Immigration Requirements for Foreign Nationals

Contact your HR Service Partner and your Finance Partner for assistance.

View our advertising tip sheet and the Advertise a Position page.

• Plan to advertise to qualified Canadian citizens and permanent residents in at least three places: the U of A Careers website and two occupation-specific publications that are national in scope for 30 days
• Employment and Social Development Canada will not accept advertisements that are over one year old.
• Re-advertising is not required to renew a Labour Market Impact Assessment (details below) for a tenure-track position
• All job postings in advertisements must be identical; review our Draft a Job Posting page and use the appropriate template.

• If two candidates, one Canadian citizen/permanent resident and one foreign national, are equally qualified based on the advertised criteria, the Canadian citizen /permanent resident must be offered the position first.
• If a Canadian citizen/permanent resident does not qualify as per the qualifications in the advertisement, you must document these reasons to include in the Labour Market Impact Assessment (LMIA) application.

Review our advertising tip sheet. Plan to advertise to qualified Canadians and permanent residents in at least three places:

• You must advertise on the Government of Canada’s Job Bank. If you choose not to advertise on the Canada Job Bank, you must provide a written rationale with your LMIA application. A rationale template can be found in the Guidelines for Completing LMIA.
• 2 of the 3 must be consistent with the occupation (targets an audience that has the appropriate education, professional experience or skill level required for the occupation).
• 2 of the 3 must be national in scope - Canadians and permanent residents must have the capacity to search advertisements for work locations across Canada in a single site, as opposed to referring to individual or regional sub-sites.
• All three ads must be posted for four consecutive weeks concurrently in the three-month period prior to applying for an LMIA.
• At least 1 of the 3 recruitment activities must be ongoing until the date a positive or negative LMIA has been issued.

Once the job posting request has been submitted, read through your responsibilities in the Review Applications, Prepare for Interviews and Select a Candidate pages.

• If two candidates, one Canadian citizen/permanent resident and one foreign national, are equally qualified based on the advertised criteria, the Canadian citizen/permanent resident must be offered the position first.
• If a Canadian citizen/permanent resident does not qualify as per the qualifications in the advertisement, you must document these reasons to include in the application.

Once you have a signed offer letter, complete the LMIA Application (ESDC-EMP5626) forms and LMIA Cover sheet and Checklist using the Guidelines for Completing LMIA for detailed instructions.

• A Transition Plan, valid for the duration of the employment of the temporary foreign worker, is a mandatory requirement to hire temporary foreign workers in high-wage positions. It describes the activities you are agreeing to undertake to recruit, retain and train Canadians and permanent residents and to reduce your reliance on the Temporary Foreign Worker Program.
• If you are applying for a Labour Market Impact Assessment and have previously submitted a transition plan for the same position and work location, you must report on the results of the commitments you have made in your previous transition plan (will be used to determine if the described activities had been undertaken).
• Immigration Services will work with you to complete your Transition Plan for your LMIA application.