Career Building for Immigrants

Deo Nizonkiza

Deo was born and raised in Burundi. After many years of school in Belgium, he earned a PhD in linguistics and moved several times before landing in Vancouver, where he plans to stay for good. Along the way, he and his wife had three kids, and he was sometimes separated from them for long periods, but Deo stayed focused on his dream, he persisted, and he got there.

He was hired to teach full-time at the University of British Columbia, and he’s finally doing the work he’s so well suited for and that he loves. His experience, his mannerisms, his background, his culture, and his personality are all quite different from the people he works with. This is a big part of why they hired him.

Deo brings the team something new. He makes the team stronger, and he’s relatable to a whole host of students who might be feeling different and alone. But for Deo to be successful and to feel comfortable enough to stay long-term, his co-workers needed to be patient while he learned a new set of systems. They needed to have his back if others weren’t so accommodating and to expand their work culture so that he could fit as well as they do. Deo is beloved by his students and his community and is no doubt a great hire

It took many years for Deo to end up in the right place, but he did and it’s been a really good outcome for the University, himself and his family.

As an immigrant, there are things you can do to help in your job search:

1.   Build Your New Social Network

When you left home, you also left your social network and now you are tasked with rebuilding it. Just like with anyone building their social network, you can start with one person at a time. Here are some tips:

·      You can ask where to look for jobs, but you can also ask how to look for jobs. Ask about how people get hired, what an interview here is like, what hiring managers are like, and about anything you should look out for or avoid.

·      Give people a chance to think about their response since this isn’t something they think about every day, but they may well have useful insight for you.

·      Also, ask little questions like how late do people work, how do they communicate, how do meetings work.

·      Ask people within your community but also outside it. What they tell you might not immediately resonate, but give it some thought so you can piece together what they’ve told you into a picture you can see.

·      Then, ask someone else, and someone else again. It will take a few people to get a clear picture.

·      Each time you speak with someone, be honest about what you’re looking for and listen honestly to their response. This will also help you ensure you’re using the right terms and can help you build your cultural literacy.

·      The people you talk to will probably also be interested in where you’re from and what jobs are like there, so share your story as well.

·      The people you talk to might know someone else who could be helpful, so you can ask for introductions too.

This is how we build a social network, one person and one question at a time.

2.   Build Your Language & Cultural Literacy

The factors that are most within your control are your language and social skills. You’re probably doing some of these things already but it often takes a long time.

Maybe the easiest thing you can do is mix with more people in the country you’ve immigrated to, especially those outside your immediate community, so that you can build the communications and cultural literacy skills that make employers comfortable. This means understanding the values and customs of the average local and being able to reflect those to a potential employer. If you do this in a variety of environments, you build some range to your experiences and can become familiar with cultural touch-points. The more familiar you are with the culture you’re trying to find work in, the more relaxed and confident you will be. And confidence is a crucial quality for anyone looking for work.

Here are some other things you can do:

·      Take language courses. There are all kinds many of them for free.

·      You can take a course in cultural literacy as well, but you’ll want to take it from a reputable organization; it shouldn’t cost much, but if it does, it might not be the right thing. Be wary of promises that seem too big to be true.

Here are some ways to improve your cultural literacy, the things that show you belong where you are:

•          Read the local news. Try to identify values inherent in the issues.

•          Go to museums, concerts, and other cultural events.

•          Learn about medical and scientific practices and beliefs.

•          Take a workshop.

•          Take a cooking class.

•          Spend time at parks, restaurants, and other places locals go.

•          Talk to local people, especially those who’ve lived all or most of their lives where you’re now living.

•          Volunteer with an organization serving a local crowd.

•          Travel around the local area.

Building language and cultural language skills can take a long time, but you can occasionally take a look back and see how far you’ve come. Did you know that six months ago?

3. The credentialing challenge

If you’re an immigrant whose credentials and experience aren’t recognized in your new country, your career dreams are more complicated. It’s a painful and unfortunate position and there’s no easy outcome, but you are not out of options. The North American labor market relies on foreign-born and educated professionals to fill employment gaps. Nonetheless, in 2022, more than two million highly skilled immigrants in the United States were either unemployed or underemployed. In Canada, this rate is decreasing, partly due to more rigorous screening before immigration, and partly due to efforts to increase approvals of foreign credentials, but let’s be honest, it’s still a lot of people.

There are a number of reasons immigrants have trouble securing work equal to their education and experience, including not having their foreign education and credentials recognized, not knowing where and how to look for work, and sometimes lacking cultural literacy and or language skills. We can’t ignore that unconscious bias or outright discrimination may play a role as well. People like to hire people like themselves. If you’re a hiring manager, check yourself — you could be missing top candidates because they aren’t what you expected or who you normally hire.

As an immigrant, you have some limited options. The hardest thing is getting your credentials recognized if you can, and this will depend in part on how similar the education systems are in the two countries. While legislation is progressing so that foreign credentials are more easily recognized, waiting for your new country to do this isn’t usually feasible; it can take a long time and there are no guarantees. And if they aren’t recognized, you must redo your credentials to work again in the same position, which might mean redoing some or all of your education. Alternatively, you can choose a new profession. This is the difficult truth.

You will persist, you probably have to. Good luck and may you meet the right people along the way.