Heads of People / VP Talent
Hiring speed, and the risk when a start date was promised on the wrong permit.
Employers · People & Culture
Global Mobility Training
For People & Culture teams at Canadian companies hiring internationally. Employer requirements, how to build a global team, and how HR handles LMIA-exempt and LMIA applications in-house over time.
Who this is for
Canadian technology employers whose People & Culture function is already writing offers, job descriptions, and start dates before anyone has checked the immigration route. Heads of People, P&C partners, and recruiting leads who own AI Engineer, ML Engineer, Cloud Engineer, and DevOps Engineer hires.
P&C business partners
Hiring managers want a title that does not exist on any occupation list. Push-back has to be possible without sending every role to counsel.
Recruiting leads
Global sourcing. Citizenship and duties belong in the intake, not at offer.
The curriculum
Module 1
Employer requirements
What the company is actually signing when it files. LMIA and LMIA-exempt offers of employment, prevailing wage, Labour Market Benefits Plans, record-keeping, and inspections. Occupation changes after arrival. What IRCC and ESDC can ask for later.
- Wage, conditions, and records IRCC can inspect
- LMIA conditions the company has to keep after the hire
- Who inside P&C owns compliance after the hire lands
Module 2
How to build a global team
The team is built on more than one recruitment route: FTA professional mobility, LMIAs, and intra-company transfers. P&C and intra-company transfers. P&C learns which roles and passports belong on which route before the requisition is posted.
- FTA lists used at intake, not after the offer
- LMIA streams when FTA does not apply
Module 3
In-house LMIA and LMIA-exempt applications
The training is how P&C takes the file work inside the company over time. LMIA-exempt applications, including FTA professional permits, and LMIA applications, including Global Talent Stream. What the team prepares, what it files, and when a live retainer is still required.
- LMIA-exempt: citizenship, occupation list, offer of employment
- LMIA streams: occupation, wage, LMIA Online
- What P&C can own next quarter, and what still goes to counsel
LMIA-exempt
FTA-based recruitment of professionals
You source against the agreement, not against an ATS title. Citizenship opens the chapter. Duties have to match a closed professional list. CUSMA (TN) for US and Mexican citizens. CETA for the Netherlands and Poland. CPTPP for Singapore. The Canada-UK TCA and CPTPP for the UK.
- Build pipelines by passport first. An AI Engineer in the Netherlands, Singapore, the UK, or Poland is not the same hire as a US citizen in the same seat.
- Write the job description to the occupation list before it goes to the hiring manager.
- An LMIA-exempt offer of employment still binds wage, conditions, and records.
LMIA
Labour-market assessments
When FTA does not apply, an LMIA may. High-wage LMIAs are the ordinary stream. Global Talent Stream is one program within that family, used when it fits. Prevailing wage and any benefit-plan commitments are constraints on the team, not paperwork at the end.
- Confirm the occupation and wage before the role is posted.
- Set compensation to the prevailing rate for that occupation and region before the offer letter.
- Treat any benefit-plan or recruitment conditions as P&C commitments the company will have to keep.
How it runs
A scoping call, then the training, then scheduled follow-up with the same lawyer. The point of the follow-up is that P&C handles more of the LMIA and LMIA-exempt file work inside the company as the year goes on. Follow-up is still training. It is general legal information for the employer, not a filing. Specific hires go on a separate retainer.
- 1. Scoping call. Team size, where you hire from, which routes you already use.
- 2. The training day. Three modules, remote or on-site, with worked examples from AI Engineer, ML Engineer, Cloud Engineer, and DevOps Engineer postings.
- 3. Quarterly follow-up. Office hours with the same counsel. The team brings live work-permit questions as it takes more of that work in-house. Unused time does not roll into a live immigration file.
- 4. Specific hires are a separate retainer. LMIAs, FTA permits, and work permits are quoted and retained separately. Flat fees for those filings are published.
Flat professional fee $12,500. That covers the training and one year of quarterly follow-up. Live hires are a separate retainer. Remote included. On-site travel billed at cost.
Training is general legal information. It does not create a solicitor-client relationship with attendees or with the company’s employees, and it is not advice on a specific hire.