The First Nations Labour Market Information and Skills Inventory Pilot is a co-developed pilot project designed to test processes and tools to improve First Nation communities’ access to timely and useful community-level information about their labour force. This will help support:
- Efforts to reduce skills and employment gaps in First Nation communities;
- Steps toward self-determination;
- Job-matching through Job Bank;
- Community planning and development, and referral to services;
- Partnerships with employers; and
- ESDC funded labour market and social programs (e.g. Indigenous Skills and Employment Training Program).
25 ISET Program service delivery organizations and 105 First Nations communities across six provinces and two territories are currently involved in the Pilot. More than 100 individuals involved in implementing the Pilot at the community-level have been involved in training related to survey data collection, coding, and analysis.
Yes – the Pilot is structured to be flexible to meet the needs of ISET service delivery organizations and First Nation communities. Ideally, the survey is implemented annually to ensure that data is updated and accurate as possible. However, it may not be possible for some communities to do the survey every year, so adjustments can definitely be made.
Yes – for the duration of the Pilot. However, First Nation communities can add supplemental questions to the survey to ensure they get answers to additional questions they are interested in. Pending approval of expansion of the survey beyond the Pilot, it will be possible for participating ISET service delivery organizations and First Nation communities to use their own questionnaires, as long as the core questions from the Pilot’s questionnaire are included (LMI and Skills Inventory questions). This is necessary for consistency and compiling data across communities.
It takes participants on average between 15-25 minutes, depending on their past work history, skills, and certifications acquired. Participants can complete the survey online on their own, or with the assistance of a community surveyor. The survey can be completed over multiple sessions if timing is an issue for the participant.
The ISET service delivery organizations and First Nation communities own and control the data collected with the survey. ESDC is provided only with grouped or aggregated data. ESDC does not have access to any individual-level information.
Once data is collected, and if requested, ESDC and/or Aboriginal Employment Services Inc. (AES) (an Indigenous third-party company) are available to work with ISET service delivery organizations and First Nation communities to prepare useful reports or visual presentations of aggregated community-level survey results that tell communities’ stories.
Yes. After data is collected and analysed, community-level reports or presentations can be developed, as well as infographics. Participating communities have access to all of their own data. They can either prepare their own reports, presentations, or infographics, or request assistance from ESDC and AES in preparing specific ones. The survey software will automatically prepare some standard reports of aggregated data for communities.
This is an innovative pilot to test processes and tools for gathering labour force information. Decisions on how to proceed will be informed by the results of the Pilot. ESDC is planning to return to central agencies in fall of 2023 to request ongoing funds so the initiative could continue beyond March 2024 with no interruptions in the process.
Yes. The Pilot has now expanded to include community members regardless of their residence location. First Nation communities participating in the Pilot have stressed the importance of including their members living outside of their communities as they are often considered part of their potential local labour market.
Typically, it would be the ISET service provider that provides service to the First Nation community where the individual is a member. In cases where the individual is receiving service from a different ISET service provider, that service provider could conduct the Pilot survey.
The service provider often has a list of all members on and off reserve. Contact information is typically better for those on reserve than those off reserve. Given that Indigenous service providers are seeking local indigenous labour market information, they would collect data from all clients they serve, either through ISET programming or their website, even when the clients are members of other First Nation communities.
The service provider, working with the First Nation communities, can reach out to all members to participate in the Pilot, regardless of whether they have accessed funds and services. Including these members in the Pilot will give the service providers a more complete skills inventory, and help identify individuals that are potentially interested in training and employment programs and services, but have not yet accessed these services.
All communities involved in the pilot have a Community Job Bank. ESDC and AES worked together to develop a way in which jobs posted on the National Job Bank could be embedded in the skills inventory database and used by the community to run their own relevant Job Bank searches from within their skills inventory database.
Both participant profiles and local job vacancies are stored in the same secured skills inventory system. A successful partnership with National Job Bank allowed the creation of a local/community job bank which captures all jobs and provides the ability to display those within 50km of participating First Nations.
A new optional module for local employers will be launched in 2023. This module will give a better picture of the skills and qualifications that employers are looking for and will support job-matching activities.
First Nation communities and ISET Program agreement holders can join the Pilot by contacting AES. There are no applications or proposals required. AES will work closely with interested First Nation communities and ISET agreement holders to initiate the Pilot in their communities.