Outplacement may not be a term that you’re familiar with, but these days we seem to be hearing it more and more.
But what exactly is it?
Simply put, outplacement is a service used during the transitional period between jobs. It can involve interview training, seminars, workshops, counselling, CV writing, one-on-one career guidance and in most cases, candidates will be coached on how best to approach the job market. Under normal circumstances you won’t have a say on the type of service you receive; it’s usually provided by consultancy firms, hired by large organisations who’ve made wide-scale redundancies.
When you consider the kind of practical and emotional support it purports to offer (not to mention the man-hours involved), you won’t be surprised to know that it doesn’t come cheap. In fact, only firms that can afford to pay thousands of pounds per person and who have ties to their Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) policy are likely to provide such services, and even then, they usually only cater for senior-levels.
So how do you get past the prohibitively expensive cost of outplacement?
Living in our glorious digital age, it’s fair to say we take for granted the multitude of online services that offer an alternative to human contact – shopping, socialising on Facebook, instant messaging, emailing – the list is inexhaustible.
These aren’t replacements to traditional methods; they’re alternatives. Shopping online isn’t going to stop me from going to the shops, having Facebook ‘friends’ doesn’t mean I’m going to stop seeing my real friends and emailing someone doesn’t mean I’m never going to speak to them. It’s just easier and more convenient at that specific moment in time.
And that’s exactly what Workthing+ offers: an opportunity for you to experience an alternative to traditional outplacement services that you might not have had access to before.
If you’ve just lost your job, it’s not only practical advice you need to move forward; it’s emotional support too. That’s why we’ve teamed up with experienced outplacement consultants to offer workshops, webinars, and a community of peers and experts who can offer support and answer your questions.
The internet might have given us alternatives to human contact, but it doesn’t mean it has to lose the human touch.
Natalie Harris
Editor, Workthing+
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