Need work? CONTACT Community Services hosting free job fair

On Thursday, Aug. 25, CONTACT Community Services will be hosting a job fair from 2 p.m. to 4 p.m. in the Zima room of the Bradford West Gwillimbury Library.

Through free initiatives and programs, CONTACT Community Services aims to help keep people in South Simcoe working.

This is the second job fair since the COVID-19 pandemic that CONTACT Community Services has hosted in Bradford.

“We’re trying to get back to in-person meetings and we have a couple employers already signed up,” said Tiffany Tyrrell-Shand, Job Developer for CONTACT Community Services.

“We’re really just looking to get everyone who is looking for work to drop by and even employers are welcome to drop in. We want to get face-to-face interaction between job seekers and employers.”

There’s typically between six to eight employers at CONTACT’s job fairs and each will have their own table where job seekers can converse with them and bring their resumes.

“They can ask about available jobs and get into further details about what the employers are looking for,” Tyrrell-Shand said. “Some employers might even be ready to interview job seekers right there; it really varies by employer with what they decide to do.”

Not only will the job fair have employers there, but there will also be a job board set up for job seekers to learn about other jobs in the community.

“Let’s say what you’re looking for is not one of the employers that are there, we’ll have other open job postings listed for job seekers to take a look at,” said Tyrrell-Shand.

With a list of employers that she works with on a daily basis and efforts to connect with others at local events and through social media, Tyrrell-Shand is hopeful there will be more job fairs to come.

“My ultimate goal is that there will be so many employers interested in this job fair that we’ll have to do another one soon,” she said.

The impact of COVID has played a role in CONTACT Community Services not seeing as many residents attend job fairs or reach out for support.

“Before COVID, we would have 60 to 80 people coming in and people would be hired on the spot,” said Tyrrell-Shand. “It makes such a difference meeting an employer and putting a face to a job seekers name.

“At our last job fair, we didn’t get the turnout we were hoping for, and a lot of people didn’t know we were open again. They thought we were closed and we had a name change (from Bradford WORKS) and we just want to remind people we’re still open, it’s just under a different name.”

Another goal of the job fair for CONTACT Community Services is to make residents more aware of what they offer.

“The most important thing is that all of our services are completely free,” Tyrrell-Shand explained. “For job seekers, we have services for resume help, interview preparation, job searching, and we can even do career exploration if you have no idea what you want to do.

“If someone’s looking to apply for the better jobs program, we help with that. We refer people for skills upgrading, ESL—we have a bunch of newcomers who come in and help them find Canadian work experience,” said Tyrrell-Shand.

“For employers, we’re also here to help out. Our job board is free, we do social media postings, we do referrals, and I’ll bring employers in to help with referrals. We have wage subsidies for employers looking to hire and train, especially now. If someone is willing to hire someone with little to no experience, we’re willing to assist with the training cost.”

Anyone interested in signing up or with any questions, can reach out to CONTACT Community Services via email at employment@contactcommunityservices.ca or by phone at 905-778-9058.