Well in this instance I was over for 2 weeks, and Queencougar mentioned her husband worked for a software development company (although he's in the QA side of things). He passed on my CV to the development manager, who arranged a telephone interview. From there I was able arrange a face to face interview + developer exam for the 2 weeks I was over there, and then I found out yesterday I've been offered the job.
But basically I didn't really want to work in downtown Vancouver, where 80% of the development jobs in the area are, so it was then a question of trying to find jobs which were more out of town. The trouble with working in downtown Vancouver is that it's either expensive rent, or a long commute. I didn't fancy either of those!
Anyway we're renting on the edge of Abbotsford (although it's actually closer to Aldergrove than Abbotsford) and the job is in Langley which is about 10 miles/ 15 to 20 minutes drive.
I think job banks and cv sites like monster.ca can be good, especially for IT and software development, but word-of-mouth and referrals will always give you the edge.
Wayne.