By Phil Jarvis

Toronto-based Career Cruising has been in cyberspace since 1998 with tools to help career practitioners help their clients. Our cloud-based resources are accessed daily by thousands of career professionals and tens of thousands of students and clients in over 20,000 educational institutions, libraries and employment centres. We see our primary mission as engaging and inspiring our users to become intentional and purposeful in constructing their preferred future.

Cybercounselling tools are more important than ever. A Perfect Storm will increasingly impact Canadians’ job prospects for the next two decades and beyond. Opportunity is greater than ever for career seekers who are prepared, but danger has never been higher for those who are not. Despite high unemployment and underemployment, employers say they can’t find the talent they need. Increasingly, career seekers can’t find employers willing to take a chance on them. With an aging population and diminishing labour force participation rates, we need all working age citizens to find career paths that meet their needs and those of our evolving labour market. Too many post-secondary graduates, not to mention those less qualified, are deep in student loan debt with no idea what careers might suit them, and which employers might want them.

Career Cruising advocates a whole-community approach to career and workforce development to weather the storm. All educators and trainers – not just career practitioners – parents, employers, and community organizations must pull together to help career practitioners help their clients secure good jobs, and help local companies find the talent they need to compete and grow. The ccEngage resources have been designed to be used by all community stakeholders.

Career Cruising is proud to announce that the Ontario Ministry of Education renewed its ccSpringboard license in October 2012 for at least three more years. All Ontario schools with grade 6 and above will continue to have free, unlimited access for all teachers, students and administrators for years to come!

The “look” of Career Cruising has remained essentially the same since 2007. That will change very soon! All users will be seamlessly re-directed to a brand new re-designed version in December. The look will be contemporary and appealing, but beauty won’t be just skin-deep. Using the very latest software tools and techniques, it will be faster and able to support a huge, rapidly growing international user network.

Most people believe career development must start earlier. Career Cruising agrees. We have just launched ccSpark for kindergarten through grade 5, and we acquired The Real Game Series in March 2012 with its two experiential programs for elementary grades and two more for secondary grades. A major project in 2013 will be enhancing The Real Game programs and integrating them with ccEngage.

For years the career development community has agreed we need to find better ways to engage parents. Career Cruising launched a free Parent Portal in Spring 2012. It provides parents free 24/7 access to ccSpringboard and their children’s ePortfolios. Parents can help their children explore career and learning options, select courses based on informed career goals, and help arrange experiential learning opportunities.

For a free demo of the latest editions of the ccEngage resources call (toll-free) 800 965-8541 or visit our web portal at careercruising.com. Free web-based training is offered regularly and archived training is available 24-7.

Phil Jarvis is Director of Global Partnerships at Career Cruising where he works with provinces, states and countries implementing whole-community career and workforce development solutions. Phil authored CHOICES, co-authored the Blueprint for Life/Work Designs, and co-created The Real Game Series. He has led the development of career programs now used by millions of students and adults globally.