First of all, the highest priority was to receive a work permit for Canada; everything else was pretty much based on that. No work permit, no job; no job, no immigration.
A lot of paperwork had tob e done – arranging documentation, translations, verifications. Fortunately, I was supported by a law firm specialiying on immigration processes. My contact persons in Canada let me know piece by piece which kind of information they’d need at which point in time, wich documents, dates, and forms needed tob e arranged. The work permit application itself wasn’t even submitted by myself, but on behalf of me. So taking this into account, this part of my immigration process was basically the easiest one.
It started with signing at least ten warrants of attorney („Use of Representative“, „Potential Conflict of Interest and Direction to Act Form“), because each lawyer acting on behalf of me needed one of those documents. After that, I needed to fill in a „Port of Entry Questionnaire“ (one page), basically stating that I am neither a crimnal nor mentally instable. In addition to that, I submitted my current and complete CV plus copies of all official identification documents (including their English translations). Good for me, that German authorities offer to create English versions of my birth and marriage certificate.
(Last but not least I needed to provide a reference letter signed by my current employer; which I wasn’t able to do at this point, since I had not yet submitted my notice of termination).
All of those documents were finally given to the Canadian authorities beginning of April to run a „Labour Market Impact Assessment“. And only if the outcome would be positive, we could proceed with any oft he next stepts; the actual work permit itself (the physical doument) would only be assigned by the immigration office upon my arrival in Canada – which left a bit of a uncertainty right there.
After about two weeks I received the good news – LMIA turned out to be positive and nothing else now could hinder my emigration nor spreading the news to my colleagues.
Except, maybe, endless additional paperwork…
Continue reading with step 2: About terminating my existing employment contract