How to create better redundancy outcomes

Over recent weeks, people I don’t know have reached out to me via LinkedIn asking for support following a redundancy or exit from an organisation. A few weeks ago, I spent some time on the phone with a gentleman who had reached out at his wife’s urging. She had read my featured article about ‘How to support your partner through redundancy’ and encouraged him to connect. We spoke on what turned out to be his last day at work and I gave him some advice and reassured him that a lot of what he was feeling was normal. I was glad he had the courage to reach out.

Afterwards I reflected on our conversation. I spend at least 70% of my career coaching life working in the outplacement industry, so the conversation we had is one I have had many times. I often say that I spend a lot of my life explaining what I do because many people don’t know what outplacement is, until they experience it.

In simple terms, I help people to do a better job search than they might do on their own and I support people through a complex time in their lives. Outplacement support, when offered, is provided by the organisation you are exiting, as part of your redundancy package. In an ideal scenario, we are present on site to meet with people directly after they have been told that their role has been made redundant. This onsite support is happening much less post COVID, however we do try to speak with an individual by phone as soon as possible. We act as an impartial buffer; we allow an individual to voice how they are feeling and we work with them to take back control of their lives by offering compassionate support and commencing an effective job search following, what is for most people, a blindsiding and difficult experience. We are experts at what we do and experts in the job market.

In my own career, my experience of the complexity and very real trauma of organisational breakdown occurred at the end of the life of Arthur Andersen. I worked there from the late 90’s until 2002 when the firm collapsed Globally over the course of about six months. It felt like a slow train wreck. I was managing my own feelings and also trying to support my team and work out how to go on with my role (managing graduate recruitment) through complex and uncertain times. My guide and mentor through it was my father, whom I spoke to at least weekly about how I was feeling and what to do. His guidance was invaluable and helped me to navigate that uncertain time. Ultimately the firm merged with Ernst and Young in Australia and many (but not all) jobs were saved. I left to go on parental leave and chose not to return but the memory of living through those horrible, uncertain times has never left me. I have great compassion for those I support who are coming out of organisations which are complex, broken, uncertain and lurching though change.

My father was a brilliant guide for me at that time as he was the preeminent Australian expert and a world leader in outplacement then and until the end of his life in 2021. He is the reason I chose to enter the outplacement profession over 15 years ago. My parents founded the industry in Australia in 1983. My father had spent decades working in the food industry globally in Europe, South America, Mexico and Australia and his specialty was fixing broken and underperforming companies. This often meant closure or restructure of some or all of the business. In 1980 we moved from Australia to Canada so that he could take up a role as Vice President of Employee Relations for a major food company in Toronto. Fortunately, it was there that he encountered Murray Axmith, a wonderful man, considered the father of outplacement in Canada. My father realised there was a market for outplacement here, knowing what a difference it would have made for the many people whose jobs he had been responsible for making redundant over the decades, something that had never sat well with him. The rest, as they say, is history and my parents returned here in 1983 and founded their company (Davidson and Axmith, which later became Davidson and Associates) and thus the outplacement industry as a whole. This is the industry I work in today, which has supported millions of people through their redundancy since then.

I am incredibly proud of this legacy and very passionate about the difference that good outplacement support can make for people when their role is being made redundant. I know very well the bewilderment, shock, fear, sadness, anger, shame, vulnerability and many other complex emotions that people can feel when their role is made redundant. For most it’s the first time it has happened in their career. Most people question themselves and their capability, worry about their job search, the financial repercussions, wonder at some point if they will ever get another job and find their job search to be a somewhat disheartening experience.

Those who only receive a redundancy payout (which is largely compulsory under the Fair Work Act) and no other support are left to fend for themselves with varying degrees of success. Sometimes, they can be lucky. Sometimes they will apply for many, many jobs and take months and months to secure a role. This can be the outcome regardless of seniority because it is not an effective way to manage a job search.

Those who receive a redundancy payout and outplacement support can have a very different experience. They receive coaching support immediately or very soon after their notification which means they have a compassionate and professional coach who is an expert, an accountability partner and who is invested in the outcome. Most cases call for getting my clients up and running quickly with a focus on creating momentum as it gives people a sense of control and a focus. In addition to my private coaching practice, for almost six years, I have been fortunate to be a part of the wonderful team at Prima Group | Outplacement I Executive & Career Coaching I Leadership Development . We also have a very good EAP division, meaning we can provide psychological support to those who need it alongside their outplacement program.

Some organisations misunderstand the cost of outplacement, considering only the dollars spent on providing outplacement and undervaluing its greater intangible impact. They also greatly underestimate the true cost to their business of not providing outplacement to their employees.

Seeing outplacement as only a bottom-line cost is understandable for a struggling organisation, however most outplacement providers will work with a client to come up with a delivery outcome that suits the client’s financial and other needs. Larger organisations can scale for volume, offer group workshops or webinars, some online elements of their program and, as is the case for most industries, have become generally smarter about creating replicable parts of their service. Most outplacement companies will offer a range of service types to best suit each employee.

So, what happens when you don’t offer outplacement support to your exiting employees? The dollar cost may seem ‘cheaper’ but are the ‘savings’ actually worth it? Let’s stand in the shoes of the employees that you have just exited. After telling them that you have made their role redundant, a few days later they are at home wondering what to do now. If their exit has been handled poorly (which unfortunately happens more than it should) and they are sad, confused and angry then they will tell everyone they know how they feel. The damage to your brand is already occurring. Their job search will likely be harder and more disheartening than it needs to be and they will feel as though their former organisation does not care. Additional to any brand damage, the company has now created a serious HR and talent retention issue. If the organisation is in turmoil, all of their former colleagues will likely be calling them to tell them how bad things are, complaining bitterly. They will simultaneously recall their friend’s unpleasant exit and wonder if it might happen to them too. Some employees may start looking around for a new job as well, not your poorer performers, but rather your ‘A’ performers, the most qualified and talented amongst your staff, who look around and decide to leave. The impact on the organisation is not only to your exiting employees but also to your remaining employees. The message from the organisation is clear: “We really don’t care about our people.” It is fairly easy to recruit people well and make them feel welcome. The mark of a good organisation is how you exit people. Are you doing it with dignity, kindness and compassion (no matter the circumstance) or are you treating people in a way that suggests that they ‘should not let the door hit them on the way out?’

Outplacement support may not be right for everyone in every situation, however as experts in the complexity of restructures and exits, whether they affect one person or hundreds, I have seen over and over again what a difference we can make to both the HR and management teams leading a restructure inside an organisation (never, ever an easy thing to do – I have done it), and of course to those who exit. I am sure I can speak for all my industry colleagues when I say that all of us do what we do because we know it makes a difference, one person at a time.

In 1983 I doubt that my father had even an inkling then that his decision to start the outplacement industry would lead to the industry of the scale and scope that exists today, but I do know that he started it because he did not want people to suffer in the face of their role being made redundant, and neither do I.