Labour Market Information

Labour market information (LMI) answers your questions about opportunities for work in your career area, salary ranges, finding work in a new field, and whether the work you're interested in suits your skills, aptitudes, and interests.

You'll hear people talk about your need to do research in order to understand the labour market. The labour market is many things, but, in brief, it is information about jobs and salaries, industry sectors, profiles of cities and communities, future trends and conditions, statistics. All these things will affect your job search over the short and long term.

Labour market information includes:

• what occupations and skills employers are looking for
• what and where potential employers are
• employment conditions
• education and training requirements for jobs
• barriers to employment
• occupational forecasts

Understanding labour market information will help you to identify any barriers that might exist as you search for work. For example, if you have professional qualifications, knowing how those are valued in Canada is very important and will contribute to your success in finding work in your field. You'll get a sense right away if your experience is valued in the same way here or if you need to do any academic upgrading or pass exams.

The following links provide you with more resources about labour market information:

Settlement.Org's Labour Market Information section

How can I find information about companies in Ontario?
If you're looking for work in Ontario, you're probably looking for information about companies that are hiring. You can search for information on the internet, in books and other print publications off the internet, and from organizations in your community.

Useful links

Ontario Job Futures - a Canadian government website containing labour market information for a variety of occupations.

Toronto Region Immigrant Employment Council - a group of employers, government representatives, and non-profit agencies in the Toronto region. It is working to improve access to employment for immigrants so they are better able to use the skills, education, and experience they bring with them to Canada.

Employability Skills Profile - a fact sheet developed by the Conference Board of Canada that describes critical skills that employers look for.