Photo: Kirk Penton

Worker shortages in the Okanagan are forcing local companies to look for employees outside of Canada’s borders, but it’s a process that can be complicated and time-consuming.

In an effort to streamline those efforts, Accelerate Okanagan this week hosted a symposium called Global Talent Strategies. Provincial specialists offered insight on the topic through presentations, and the Innovation Centre’s theatre was full of employers trying to learn everything they could to make international hiring easier.

Gina Wells, operations manager for Kelowna’s Silver Springs Concrete Services, found the event helpful.

“Lots of connections and straight lines to answers and resources that actually even for me, doing this application process twice, I wasn’t aware of,” Wells said. “So I found it very helpful.”

Wells has hired one temporary foreign worker and is looking to hire more to do concrete work. She noted how the application form started at 18 pages and ended up being 43. The government informed her she would be approved to hire a worker at the end of April, but it didn’t happen until the end of June.

“Being in concrete construction, our season was half over almost,” Wells said. “And now trying to recruit workers, because our (labour market impact assessment) is only good for six months after approval day, now we’re in low season and I still have three positions open that I paid $1,000 each for. I’m trying not to waste our company’s money.”

For more on this story, visit Okanagan Edge.