OUTPLACEMENT – divorce with cosmetology treatment

  Specialists in Human Resources define outplacement as the process to facilitate the transition of the employees who leave the company. Transposed in civil law, the process looks like a divorce, where the abandoned wife receives as compensation a 3 months Spa subscription (to facilitate the transition)
  
   It is almost compulsory in European Community, often and often in our country, the outplacement appears (as a clause) in labor individual agreements. The situations when the employee shall receive outplacement support services are provided within the agreement, which is their structure and the average period when they act. Usually, the outplacement is granted as a benefit in case of collective dismissals, rarely in case of individual dismissal and exceptionally in case of resignation.
  
   The technologizations, organizational reorganizations, merges, financial problems, limitations of activity, renunciation of certain products, takeovers, etc., can lead to massive restructuration.
   Beside legal obligations to inform the employees who are the subject of these dismissals, any company assumes its ethical duty to offer specialized support to these employees. During the past few weeks, we were talking about the “employer’s brand, a main element is the outplacement. The fact that the employer takes care of its former employees, even in less agreeable situation, determines future employees to trust increasingly in such companies. Moreover, after a calm “separation”, the employer can continue informally the relationships with its former employees, can maintain a certain flexibility in providing its own human resources, can bring back former valuable employees within the organization.
  
   Specific services can be provided by the company’s own HR department or by a specialized organization. However, for the first case, due to preservation instinct, the employees shall open less to a former colleague than to a third party, they shall not admit easily their weak points and hence the project is delayed and the result denaturized. Anyhow, the outplacement specialist (either an agency or the employee of the company) should offer a solid experience, a robust methodology, absolute confidentiality, as well as an exceptional ethical and professional approach. He/she should be involved within the process even since the idea of dismissal was conceived in order to offer active support in defining the dismissal strategy and communication to employees.
   The most difficult is to announce the dismissal decision. The employees shall want to know [b] why, who is responsible, why them, which are their options on the labor market, which are the services they would benefit of and how efficient they are, etc. [/b] A good PR can try to cover all questions, but supported by the outplacement specialist (who, due to his/her experience knows which are the major questions and fears) they shall certainly succeed.
  
   The service package that shall be personalized depending on the company, the cause of dismissal, professional and social level of those who are to benefit of these services, job request and offers on the respective specialization, the experience to be interviewed of the former employees, etc.
   As a minimum, a standard package of such services shall provide the following:
  - support to define the personnel cut strategy
  - evaluation of the employees; proposal for professional training programs
  - individual or group counseling, in order to highlight the qualities and professional potential and correction of any eventual lacks, incorrect behaviors, etc.
  - support in elaborating the resume and motivation letter; counseling concerning the presence of the former employee in employment interviews
  - facilitation of access to potential companies that offer employment (eventual companies within the same area of activity as the former employer); offering the contacts necessary to sent an application to different fee jobs
  - recommendation, following the evaluation, for different fee jobs
  - etc.
  
   For an employee, the benefices are equally important as for the employer, they shall identify their strong and weak points, they shall know which are the activity areas they might orientate to, if they need professional training programs, how they can keep their application, which are the companies indicated to orientate toward, etc. With a clear image of their own value, they can turn to jobs within the same area of activity or in other industries, to retirement, or, why not, to establish their own business.
  
   What [b] IS NOT [/b] the purpose of outplacement, although most of the persons who are not involved directly within such processes, consider that the purpose of outplacement is to find you directly a new job. The outplacement specialist does not offer you a new job, he/she recommends you areas of activity, companies, presentation modalities, advice post employment interview, etc.
  If they are not fundamental, I hope that the next example proves the contrary:
  
   During the last few weeks I met a special lady. We met to evaluate her for a chief accountant position in a multinational company. Professionally speaking, the respective lady could successfully compete with any experimented chartered accountant, as far as its psychological profile fitted the respective job, however … The lady I am talking about have been working for 16 years within the same company, during this period she did not come to any interview, she lacked experience within the every day of labor market.
   The way she presented herself within a interview was so full of shortcuts as she left a pregnant impression that she was a disoriented person, unsecure of herself, with major lacks, totally unfit for a multinational company. However, for a HR person, the professional and psychological essence of the lady was highly positive, the contrary impression she left was as simple as the ABC – she was not used to evaluate and introduce herself. However, for a general manager, whose main concern is not to “read” the profile of a candidate beside the bad image he/she created, there is nothing but what they can see and hear in the interview … We took a decision which was not quite simple but clear: we could not present her for the respective job as, although she was professionally well trained, she would never been accepted due to her impressive appearance.
   There was such a short time between the date of the interview with the respective lady and the date to introduce the short list which made impossible to have a serious preparation for her for the final interview. This lady lost an important opportunity as she did not know how to introduce herself to an interview.*
  
   Imagine this situation in case of a person fired after 16 years within the same company, without benefiting of outplacement situation... After 4-5 stranded interviews do you think that the respective lady would have got a correct image of her own value?! No! It is very possible for her to accept a job under her own professional value, to cumulate frustrations, her evolution shall be clearly slowed down … all these as she did not benefit at the right time of a competent piece of advice.
  
   The outplacement [b]is [/b] the process looks like a divorce, where the abandoned wife receives as compensation a 3 month Spa subscription (to facilitate the transition), it is sure that nobody would be hurt following such a treatment, however, we have to admit that certain “freshly divorced women” are desperately in need of such treatment – as… to facilitate the transition.
  
  
  
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  * after that, we met this lady, we supported her and we succeeded to determine her to change, to know her objectives very well, her pluses and minuses and to act depending on them. By all means, we introduced her to another employer … the lady really was worth our effort.