According to a recent study, the vast majority of information technology jobs are in Canadian metropolises. Is it possible in this case to work in the field if you want to live outside the major centres?
“For us, 95% of our business is concentrated in Greater Montreal,” says Geneviève Lavoie, vice-president at Montreal IT Recruitment, a computer placement agency. Mrs. Lavoie explains that the agency does have some requests from IT companies based in Sherbrooke or Trois-Rivières, “but it’s very difficult to meet the demands of employers, because there are very few candidates in outlying areas, or people willing to go there,” she explains. On the other hand, according to her experience, it’s rather the IT workers who come from outlying areas that move to work in the big cities. And they often do so immediately after their studies, because they know that IT activity is strongest in Montreal, Longueuil and Laval.
According to the Indeed study, elsewhere in Canada, one in three IT jobs are in Toronto, of which one in 10 is technology-related. Montreal is in second place, with 18% of the country’s IT jobs. This ranking is closely followed by Ottawa (6%) and Calgary (4%). As for the type of jobs in the field, the most sought after professions by IT companies are quality assurance engineers, software engineers, web content specialists, reliability engineers and developers.
According to Alteo, a recruitment agency based in Montreal that specializes in IT, “the ICT industry provides 120,000 jobs in Greater Montreal out of a total of about 170,000 in Quebec, with a high concentration in the Island of Montreal itself.” The agency’s website also says that in total the field has around 3,000 companies in the region.
“There are a few candidates in outlying areas who want to stay there, but it’s quite rare,” says Mrs. Lavoie. So it is possible to remain in outlying areas and work in IT, but let’s say that the supply and demand are much more tenuous… in Quebec as elsewhere in the country.