Sector Specific Job Fairs

The Barrie area has been experiencing shortages in AZ and DZ truck drivers, as well as construction trade workers for quite some time. In response to these growing issues, Invest Barrie and area partners responded by organizing two separate industry-specific job fairs in spring 2024; a Commercial Trucking & Driver Job Fair and a Construction Industry Job Fair.

The Trucking Job Fair included companies that were hiring drivers and was also used to bring attention to these well-paying careers and the truck driver training options available. Drivewise, a local business, provided a trucking simulator to allow a first-hand truck driving experience at the Trucking Job Fair.

The Construction Job Fair materialized through Invest Barrie’s relationship with the Barrie Construction Association (BCA). Noticing the success of the first Trucking Job Fair that was held in 2023, the BCA was interested in partnering on construction industry job fair to highlight the many different careers and specialties in the industry, and the work available for all skill levels.

For both job fairs, Invest Barrie sponsored the space, created the advertising and handled the administration, employer recruitment and event logistics. The County of Simcoe helped to fund and promote the events and assisted with event day tasks. The city’s five local Employment Ontario offices provided their services at the events, informing employers of different grants and recruitment services available and promoted the events directly with their clients and through their social media channels.

These industry-specific Job Fairs are an example of solid partnerships between local government, employment service providers, industry associations, and the business community, which came together to help address an issue that is affecting each of them.

Both Job Fairs were at exhibitor capacity with 20 companies each and had a continuous flow of job seekers. There was a mix of people actively searching for employment and people wanting to learn more about the opportunities and training available. The Trucking Job Fair attracted 210 job seekers and the Construction Job Fair saw 421 job seekers in attendance.

The feedback received has been exceptionally positive. Several companies mentioned that focusing on a single industry helped to increase candidate numbers that were truly interested in the jobs they were promoting and the candidates were better qualified than those encountered at more traditional, sector-agnostic job fairs.

One concern we have encountered at previous job fairs is that some job-seekers attend with the hopes of being hired immediately as registered apprentices, only to find that those positions are not always available. To combat this, we worked with exhibitors and our community partners to ensure a cohesive message, informing job seekers that many people start as laborers and are later promoted to apprenticeship roles.

The target audience was inclusive of all job seekers from the region potentially interested in construction or trucking.

Talent recruitment continues to be an issue across many sectors. Based on the success of these collaborative events, Invest Barrie is already engaged in discussions regarding other industries that could benefit from future targeted, sector-specific job fairs. Supporting our partners in matching job-seekers with open positions in industries in need of recruitment support, as well as bringing awareness to the training available to enter those fields, proves to be one of the most impactful ways Invest Barrie can support local labour market development.