Employment Equity initiatives aimed at short and long term results

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A number of employers across Saskatchewan are looking at ways to increase the representation of Aboriginal people within their work forces, with an eye to both the present and the future.

Donalda Ford is assistant director of the Saskatchewan Human Rights Commission in Regina.

One of the initiatives Ford sees being used by several companies to help more Aboriginal people become employed is work placement. Through the work placement programs, employers take Aboriginal people who are taking part in some form of upgrading, and give them an opportunity to work for a period of time.

"They're not people who have a high level of education, and they don't have a work history, usually, and so it's a particularly good initiative for people who are in that kind of a situation." Ford said.

The placements can range anywhere from two weeks to three months in length, and have often turned into term or permanent employment for the participants.

"I really think it's an important initiative, " Ford said, "because it does give them some work experience, which really helps them when they go out, trying to find a permanent job."

Along with the work experience programs, Ford explained, companies also have to have aggressive recruitment and selection procedures in place to find Aboriginal employees.

One organization that has such procedures in place, Ford said, was Saskatchewan Government Insurance.

"Their human resource people will look for designated group people and, or course in many cases it's Aboriginal people, for every job opening, and they'll refer the people they feel have the minimum requirements for the job. If the managers don't select a designated group person, they have to explain why. They can't just ignore the designated group people without having to provide an explanation," Ford said. "And that really is effective in making them look closely at the designated group people."

Another employment equity initiative Ford sees as a positive one is the development of partnership agreements, signed between employers and the provincial department of Intergovernmental and Aboriginal Affairs. Two such partnership agreements have been signed recently with the University of Regina and the University of Saskatchewan.

"I think that it has the advantage of forcing senior management to be involved, because that's who these partnerships are signed with. And you need that commitment in order to make any gains," Ford said.

Through the partnership agreements, employers take a look at what they think their requirements for employees will be in the future, allowing Aboriginal organizations to work toward meeting those future needs by providing the required training and education for potential Aboriginal employees.

Another positive practice Ford sees becoming more and more common is development of Aboriginal employees networks within organizations.

"It's one thing to hire Aboriginal people. Another concern is to retain them, to keep them. And I think the Aboriginal employees network helps an awful lot in that regard...And that just helps Aboriginal employees to have support among themselves in their work places," Ford said.

Partnering is another employment equity practice Ford sees as a positive one, with employers working with Aboriginal organizations to try to get more Aboriginal people into work places. Many of these partnering projects are aimed at improving the employment situation for Aboriginal people in the long term.

One such partnering initiative is a science program for Aboriginal youth, being offered in partnership with the Saskatchewan Research Council, designed to get them involved in the sciences. The goal of the project is to try to get Aboriginal students interested in the sciences at an early age, making it more likely that they'd consider it as a possible career path.

"Again, it's a long term thing, but it's going to pay off in the long run, getting more Aboriginal people in the science programs and ultimately into medicne and that kind of thing," Ford said.

"They're all effective measures. Some of them are helping now, and others are looking down the road and they're preparing," Ford said.

"It's to the employers benefit, because these young people, the Aboriginal young people now, are going to make up such a proportion of the labor pool, that they need to be encouraging them to get the background that the employers are going to need."