also matters and it makes differences according to the social location. Certainly, I have carried some of the inherent biases and social beliefs due to my social location and I am aware of those limitations. I will make sure my biases will not influence my professional decision making. Whereas these personal certainties make slight changes to my current social location, they also can make changes to the kind of service provider that I am. Being a social worker we are critically aware that how adopted oppressions can become a great form of service users reality. While assessing the social location of the new skill immigrants, undoubtedly I feel a relation among us. As we moved from the same part of the world, shared nearly the same culture, values and family bonding as all south Asian people inherited which influence my worldview. As Razack & Badwall (2006) describe that basic reflexivity has gotten to be the educating device within the classroom to support students in considering their social location in endeavors to look at how it may impact their work with clients within the field. I must aware of my biases and I would not allow my biases to influence my critical decision making. As I tried to assess the new immigrant's social locations, I found sometimes they are facing challenges to enter into the job market as they want to join the same level as their previous job. After having the skills and knowledge they are unable to get the job as they do not have Canadian experiences that required by the employers or they're non- recognition of credentials. Discrimination lies among the non-white- brown bodies immigrants with ethnic sound names, gender, and accent in the languages. Within North American social structures, new immigrants might have a significant combination of privileges and oppressive condition. Nevertheless, one’s social location, individual circumstance matters, over the time, it can modify or change an individual’s social location in terms of variable individualities. As Carniol, (2005) explains that, Individual circumstances are key to the address of the individual agency, that is to whether or not we will act towards changing oppressive circumstances into social justice. Social justice is vital since it advances and works toward a society that celebrates differing qualities and uniformity. Having more balance and differences in a society is better since it advances opportunity, development, and social wellbeing.

In this section, I will discuss the roles, responsibility, and contribution of a social worker to work with new immigrants in identifying the challenges and opportunities to successfully integrate into the Canadian job market. Lai, Shankar, and Khalema (2017) highlight that a social worker can focus on a series of strategies at the individual and organizational level so that a receptive and responsive work environment could be developed for the increasingly diverse Canadians new immigrants. Mullaly, (2010) pointed that the challenges faced by the immigrants in the job market are the result of clashes between different groups, with a leading group monitoring all the the assets of society and having most of the financial and political power. The major objective of the critical social theory is to developed clear understandings of domination, misuse, and oppression into the anti-oppressive practice of social change whereby society in the event that liberated from these phonemoeana. In this way a significant assignment for the critical social theory is to find genuine practices of domination somewhere they happen – that is, at the individual, cultural and structural levels.

From my own social location as a social worker, the challenging part is that I can help the new immigrants in individual level to state and contextualize his/her situation and also suggest them the particular interventions for their empowerment but I can not solve their problem. My roles and responsibility are to define the problems that new immigrants facing at entering into the job market and can contribute by finding the opportunities focusing anti-oppressive perspective in personal and structural level. Weiner, (2008) suggests that in the structural level government programs and community services can assist the immigrants to acquire credentials and language assessments, certification, and licensing procedures, also support them to integration of the workplace through facilitating training program on communications skills such as soft and hard skills, legislation and Canadian regulation and Canadian culture and ethics issue.

Branker (2016) emphasizes that government, employers, exchange unions and bodies that control professions and exchanges must work together, to create arrangements to eliminate obstructions to break even with getting to employment confronted by new immigrants in Canada. Weiner (2008) also explain that endeavors to support workplace integration ought to include government, proficient regulatory bodies, employers, unions, educational institutes, and community organizations. However, there are few set up administrative bodies or well-defined rules and evaluation procedures giving new immigrants with data and support for employment opportunities and adjustment. There is a need of clear and open data, gaps in business support and administrations, and deficient approach coordination between government levels and divisions. As a social worker, I should provide details on job search support, interview preparation, mentorship programs, workshop and training information and also existing resources on immigrants workplace integration. Skill immigrants who have recognized credentials for a long time, moving to Canada, ought to have their capabilities recognized instead of being constrained into low paid employment. Their skill and knowledge, in case they were permitted to put them to utilize, would advantage all of Canadian society. They should not be penalized as they moved to Canada for a better lifestyle. From all structural levels, they need support to become a full member of the Canadian society despite race, ethnicity, gender, color, religion, and culture. Teelucksingh and Galabuji (2007) argues that there is also required for more transparency in hiring practices, way better assessment of the human capital; of new immigrants and expanded approach center on the creation of well paid employment and for superior direction of working conditions for workers in Canada.

In conclusion, this paper explains that new skill immigrants find challenges on recognition of their foreign qualifications, finding work and experiences within job market emerged as dominant subjects, each of which affected not only professional adjustments not individual adjustments as well. As a social worker from our own location, we need to promote unity for all, equal rights for all immigrants despite their race, gender and ethnicity.