By Anne Markey

Canadian Association of Career Educators and Employers, Ontario Regional Conference Update

On Wednesday, December 9, 2009 over 100 career educators and employer recruiters gathered at the Hyatt on King for the Ontario Regional Conference hosted by the Canadian Association of Career Educators and Employers (CACEE).   Despite the dreadful mixture of snow and rain, the majority of registered delegates arrived in time to listen to Ken Steele, Senior Vice-President, Education Marketing at Academica Group, keynote speaker.   Ken’s focus, changing times in education and employment, was well researched and certainly resonated with the audience.

CACEE events are well known for providing networking opportunities and last Wednesday was no exception.  Delegates exchanged contact information, updates on recruitment in the various environments  and suggestions for possible future collaborations at breaks and over lunch.  The conference vendors: Devin Grady from Orbis Communications;  Jean-Marc Hachey Author and Online Publisher: The BIG Guide to Living and Working Overseas; first Jaz, then Peter Ono participated on behalf of  Contact Point.

Several sessions spoke to Gen Y and the transition of this group into the workplace.  Donna Smith and Janice Rudkowski of Career Edge described their partnership with Angus Reid Strategies and Porter Novelli Canada to build and design a national, bilingual survey targeted towards 1,000 culturally diverse, young Canadians aged 18-29 years.  The results provided educators and employers with insights into Gen Y’s short and long-term career goals and aspirations, job satisfaction and motivations as well as their opinions on workplace performance reviews and career advancement. Lauren Friesen, Founder of TalentEgg presented the student perspective on campus recruitment and worked with participants to explore new mediums to reach Canada’s top students.  Nadir Shiraz, Program Coordinator at the Multi-Faith Centre for Spiritual Study and Practice at the University of Toronto, provided an overview of religious and spiritual diversity on Canadian campuses and what students may be looking for when selecting a potential employer as part of the Y generation.

The phenomenon of social media and its use helping employers to both brand their organizations and recruit new graduates was presented by Arieh Singer, National Digital Strategist, TMP Worldwide and Patricia Polischuk Diver, Careego Account Manager. One of the themes that we’re hearing over and over again, is the need to be aware of and use social networking applications such as Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn; combined with the simultaneous requirement to protect privacy and ensure that appropriate information is available to potential employers on social media sites.

These were just some of the twelve topics presented in the one-day conference which also featured Professor Larry Smith from the University of Waterloo who presented on Jobless Recovery?  Or the Disruptive Transformation of the Labour Force?

The next CACEE conference will be the 2010 National On-Campus Recruitment Conference will be held June 6-10 in Halifax, we hope to see you there.  Please visit www.cacee.com for details.For information about CACEE please contact Anne Markey, Executive Director annem@cacee.com.

Anne Markey is the Executive Director of CACEE, the Canadian Association of Career Educators and Employers.  Anne has extensive experience assisting new graduates and internationally trained professionals with career and employment planning.