“Job losses surprise Tories”, screamed a headline from a Calgary’s newspaper on 8th August 2009. The news went on to state that since the economic downturn struck in October 2008, Alberta's jobless rate has climbed month after month, nearly doubling to 7.2 per cent in July 2009 (highest since June 1996) with the evaporation of 75,600 positions.
In Edmonton, the unemployment rate was 7.0 per cent in July, compared with 6.5 per cent in June. Calgary's rate increased to 6.9 per cent from 6.6 per cent. The figures are based on three-month moving averages. Meanwhile, the number of people failing to make payments on their debt jumped more in Calgary than any other Canadian city, according to Equifax Canada.
First, due to the incompetence and blunders of oilsands companies the Canada educated young engineers suffered when the projects got shelved, and then due to the combined effect of incompetence of recruiters and myopic view of employer companies, the aforementioned junior engineers are getting a raw deal.
Someone not familiar with Canada and in particular Alberta would wonder why this calamity befell Albertans. For them and others, here is a quick recap: During 2006-07, a number of oilsands companies launched highly ambitious plans for development of the vast hydrocarbon resource – called oilsands – that abounds Alberta.
It must be said that except Imperial Oil the top management of these oilsands companies made investment decisions in a stupid manner without doing commonsensical due diligence regarding risks to their long term investment plans. Like a bum high on pot, these numbskulls thought in their fool’s paradise that oil prices will remain high and their projects will have attractive IRR’s.
Due to the mega projects arising out of financially foolish decisions of these various oilsands corporations, the engineering companies in Alberta filled positions with people like crazy – a lot of these positions were filled by new immigrants who came in droves to join the gold rush.
However, in mid-2008 came the cataclysmic downturn stemming from greed filled devious financial products sold in US. The disaster that started in US caused a global meltdown which, among other things, brought a precipitous fall of oil prices from >US$120 to less than US$40.
This dealt a huge blow to the not well thought out ambitious oilsands projects alluded to above. Except Imperial Oil's projects, other projects started to get shut down or moth balled one after another from late 2008. Consequently, the engineering companies in Alberta started laying off people in hundreds.
In this massive layoffs the young engineers who did their undergraduate degree from Canadian universities are the worst affected. However, as the oilsands companies – small to big – reconciled to reality in Q2/Q3 2009 and started to develop new projects in slow and cautious manner, some laid off engineers started to get job offers.
But the job offers are very few and far between for engineers having 2-3 years experience in oilsands projects. These bright Canadian universities educated engineers are getting shunned by the myopic, dim witted and foolish attitude of both engineering and oilsands companies.
The aforesaid companies want engineers with 5-7 years or more oilsands’ experience. Since there is this racket in Alberta and Canada of hiring of people through recruitment companies, the young, dynamic Canada educated engineers are getting filtered out at the hand of the robotic recruiters.
These twits are just looking at numbers (of experience) rather than the core competency of the candidates who may have relatively less experience. The important aspect that is getting overlooked is that these young engineers cut their teeth in oilsands rather than drifting from some other oil and gas experience and that too from other countries.
Moreover, because of their Canadian engineering education these junior engineers have an edge over the so-called 5-10 years experienced jokers coming from outside Canada a large number of whom can’t even speak English properly.
Most of the recruiters don’t have necessary competence to discern whether a so-called 5-6 years experienced engineer, who may have done his Bachelors from some other country’s very pedestrian level university, has got necessary oilsands experience, or, is s/he bluffing her/his way through by camouflaging their experience under the façade of years of experience.
The poor young engineers who started their career in oilsands after completing their undergraduate course from Canadian schools are getting edged out at the very screening level at the hands of lousy recruiters, and second-rate interviewers of employer companies.
The question is: who will crack the whip to instil some sense in the minds of the employer companies to provide employment opportunities to the bright, Canada educated young engineers rather than opting for some foreign educated clown who has neither the communication skills nor the familiarity with the Canadian way.
It is so disgusting and painful to see the young, bright, capable (but less in so-called years of experience) Canada educated engineers suffering, for no fault of theirs, due to callousness, inadequacy, incapability of people charged with hiring processes. Probably only God’s intervention can bring some relief to these struggling young folks! Amen!
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