Local Chamber of Commerce wants to bring in more foreign managers

The Sault Ste. Marie Chamber of Commerce is calling for expansion of Canada's temporary foreign worker program to allow expedited recruitment of foreign managers for companies experiencing rapid growth.

Rory Ring, the chamber's executive director, says there's a skills gap at local companies looking to commercialise products for the global market and a special 'scale-up' visa is needed to address it.

"We have a demand for particular type of talent," Ring says. "The labour market supply for that talent is either not fully developed yet or is under development, or we're just not able to source it from a local marketplace."

A just-released report from the Ontario Chamber of Commerce, Breaking Barriers: Ontario’s Scale Up Challenge, says the new visa is needed to help high-growth firms, which it defines as companies experiencing average annualised growth rates in employment or revenue greater than 20 percent per year, over a three-year period, if they had 10 or more employees at the beginning of the period.

The Sault Ste. Marie chamber agrees with the provincial report and ranks the scale-up visa at the top of its wish list for measures to help rapidly expanding companies.

"Chief among the Sault Ste. Marie chamber’s recommendations are for governments to improve businesses’ access to talent in the short term by creating a scale-up visa to quicken access to essential international managerial talent," the local chamber says in a news release.

According to Ring, gaps in the local talent pool tend to be greatest in scientific and math-based enterprises.

"In the majority of cases, you will find that they're between 25 and 50 employees if they're looking to commercialise their product on a global scale," he tells SooToday.

The scale-up visa would exempt companies from completing labour market impact assessments before hiring managers experienced in rapid-growth scenarios.

"Companies are looking to the immigration system and policies to allow them to access those labour markets that might have the particular talent that they're looking for," Ring says.

"You need a talent pool  that understands how to manage in a global context, that needs to know things like country risk analysis, adoption of technology, marketing, currency exchange and political risks that exist when you're looking to enter into a foreign market."

Such enterprises tend to be highly competitive and move 10 times faster than more traditional businesses, Ring says.

The talent we need tends to gravitate to places like the United States, the Greater Toronto Area (GTA) and tech start-up hotbeds like Kitchener-Waterloo.

So can the Sault find the scale-up talent it needs in the GTA and Kitchener-Waterloo, or must we recruit internationally?

"It is a challenge for us in Sault Ste. Marie to identify those particular individuals, but we've got great infrastructure at Algoma University and the Sault Ste. Marie Innovation Centre. We've got The Tech, the Hub. We have a number of initiatives here in our community that are building that level of attractiveness for this kind of talent."

The Sault also offers an attractive quality of life and competitive cost of living, Ring says.

"Can we do better? Absolutely we can always do better. We need to compete harder for that kind of talent pool, building that perspective that Sault Ste. Marie is a great place for innoovation, for entrepreneurs and a great place to build a business.

The following is the full text of a release issued by the Sault Ste. Marie Chamber of Commerce:

 

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SAULT STE. MARIE, ON – Today, the Sault Ste. Marie Chamber of Commerce (SSMCOC), in partnership with the Ontario Chamber of Commerce (OCC), released the report, Breaking Barriers: Ontario’s Scale Up Challenge, which identifies the major roadblocks preventing Ontario businesses from expanding and presents recommendations to best support business owners in taking their ventures to the next stage of growth.

 

According to the report, based on interviews with nearly two dozen business owners, sector associations, and other organizations, as well as a survey of over 350 Ontario business owners, too few entrepreneurs are continuing to build their business, or “scale up,” in the province.

 

The report adds to a recent chorus of voices calling for governments, the business community, and other actors to build on the province’s entrepreneurial spirit by creating the conditions to enable our most promising firms to scale.

 

To position Ontario for long-term success, the report proposes recommendations to address six specific barriers preventing businesses from growing, which includes a lack of access to talent with scale-up experience, gaps in the right kinds of financing, and lower incentives to growth offered through public programs.

 

Chief among the Sault Ste. Marie chamber’s recommendations are for governments to improve businesses’ access to talent in the short term by creating a scale-up visa to quicken access to essential international managerial talent.

 

According to an OCC survey, 63 percent of businesses that are looking to grow face a talent shortage.

 

The SSMCOC also encourages governments to gain a better understanding of where current gaps exist in the Canadian financing landscape.

 

Other recommendations of the report include:

The OCC’s survey also revealed that the cost of doing business remains a top issue for Ontario employers as 69 percent of business owners looking to grow identified this as a barrier.

 

Through its advocacy efforts on other key policy issues, the SSMCOC, in partnership with the OCC, continues to highlight the cost of doing business as a major challenge facing Ontario’s business community.

 

Read Breaking Barriers: Ontario’s Scale Up Challenge

 

Allan O’Dette, president & CEO of Ontario Chamber of Commerce: “The release of Breaking Barriers coincides with initiatives currently underway by the governments of Canada and Ontario to help our most promising firms scale up. We have an incredible opportunity to leverage this alignment across government and the business community to tackle this challenge.”

 

Sean Mullin, executive director of the Brookfield Institute for Innovation + Entrepreneurship: “Supporting the work of innovators and entrepreneurs across the country is integral to Canada’s future productivity and economic prosperity. Canada and Ontario stand to benefit from focusing efforts on supporting our most promising new firms and helping them succeed on a global stage.”

 

Jérôme Nycz, executive vice president of BDC Capital: “BDC’s sole purpose is to help Canadian entrepreneurs succeed and grow. While our growth and transition capital team already supports many entrepreneurs with flexible, patient “scale-up” financing, we see the need for more. That is why we are already exploring additional ways we can help more entrepreneurs find the specialized financing they need to bring their business to the next level. Last year, BDC provided nearly $1.2-billion in lending to Ontario’s small and medium-sized entrepreneurs, $100-million of which was allocated to high-growth, high-potential entrepreneurs in the province.”