Comment of the week: The future of outplacement

Readers discuss whether the success of outplacement is really HR's responsibility in the first place

When we talked about outplacement this week, Texas-based recruiter Sandra McCartt said the service was not always useful. According to her experiences, it’s only effective for a small proportion of employees who have not recently been active job seekers, and that it was not very effective during the recession when there were few jobs to be sought.
Reader Jean added her two cents, saying it’s the client’s responsibility to get the most out of the service:
As with anything the client gets out of it what he/she puts into it. It's not the job of the outplacement consultant (or Career Coach) to find the job, instead it's our job to provide the tools for a successful transition. What the client does with the tools is up to them.

I've worked with many clients, those without motivation have a very difficult time finding the right fit. Those that are motivated usually find something better than what they left. – Jean

While big retailers Sears, Macy’s, JC Penney and Target seem to still be using outplacement for some employees in their recent layoffs, time will tell where the service is going in the future. The most recent major company to announce staff slashes is investment bank Barclays, which announced cuts of 12,000 jobs, although most of those will be in Britain.

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