Page 15 - Socially-responsible-restructuring-Effective-strategies-for-supporting-redundant-workers

Socially responsible restructuring
Effective strategies for supporting redundant workers

Executive summary

Scope and context

This summary draws together the main findings and the most challenging issues
of a comparative review on effective strategies for supporting redundant workers
and, more specifically, on employer support to reintegrating workers into
employment. The analysis provides practical evidence of the contributions of
career guidance and other forms of support, such as continuing training, to
socially responsible restructuring processes, based on desk research and in-
depth analysis of case studies.
This review is produced as most European economies are struggling to
emerge from a deep recession. Enterprises of all sizes have been affected, with
employment levels falling not only in the production sector and consumer
services, but also in other sectors which may have been sheltered from the worst
effects of past economic downturns. This report is timely in looking at how
different enterprises, in different contexts and circumstances, have responded
imaginatively to restructuring, using socially responsible practices.
Its focus is not wholly on recession related adjustments. Enterprises in Europe
have long been adjusting to broader and longer-standing restructuring
challenges, and this can be seen for some as a continuous process of ad hoc
and cyclical restructuring. Here, socially responsible practice can help to ensure
adjustment goes beyond assuring the vitality of critical sectors, to minimise the
disruption and trauma often involved for citizens, their families and communities.
Effective career guidance to support those losing their jobs, or at risk of doing so,
brings an important contribution to front-line restructuring. Recent Council
Conclusions on competences supporting lifelong learning and the New skills for
new jobs initiative (Council of the EU, 2010) have also highlighted the crucial role
of effective ‘all-age’ careers guidance to help inform and empower citizens in
their work and life transitions. Against this background, the study has sought to
provide a comparative and evaluative state-of-the-art review, looking specifically
at:
• existing evidence and expertise on socially responsible restructuring practices
by enterprises and, in particular, on career guidance contributions to strategies
that support redundant workers;
• the regional and national responses and innovations that foster the
employability of workers, within restructuring processes;

9