TORONTO —
Although COVID-19 spread in Canada remains far greater than it was last spring, many Canadian employers seem ready to abandon the hiring freezes and bare-bones workforces that got them through 2020.
A recent survey conducted on behalf of staffing agency Express Employment Professionals (EEP) found that 31 per cent of hiring decision-makers expect their company to increase hiring in 2021, while only 10 per cent expect less hiring this year.
When a similar survey was taken at this time last year, only 16 per cent of hiring managers expected their company to take on new workers.
Of course, 2020 didn’t play out the way anyone was expecting it to last January. Last year’s survey was taken before COVID-19 had even been given that name, much less become a serious concern among Canadians.
Larger companies appear to be most bullish on hiring this year. According to the company’s survey, 42 per cent of employers with 100 or more employees plan to add to their workforces in 2021, versus 17 per cent of companies with fewer than 10 employees.
“The larger companies tend to be more resilient, they’re more diverse, they’ve got a little bit more flexibility from a cash perspective as well,” Jessica Culo, an EEP franchise owner in Edmonton, told CTVNews.ca via telephone.
“The smaller businesses tend to be not so optimistic.”
That lack of optimism is well-earned. The Canadian Federation of Independent Businesses estimates that 58,000 small businesses became inactive in 2020, and 181,000 – about one in six – are seriously contemplating following their lead.
Every time a business closes, its competitors gain a bit of market share, which may also help explain why larger organizations are in a better position to hire this year, Culo said.
Less clear is when over the next 11 months that hiring will actually happen. Most companies seem to be holding off for now, Culo said, anticipating that vaccinations and reopenings will have life somewhat back to normal before the end of 2021.
The EEP survey was conducted by The Harris Poll between Nov. 16 and Dec. 7, 2020, and involved online surveys of 506 Canadian hiring decision-makers.
WHERE ARE THE JOBS?
If the jobs boom EEP expects does come to pass, it won’t happen right away.
After regaining first-wave job losses for seven straight months, the Canadian economy shed 63,000 positions in December, according to Statistics Canada. Economists expect the January numbers to show further tightening of the job market, due to the restrictions on businesses in most provinces over the holiday season.
But while the losses were felt heavily in the most affected economic sectors – accommodation and food services, hair salons and culture, among others – some industries were gaining jobs even as COVID-19 cases hit record levels.
Topping that list was manufacturing, which picked up 15,000 jobs in December. Culo said manufacturing and supply chain industries, such as transportation, logistics and packaging, are among those that seem to be hiring most in the first weeks of 2021 as well.
Beyond that, though, she is also seeing demand in medical services and supplies, construction, project management, business services and accounting.
Staffing and recruitment agency Randstad Canada sees similar trends. Delivery drivers, procurement and supply chain specialists, and warehouse workers all made the cut for its list of the jobs expected to experience the most growth in Canadian demand in 2021.
“There’s lots of opportunity that’s starting to come back. The economy is starting to recover, regardless of what’s going on with the closures,” Carolyn Levy, Randstad’s president of technologies and chief diversity officer, told CTVNews.ca on Thursday via telephone from Calgary.
Randstad’s list also includes several positions that have direct connections to pandemic life: customer service representatives, essential retail workers, security analysts and architects, IT and support desk specialists, and registered nurses.
Retail workers may seem like an outlier on that list, even narrowed down to the essential stores allowed to stay open in many parts of the country. Levy said the health risk posed by working in retail is making it hard for some companies to fill all of their open positions.
“It’s actually been quite difficult to attract people into that sector and then keep it sustainable, so they feel secure and safe while they’re just trying to stock the shelves or help you check out,” she said.
“That’s not something we associated to groceries before – you are having a higher risk by being present. Not everyone’s up for that.”
Administrative assistants are on Randstad’s list, too. Levy said that these positions were more often being eliminated before the pandemic, but employers now see them as necessary.
“That’s really coming back, because of how many people are remote and the logistics around working with teams,” she said.
THE FUTURE IS REMOTE
Several of the positions on Randstad’s most-hirable list can be done remotely. However, the company sees remote work as such a prominent and permanent fixture of the Canadian business landscape that it released a separate list focusing only on jobs that can be performed from home.
That top 10 includes the IT roles necessary to make remote work feasible, as well as 21st-century positions, such as social media managers and digital marketers, but also some jobs for which not working in an office was once thought impossible, including accountants and human resources administrators.
According to Levy, employers who have surveyed their employees about what sort of workplace they want going forward have found that an overwhelming majority of workers want to be able to continue to work from home at least some of the time.
The shift to remote work is not only affecting how employers interact with their employees, it’s also changing how companies deal with each other.
Culo said workers in sales positions have seen significant changes, as virtual meetings provide for a different sort of relationship-building with clients than the traditional face-to-face approach.
“The men and women that we’re placing in those roles, they’re having to adapt,” she said.
Buoyed by the rise of remote work, some Canadians are already fleeing big cities for quieter and more affordable communities, expecting that they’ll be able to do their jobs from these places even once the pandemic is over. Employers, likewise, are realizing that there are benefits to attracting talented workers who may not want to live near their offices or deal with long commutes.
“Definitely this stuff is going to stick. This has introduced a new way of work, and it’s disrupted a lot of old business norms that used to exist,” Levy said.
“This is what businesses have to pay attention to, if they have not paid attention to it yet.”
TALLAHASSEE, Fla. (AP) — Florida State has asked a judge to decide key parts of its lawsuit against the Atlantic Coast Conference without a trial, hoping for a quicker resolution and path to a possible exit from the league.
Florida State requested a partial summary judgment from Circuit Judge John Cooper in a 574-page document filed earlier this week in Leon County, the Tallahassee-based school’s home court.
Florida State sued the ACC in December, challenging the validity of a contract that binds member schools to the conference and each other through media rights and claiming the league’s exit fees and penalties for withdrawal are exorbitant and unfair.
In its original compliant, Florida State said it would cost the school more than half a billion dollars to break the grant of rights and leave the ACC.
“The recently-produced 2016 ESPN agreements expose that the ACC has no rights to FSU home games played after it leaves the conference,” Florida State said in the filing.
Florida State is asking a judge to rule on the exit fees and for a summary judgment on its breach of contract claim, which says the conference broke its bylaws when it sued the school without first getting a majority vote from the entire league membership.
The case is one of four active right now involving the ACC and one of its members.
The ACC has sued Florida State in North Carolina, claiming the school is breaching a contract that it has signed twice in the last decade simply by challenging it.
The judge in Florida has already denied the ACC’s motion to dismiss or pause that case because the conference filed first in North Carolina. The conference appealed the Florida decision in a hearing earlier this week.
Clemson is also suing the ACC in South Carolina, trying to find an affordable potential exit, and the conference has countersued that school in North Carolina, too.
The dispute is tied to the ACC’s long-term deal with ESPN, which runs through 2036, and leaves those schools lagging well behind competitors in the Southeastern Conference and Big Ten when it comes to conference-payout revenue.
Florida State has said the athletic department is in danger of falling behind by as much as $40 million annually by being in the ACC.
“Postponing the resolution of this question only compounds the expense and travesty,” the school said in the latest filing.
The ACC has implemented a bonus system called a success initiative that will reward schools for accomplishments on the field and court, but Florida State and Clemson are looking for more as two of the conference’s highest-profile brands and most successful football programs.
The ACC evenly distributes revenue from its broadcast deal, though new members California, Stanford and SMU receive a reduced and no distribution. That money is used to fund the pool for the success initiative.
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QUEBEC – Australian road cyclist Michael Matthews raced to victory at the Grand Prix Cycliste de Quebec on Friday.
Matthews earned a record third career victory in Quebec City. He was previously tied with Slovakia’s Peter Sagan with two wins.
The Jayco-AlUla rider won the fastest edition of the Quebec race on the UCI World Tour calendar.
Matthews, who claimed titles in 2018 and 2019, edged out Eritrea’s Biniam Girmay and France’s Rudy Molard in a thrilling sprint.
Tour de France winner Tadej Pogacar, the heavy favourite, was unable to follow through with his attack launched just over two kilometres from the finish line. He finished in seventh place.
Pogacar will look to redeem himself at the Montreal cycling Grand Prix on Sunday.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 13, 2024.
VANCOUVER – The Vancouver Whitecaps have loaned midfielder Jay Herdman to Cavalry FC of the Canadian Premier League and rewarded two Whitecaps FC 2 players with MLS contracts.
Midfielder Jeevan Badwal signed as a homegrown player through 2027, with options for 2028 and 2029, while forward Nicolas Fleuriau Chateau signed an MLS contract through 2025, with club options for 2026 and 2027.
Both have been playing for the Whitecaps’ MLS Next Pro team along with the 20-year-old Herdman, the son of Toronto FC coach John Herdman.
The moves were made before Friday’s MLS and CPL roster freeze.
Born in New Zealand while his father was working for the New Zealand Football Federation, Jay Herdman was also part of the New Zealand soccer team at the Paris Olympics with three appearances including two starts. Herdman’s loan deal runs through the end of the CPL season.
“Jay is an important signing for us, who will provide another attacking option for the run-in,” Cavalry coach and GM Tommy Wheeldon Jr. said in a statement. “He’s a player that we’ve been tracking since we played against Whitecaps in pre-season and he has very good quality, with terrific energy and the ability to contribute to goals.
“With the recent injury to Mael Henry, Jay’s positional profile and age helps us with on-field options and minutes that count towards the league’s required 2,000 U-21 domestic minutes during the regular season.”
Badwal, an 18-year-old from suburban Surrey, is the 26th academy player to sign an MLS contract with the Whitecaps.
“Having joined our academy in 2019, Jeevan continues to progress through our club and takes every challenge in stride,” Whitecaps FC sporting director Axel Schuster said in a statement. “He is comfortable on the ball, positionally sound, and does the simple things very well. We are excited for Jeevan to make the next step in his young career.”
Badwal has made 19 appearances with Whitecaps 2 this season, scoring two goals and adding three assists. A Canadian youth international, he started all three matches for Canada at the 2023 FIFA U-17 World Cup
Badwal made his first-team debut off the bench in the first leg of the Canadian Championship semifinal against Pacific FC.
Chateau was originally selected 74th overall by the Whitecaps in the 2024 MLS SuperDraft after spending two years at St. John’s University.
The 22-year-old from Ottawa signed an MLS NEXT Pro contract with Whitecaps FC 2 in March. He leads Whitecaps FC 2 in goal-scoring this season with eight goals across 21 appearances (including eight starts).
“Nicolas leads MLS NEXT Pro in shots on target, has a very strong work rate and willpower. We are looking forward to seeing his growth as he builds on his young professional career,” said Schuster.
Chateau made his first-team debut as a second-half substitute at CF Montreal on July 6.
Herdman, who joined the Whitecaps academy as a 13-year-old, has made 19 appearances for Whitecaps FC 2 in 2024, scoring six goals and adding three assists. He made his MLS debut in April as a second-half substitute in a 2-0 victory at the Seattle Sounders.
Internationally, Herdman has represented New Zealand 29 times across the U-19, U-20, and U-23 sides. He was part of New Zealand’s squad at the 2023 FIFA U-20 World Cup, starting three matches at the tournament and scoring against Uzbekistan.
The Whitecaps host San Jose on Saturday while Cavalry entertains Atletico Ottawa on Sunday.
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This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 13, 2024
