Sudbury-based Canadian Shield Health Care Services may run job fairs at Canadore College on a regular basis.
That’s according to the company’s CEO, Maneesh Walia.
Walia says a job fair the agency ran with Canadore proved far more successful than he expected.
“A huge success to me would have been if we hired 10 people,” Walia said.
However, Shield ended up hiring 16 students and most of them will fill Personal Support Worker positions.
Walia says about 50 students took in the job fair and his staff were set up to conduct interviews the same day.
Walia says the quality of the candidates also surpassed expectations and he attributes the students’ preparedness to the Canadore staff.
“The teachers took the time to do mock interviews with them so when they came in they were extremely well prepared,” Walia said.
“I kept hearing from my team how impressed they were with the quality and preparation put in by the potential candidates.”
This is the first time that Shield has carried out a job fair at Canadore.
Walia says it was mostly intended for PSW students as well as registered nurses and registered practical nursing students.
He adds some nursing students from Nipissing University also took in the job fair as did some students with a social worker and business backgrounds.
Those business students shouldn’t feel that they wasted their time at the job fair.
Walia says down the road Shield will also be looking for marketing and business professionals as it continues to grow.
He says among the positions it hopes to open in North Bay are jobs like an administrator or coordinator.
Walia says the students will start their jobs with Shield once they graduate from their programs this spring.
He says most live in the North Bay area and prefer to work in Nipissing.
Canadian Shield Health Care Services offers positions in its home city of Sudbury but also in Parry Sound, Elliot Lake and North Bay.
However, Walia says the company’s plan is to expand those borders in the near future.
He says the plan is to talk to Canadore about holding another job fair sometime next year.