New Rules Coming for External Job Postings
Effective Jan. 1, 2026, the rules governing how employers advertise job postings to attract candidates will change.
Probably the most important change is that all advertisements must include a wage range and that range cannot be a spread of more than $50,000. Saying the job pays anywhere from zero to a million dollars just won’t work.
In non-unionized work environments, employers are free to negotiate different wage rates with different employees. But it is not exactly great for morale if employees see you advertise for somebody to do the same job as they do and get paid a lot more. There is no better way to provoke employees to start looking for work elsewhere.
The new legislation also requires employers to disclose in the ad if they are using artificial intelligence in their recruiting process. Employers don’t have to disclose exactly how it’s being used or why. This will alert candidates that there is not necessarily a human at the other end of the email making decisions about who gets an interview.
Employers will no longer be able to include in their ads the requirement of Canadian work experience. This is meant to open up the job market for internationally trained immigrants. The provincial government has expressed a concern that many people arriving in Canada have been funneled toward dead-end jobs for which they are overqualified. This is not helpful in addressing labour shortages in areas where expertise is needed.
Employers will be free to require a certain level of experience, just not Canadian experience.
Suffice it to say that if an employer is intent on having somebody with Canadian experience, some candidates will never survive the interview process. One would never be able to prove why he did not get a callback. It is to be hoped, however, that the process of sitting down and talking to somebody with non-Canadian experience might open a manager’s mind to the possibility that Canadian experience is not the be-all and end-all.
The government is also introducing anti-ghosting rules that require all job candidates to be contacted one way or the other within 45 days after an interview. This rule does not apply to the initial screening process, only people whose time is taken up with at least one interview. It’s a sad day when the government has to legislate common courtesy.
None of these new rules will apply to internal postings. Perhaps one of the upsides of making external postings a bit more onerous for employers is that it will discourage sham postings. I have been witness to a number of employers who appear to advertise positions they have no intention of filling externally. They have already got an internal candidate in mind, but they feel, somehow, that since they receive taxpayers’ dollars, they have to do an external advertisement. All that does is waste people’s time, and it is very disrespectful. Maybe they will start to think twice about that practice.
This article was originally published by The Hamilton Spectator.
