Canada's Temporary Foreign Worker program continues to fulfill the needs of employers and workers separated by thousands of miles
The Prestige Hotels and Resorts group was undergoing a staffing crisis, especially in the Thompson Okanagan and Kootenay Rockies regions. The problem? Almost no one wanted to do housekeeping work.
“We were really struggling,” says Terry Schneider, executive vice president, Prestige Hotels and Resorts. “It was four years ago and the height of the labour crisis. There were places in our chain of hotels where we simply had no responses to our advertisements.” Many young Canadian workers, it seems, didn't view housekeeping as anything other than a temporary position, and tended instead to gravitate to the food and beverage area of the hospitality industry.
At this point Schneider was approached by go2, the resource for people in Tourism. The Temporary Foreign Worker (TFW) program had not previously been used in the housekeeping sector. Schneider was asked whether he would be interested in launching a pilot program by bringing in some workers from the Philippines. “I determined that my most difficult hiring program was in Radium Hot Springs, BC,” he says. “Initially, we brought in two applicants as room attendants.” The workers were such a success that two more were brought in. Over the past four years, the program has been such a success that some 28 workers have been brought to British Columbia to work for Prestige. Two of these have been Australian while the rest are from the Philippines.
In the Philippines, lucrative work can be hard to find. The chance to create a new life with two years' ensured employment is a coveted prize for those who come to Canada under the TFW program. “We have been immensely pleased with their attitude and their performance,” says Schneider. “It has actually exceeded my expectations. They come with a very respectful attitude toward the company and their community and toward the work, which is very impressive. They respect what they’re doing.”
As dictated by the program, applicants are flown to BC by the employer. Once here, they are helped to get a social insurance number, set up a bank account, sort out visa or passport problems, shown ethnic food shops in their neighbourhood, and in every way possible helped to fit in. On the job, they are promised a 40-hour work week.
“Our attitude toward the TFW program was that we were not going to do anything that wasn’t in the rules,” says Schneider. “We had heard some stories of how things had been bungled in the past, and we were determined not to have any taint of that associated with our company. We were determined that people were welcomed, fully integrated, made to feel that they were really part of our company and part of our community.”
After two years of work, there can be transition from the TFW program to the Provincial Nominee Program (PNP). This involves permanent residency, at which point the worker is free to move on. “We’re hoping that the loyalty we’ve shown them will keep them with us,” says Schneider. And that seems to have worked out for Prestige so far. Of the 28 sponsored employees, only one has returned to the Philippines, while several have taken a step up in the company to become front desk attendants.
“When we’ve recommended that people move on to the PNP, I’ve sat down with my director and general manager in those areas and said, ‘OK, look me in the eye and tell me this is someone you can see in 10 years being a neighbour of yours, who is going to be a contributor to a community that you live in.' We want to make sure that this is someone we want to have onboard and not just a convenient way to fill a place in your staffing roster,” says Schneider.
“We respect our workers, their contribution and our own country,” says Schneider. “We’re only bringing in people who work in well with our society, who fit in with our culture. And if they move on to the PNP, then the assessment has been made that, yes, we would be happy having these people work alongside us on a long-term basis.”
