While vacationing, based on my recent readings, Canada’s economy has faced significant shocks in recent years—from U.S. tariff impacts to declining exports and in some regional job losses. These disruptions highlight the need for a workforce that can pivot quickly and absorb change.
In my visit this time, I sought out some of my former colleagues in the Philippines just to check on how they were able to adopt to their new work place & environment, both technically & psychologically. Was their education and work experience even a factor or did their past trainings become applicable or were skillset comparable to other workers. What did make them overcome the initial setbacks & struggles they encountered as they tried to make their way into the labor force.
In totally different conditions & out of their comfort zones, for them to thrive in a foreign workplace requires the courage to step out of comfort zones and the patience to navigate cultural differences. Key is how to build trust through mutual understanding, embracing resilience, and actively creating professional opportunities.
To overcome adversity and workplace challenges Canada increasingly depends on being multi‑skilled and resilient. With the country’s labor market undergoing rapid change, driven by technological disruption, shifting global trade conditions, and evolving workplace expectations.
To be better positioned to thrive despite uncertainty, workers must adapt by diversifying their skills, build psychological resilience to cope with being a totally different work set up & conditions, way of working & rules.
Israel Joms Simbillo is currently a Production Supervisor in a Trucks parts manufacturing company in Surrey, Vancouver while Ric Bernabe is a QA Supervisor in a farming equipment manufacturer based in Saskatchewan.
Having had the privilege of working with these young engineers, I happily recall how I’ve known their work demeanor & leadership skills.
Joms was plucked out from the graduating class in one of the top engineering schools in the region, the Holy Angel University for an On-The-Job Training Program we implemented with the intention of teaching them how to implement the 8 Quality Tools Japanese style.
At the end of their training, they were expected to be able to suggest ways & means on how to help address an increasing manufacturing defect ratio against good output. With the enormity of challenges they faced, due to the technical specifications & complications of the sudden increase in demand as against the technical capability of our Quality team & current practices on the shopfloor. Though we jokingly referred to their group as the “Defective Engineers”, we knew that their stint with us would be helpful because they had fresh eyes and were a group of young engineers raring to prove theoretical practices against actual situation. We eventually hired most them as process engineers then sent them to further technical & product training in our main manufacturing plant in Japan,
Meantime I recruited Ricardo Bernabe, an electrical engineer by education, to be a Production Supervisor handling lines with close to 200 operators. He was a returning OFW from the middle east working in a Petrochemical plant. I wanted to give returning OFWs the chance to reintegrate with the Philippine Labor market though I knew the sudden drop in pay will later haunt my desire to change the narrative & will eventually hit my attrition rate if economic needs become too much as a strain.
When Ric applied for a production supervisor job, readily noticeable was his kind demeanor & “kuya” persona. I took it to mean that only a naïve person will not to be enamored by amiable personality & likable charm, which is an added value skill needed in handling production lines with huge number of production workers.
Both, though already with relatively successful careers in the Philippines, chose to pack their bags and seek better opportunities that the allure of Canada had to offer.
Ric was recruited 2022 as a CNC laser programmer in Montreal. Joms came to Vancouver via the approved application of his wife as a qualified professional in November 2023.
Aside from the weather, their common shocker was the struggle on how to be placed in a job that was aligned to one’s profession and work experience. They also opined that we might have been overdoing it in our previous companies. Root Cause Analysis (RCA) were simple & precise. No need for experiments & piles of documentation to support findings. The trust placed on one’s judgement and investigation almost always assured. Communication & team meeting need not be heated or Philippine Senate like (pun intended). If there is any cost that cannot be tracked or cost of quality specially if minimal, it is written off, no big deal. Executive time & team cohesion is more important than pin pointing or identifying culprits. If despite all the corrective & preventive actions still cannot stop a repeat, then they say….”it is what it is”.
Joms started out as a forklift operator. My initial reaction was of guarded pessimism because I knew that menial job is not one of his core strengths. He was more known to be a strategist, a communicator, or an instigator of ideas and “Mr Root Cause Analysis” where he can give you 100 & 1 reasons why there is a slippage in production output for the day. True enough, at the onset felt so downtrodden that he not only lost weight (a good 15 kilos) but was on the verge of giving it a month or so before he decides to go back to the Philippines to resume his manufacturing career.
Ric was a doing a category 2 Technical level work. When the company took a hit due to low demand, he decided to move to Saskatchewan, a more rural (cold & snow prone area) because his chances for a better & stable job were greater than in a metropolitan Montreal.
As their HR person, I had the privilege to maintain communications line with them and continue to give counseling & advise when sought specially when things were not really turning out to be as they have may visualized before they left.
Sometimes I would reach out to them when read their fb status posts when it felt something was not going well. “Kumusta ka?” (not to Pia). Owing to instinct, plain luck or my decades of training, I was most of the time correct that their morale was becoming low and determination waning. And striking a conversation was my way of intervening (Kumusta ka Pia…I mean Joms orRic?) even thru digital messaging only. As always, was happy to listen & give some nuggets of wisdom on how to deal with their difficult situations.
Having seen how they were able to overcome initial struggles & challenges, both are now in stable companies, becoming key persons & decision makers in their own right and trusted by their supervisors. I feel vindicated and in same time validated because I knew that Filipino Production Engineers and Supervisors like Joms & Ric will surely thrive in Canadian manufacturing. They bring a combination of technical competence, adaptability, and strong cultural work values that align well with the needs of Canada’s modernizing industrial sector.
Adaptability translates into ease in working with multicultural teams. This is important because Canada is such a diverse country. The natural tendency to respect individuality & diversity, follow rules, comply on safety and structured processes comes from our workplace practices that emphasize following procedures, protocols & policies. That makes it easy to adjust to Canadian expectations. Their strong interpersonal communication and teamwork is just a continuation of their multi national & diverse work set up back they’ve experienced early in their careers.
Notable is the program to make them multiskilled truly matters specially in the changing workplace or in so many cases for Filipinos changing place to work. Being multi-skilled strengthens & improves one’s ability to move across roles and sectors when industries contract or restructure.
Filipino engineers and supervisors often come from fast‑paced, resource‑constrained manufacturing environments in the Philippines or the Middle East. Their past experiences have developed their high resilience under pressure. They possess strong problem‑solving instincts as they can easily rely on past situations where they were able to come up with solutions though resources may have been scarce. It did help that that the ability to manage multiple responsibilities. Being multi skilled is a natural tendency for them to learn through training & workplace learnings because it was our survival kit 101.
Filipino supervisors are known for relationship‑based leadership, which fits well in Canadian workplaces that value empathy, fairness, and psychological safety.
I can also say that both have strong technical foundations & Global Manufacturing Experience. Our engineers & supervisors bring with them solid backgrounds in ISO‑aligned manufacturing, lean systems, and multinational production environments skills that Canada actively seek. I can attest that they are already familiar with Quality systems (ISO 9001, Six Sigma), ERP and production planning tools, cross-functional coordination & continuous improvement (Kaizen) and process optimization at the very least. We have exposed them & trained them to such standards & procedures. Their willingness to learn new technologies & flexibility to work shifts, overtime, or rotating schedules out of necessity or adaptability is well regarded
These competencies match the high-demand roles in the manufacturing sector of Canada, especially for production supervisors and team leaders.
Though a recent study stated that Filipino‑Canadian engineers or supervisors still have areas for improvement specially in skills like assertiveness, critical and creative thinking, emotional intelligence & intercultural communication. In due time, these can be easily overcome when they gain the necessary confidence in communicating & in navigating diverse culture.
I believe that they will continue to thrive because of their strong technical background matches high-demand manufacturing roles. Their adaptability & cultural fit supports multicultural teamwork. Their collaborative leadership enhances morale and productivity. Innate resilience & work ethic is ideal for fast-paced production environments. They have the needed Professional networks both here & back home to accelerates career growth and network.
Knowing that Canadian employers consistently value reliability, initiative, and dedication, traits that both Joms & Ric possess, I am pretty certain that all the right cards will fall into the right places for these two young engineers & family men who in the previous months, were struggling and restless with uncertainty just in the horizon until, patience, perseverance & the right mindset carried them through out of the the woods.
GOOD MORNING HARDWORKING PEOPLE!