Plain Speak: Outplacement services as human resource solution

Workforce realignment, restructure, downsizing, mergers, acquisitions, headcount reduction, relocation. These are just some of the business terms being used to explain why employees are increasingly finding themselves parting company with their current employer and out on the job market sooner than they had planned.

The rapid pace of change, globalisation, and shareholder pressure to perform are forcing organisations to make constant adjustments that lead to difficult decisions regarding employees. Often this involves letting go of a few to several hundred people.

The impact is not limited to departing employees. It also affects retained employees, customers and suppliers. If the separation is managed badly the effect upon an organisation can be devastating.

Letting people go is never easy. An executive business decision can become a life-changing event for employees, some of whom may have been considered at one time an organisation's best-performing talent.

Upon learning of their retrenchment, a number of employees will debate the decision and its lack of logic or fairness from a personal perspective. They might question why, bargain for an alternative job, assume there is a personal vendetta against them, or reassure themselves that it won't be long before the company recognises its error and begs them to come back.

To help employees further absorb the news and begin the transition process, many organisations elect to bring in trained transition or outplacement consultants to meet with employees immediately following the meeting where they are told they no longer have a job with the company.

When managers are trained to conduct the separation in a professional manner, dismissed employees, while not pleased about their situation, usually feel that they were treated as well as possible under the circumstances. As a result, they spend less time and energy looking back and are able to focus more readily on the future. At the same time, remaining employees also realise that if they were to get caught up in something similar, they would be treated with the same level of respect – and that's very important if the organisation is to move past the pain and on to the next level of growth. Productivity can also suffer as the downsizing is carried out, and as the remaining employees adjust to the loss of their co-workers. "Will I be next?" some may wonder. Others might ask themselves, "How will I get all the extra work done?"

It is not an easy job delivering this type of bad news but with the right approach and with careful preparation, a company can preserve its image, the dignity of those individuals let go, the productivity of those who stay, and a manager's own psychological well-being.

Transition

Helping a retrenched employee to update their resume or interview skills is only a small but key component of transition or outplacement consulting. An individual outplacement programme provides coaching, counselling and training to displaced employees using a proven, systematic job search process.

Provided by the employer at no cost to the employee, outplacement helps individuals to transition quickly and effectively between periods of unemployment.

The process essentially teaches lifetime career management in a series of integrated steps that produce a reliable outcome. For senior managers and professionals, an individualised career transition programme is recommended, for groups of more junior employees interactive workshops can be a cost-effective option.

Assisting companies experiencing change requires a holistic approach.

Given the importance of correct handling of retrenched employees, it is vital to choose carefully a human resource solution provider offering career transition or outplacement services.

- The author is regional director of operations at Drake Beam Morin (DBM), a leading global provider of strategic human resource solutions.