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Adult learning in socially responsible restructuring 75

of very small businesses may not have the experience, the financial and
human resources to anticipate changes and access support, including
skill needs analysis and training delivery, so they can still be part of the
supply chain (European Commission, 2009c). Yet SMEs are the engine for
change and growth in the EU, so it is particularly important to assist them
when the sector in which they operate and the companies that subcontract
them undergo restructuring. Policy initiatives that intend to outweigh the
negative impacts of restructuring should, therefore, support networking of
SMEs and other partners, so they can anticipate difficulties early and plan
joint solutions, including career guidance and training for their employees.

6.3. Tailoring training and career guidance
to needs

Career guidance brings an important contribution to front-line restructuring,
within strategies that support redundant workers. Career guidance can aid
the transition into employment through a series of interrelated building blocks;
these may include the opportunity to familiarise oneself with the labour
market and validate previous on-the-job learning, weighing up strengths
related to competences owned, as well as testing and tasting potential job
prospects, to build up a new life and work project. Also, career guidance
cannot be developed in isolation from other related services, such as work
brokerage and work tasters, support for enterprise start-ups and learning
and training activities that tone with individual circumstances.
The sooner workers are provided with an adequate combination of
support and learning services, tailored to their needs, the sooner they
are reactivated in the labour market, the more successful their return to
employment (Eurofound, 2007b). The longer they remain unemployed, the
more difficult it becomes to reintegrate the labour market and reconstruct
a professional and life project. However, career guidance and counselling
and other supporting interventions need to be carefully targeted to prevent
raising unrealistic job expectations that would damage the self-esteem,
the motivation to learn and the search for new employment. Many support
services to redundant workers involve being close to those affected to
understand how they see their future and how they think they can use their
skills in new ways, in professional contexts and even occupations they
had not envisaged before, and assist them in the preparation of a personal
development plan, for life, learning and work.