Employment Service. Job Placement. Orientation Preparation Matching

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Barnard Whitehead
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1 Go to online version Employment Service Job Placement Orientation Preparation Matching Job placement is a process by which service providers assist jobseekers to find suitable working (or learning) opportunities and by which service providers support employers to find suitable employees, workers, interns, and apprentices. Job placement providers are public, private or civil-society entities that link the supply with the demand side of the labour market. Placement services always work with both sides of the labour market, hence dealing with two different customers in parallel, jobseekers and employers. Successful job placement involves activities like outreach to jobseekers, outreach to employers, networking with employers and other partners, profiling customers, filtering and matching competence profiles with job profiles, referring clients to job interviews or to other services and following-up referrals and job interviews. Finding a good match between employers needs and worker s qualifications often also requires preparing both customer categories (jobseekers and employers) for the matchmaking and placement process (e.g. how to prepare a job profile or how to apply for a vacancy). 1/6

2 Providers Common providers are public employment services (PES), i.e. public employment offices under the ministry of labour, offering placement next to other active labour market measures (e.g. technical or entrepreneurial training, job search support, career guidance, wage subsidies) to entitled registered target groups. There are also private sector placement providers offering recruitment services to individual employers or collectively (e.g. members of employers or business associations) for a fee, or under a public licence (e.g. under the authority of PES). Education and training institutions (technical schools, universities, vocational training centres) may provide school-based services placing students and graduates into internships and jobs at collaborating companies. Online platforms publish information and connect relevant stakeholders: employers are given the opportunity to advertise vacant positions. Jobseekers present themselves, upload their profiles or CVs and may directly apply for advertised positions. Providers of related training and other services publish their course programmes and services. Operators check the relevance of information for users and keep them constantly up to date. Online portals are an economic tool to ease first contact between jobseekers and employers. Personal contact, however, is important for building trustful relations and for negotiating agreements. There may be other service providers like NGOs, rehabilitation centres, recruitment centres, agencies placing Au-pair or volunteers, transfer companies and so on. There are also cases of illegal service providers, some of which charge jobseekers high fees for dubious illegal - sometimes downright dangerous - work assignments abroad. People need to be aware and warned of the industry s criminal operators. Placement services are based on a dual customer approach, serving both market participants: jobseekers (labour supply) and employers (labour demand). Usually they also network and collaborate with key partner institutions: Target Groups Beneficiaries on the supply side of the labour market are: People looking for wage employment, e.g. unemployed, graduates and young people entering the labour market for the first time, re-entrants to the labour market such as parents after a family phase or people after rehabilitation or a long unemployment period; People seeking further education or training, for example, work-based learning opportunities, job-shadowing, internships, apprenticeships, studying abroad, entrepreneurship training, etc. Young people or intermediaries (e.g. parents, teachers, social workers) looking for career information (e.g. jobs or occupations in demand on the labour market, related education and training opportunities, current vacancies, etc.) may also consult placement services. Further services may specialise on target groups such as migrants, returnees, people with disabilities, the workforce of state-owned enterprises undergoing privatisation, and others. Many placement services conduct outreach activities to target inactive unemployed individuals not engaged in training or education, or to address rural or minority groups, sometimes using mobile outreach units. 2/6

3 Target Groups Employers Public and formal private sector companies benefit from placement services in several ways: They use the service to publish vacancies. Also, they may receive prevetted candidates with matching profiles for job interviews which helps reduce recruitment costs and possibly also staff turnover. Working with matchmaking and placement professionals can improve employers human resource selection, retention and development capacities. Partnerships Employers and private sector institutions (e.g. business associations, chambers) are not only beneficiaries but also important partners to network with to set up, running, improving and up-scaling placement services. Other relevant partners may be private employment service centres and online platforms, education and training institutions (technical schools, universities, colleges, vocational training centres), municipalities, civil society organisations, which are close to relevant target groups, non-formal training providers, or related ministries and public agencies. Placement providers make the labour market function by connecting the demand side (employers) with the supply side (jobseekers) and balancing economic and social goals. Objectives They place people into employment, self-employment, internships, apprenticeships, education or training. Placement services give labour market entrants, the unemployed and career changers access to career and labour market information, to work experiences (internships, apprenticeships, jobs), to training opportunities, to wage-employment in the formal labour market and may also support entry into entrepreneurial careers and self-employment. Placement services lower employers recruitment costs by vetting and pre-selecting suitable and motivated candidates, promote less popular or lesser known areas of work and help search the market for difficult to find -profiles. While all formally established enterprises may benefit from placement services, its often the small and medium-sized enterprises searching for skilled labour or those with high rates of staff turnover or a demand for seasonal work which are more likely to use these services. In many countries, companies report difficulties with finding staff motivated to take up manual (blue-collar) work despite high rates of youth unemployment. While online platforms may be used by employers from both, the formal and the informal sector, public providers limit their services to formally established enterprises only. Some providers require employers to meet job quality criteria. On an institutional level, placement providers contribute to lowering the skills mismatch by sharing their experiences and information on current and prospective labour market trends with education, training, and career guidance providers. Range of Concepts Stand-alone centre models Employment offices or career centres are places where people go to find professional employment assistance (information, guidance, counselling, placement). Centres often have a self-help area with computers, career information, and info boards with current vacancies. They may also have training and meeting rooms for group activities. As well, there are counsellors to offer case-managed services on an individual face-to-face basis. 3/6

4 Range of Concepts Integrated approaches Education or training providers (universities, colleges, technical and vocational schools) may integrate placement services through career centres or placement units. They use collaborative networks with employers to place their own students and graduates into internships and jobs in related industries. Career Education (self-placement) models Career education in school or through non-formal training providers prepare participants for the job search and application process, making them more independent of placement services. Career guidance and training (networking, exploration, information interviewing skills) enables students to manage the job search and application independently and competently. They learn to find themselves suitable places for learning and working in quickly changing labour markets. This approach sees career management as a life skill useful not only for the first transition to work but for every career decision that follows. This skill may also allow the informal labour market to be tapped, which, although not the primary goal for jobseekers, can serve as stepping stone into decent formal employment. Online Platforms Online matching portals gather and share the information of key stakeholders and keep them up to date: Profiles of employers and vacant positions, jobseekers profiles as well as training courses or other complementary, preparatory or consulting services. Resources Physical resources (for centres) A room with desks, computers, internet access and space for group activities Office space for job placement personnel, equipped with computers, printers, phones, internet, projector, etc. Information materials Qualified human resources with a shared work philosophy and a clear institutional framework and guidelines (e.g. standard operating procedures). Staff may be specialising on one or more of the following core tasks: Centre or service management (developing and implementing business and policy strategies, managing human resources, ensuring financial sustainability, collaborative management with key partners, quality assurance, etc.); working with jobseekers (reach out to and register jobseekers, provide information, interview jobseekers and match their qualifications and skills to those required by employers for specific job openings, counsel jobseekers, assist jobseekers to develop realistic career goals and strategies and draft and implement action plans, follow-up and coach jobseekers, etc.); working with employers (network with employers, scout vacancies and workbased learning opportunities, promote services, nominate motivated candidates with matching profiles, follow-up job interview results, etc.); information System managers, who create or administer the hardware and the database for registering jobseekers and vacancies, modify the software supporting the matchmaking process, and support contact management and data analysis for monitoring, evaluation, and reporting; event managers, who organise job fairs, training courses, information sessions, school visits, or who manage deployment of mobile units. Administration and logistics; Researchers, who analyse market trends (e.g. labour market assessments or target group surveys), interpret statistics and compile career information. 4/6

5 Resources Technology resources Profiling software and database, social media for outreach and mass communication, online matching platforms (self-help tool). Financing Placement providers can charge fees from employers or, more rarely, also from jobseekers. Charging registration or placement fees from jobseekers, however, contradicts the social objectives. Young people or vulnerable target groups may not be able to afford the service. Employers and private sector institutions (e.g. employers associations, sector associations, value chain clusters) may be willing to pay fees (e.g. through a membership or annual fee) if the services hold tangible benefits for them. Integrating placement services into education and training can decrease costs for space and also partly for human resources. Professional online platforms may generate income through advertisements. Public employment services depend on public funding while civil society organisations need fundraising specialist and public support. Success Factors Placement services are based on a dual customer approach. Providers need to understand and serve the different needs of both client groups to be successful. Some services have specialised staff to work with either jobseekers (and sometimes sub-categories of jobseekers) or with employers. Promotion, communication and negotiation skills are useful to mediate expectations and to achieve compromises and mutual agreements. Vetting and matchmaking are longer processes that require placement services to register many, filter a short-list of some and match them carefully and competently in order to place a few sustainably. To this end, custom-made software and databases support the handling of many clients and the matching and filtering processes. They do not replace personal contact unless clients are fit for the job search and application process and know how to use online platforms. Establishing successful relations between young jobseekers and employers often requires additional preparatory and complementary services to activate young people and strengthen their employability with information, guidance and training (e.g. training life and soft skills or job search and application). Working with employers requires placement providers to be expeditious. The more effective the service is at matching the employer s needs to the qualifications and expectations of the youth, the greater the likelihood that the young person will be engaging actively and be productive to the satisfaction of the employer. Employers contentment with the services is only one side of the coin. It needs to be coupled with jobseekers satisfaction, as services also have a social purpose and ethical standards to comply with. Job fairs, when well prepared, have proven to be a good tool for placing a high number of jobseekers or interns. The intensity and speed of the process is appealing to both, employers and jobseekers alike. 5/6

Imprint Published by Deutsche Gesellschaft für Internationale Zusammenarbeit (GIZ) GmbH Registered offices Bonn und Eschborn, Germany YouMatch - Global Initiative on Innovative Employment Services

6 Imprint Published by Deutsche Gesellschaft für Internationale Zusammenarbeit (GIZ) GmbH Registered offices Bonn und Eschborn, Germany YouMatch - Global Initiative on Innovative Employment Services for Youth Dag-Hammarskjöld-Weg Eschborn, Germany E youmatch@giz.de I Author / Layout YouMatch Global Initiative on Innovative Employment Services for Youth On behalf of Directorate-General Addresses of the BMZ Global issues sector policies and programmes BMZ Bonn Dahlmannstraße Bonn 4 T +49 (0) F +49 (0) BMZ Berlin Im Europahaus Stresemannstraße Berlin T +49 (0) F +49 (0) poststelle@bmz.bund.de As of May 2018 In cooperation with 6/6

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