Job centre plus not fit for purpose

Not fit for purpose

In a recent post I talked about how critical it is that Job Centre Plus (JCP) gets its act together to support the increasing number of us who are forced to rely on their support. These days I regularly hear quite demoralizing tales about the culture shock experienced by senior folk who have never been in a Job Centre before in their lives.

I saw a news report with the new Secretary of State - Yvette Cooper (well known to us in regeneration of course) - being challenged about recent negative public comment that JCP has been receiving. She talked about how the organisation has transformed itself since the 1970s.

Well I should hope it has!

But doesn't she miss the point? The issue is not how JCP (and its forebears) has improved over the past 40 years, but whether it is currently fit for purpose. The issue is: does JCP meet our needs today?

And I fear it does not.

Many of the changes have been superficial - new brand, new job titles, private-sector language, advertisements on the TV and radio. But the essence of what it does has not changed at its heart. Any marketing expert or business person will tell you that, to meet the needs of your customers, you have to accept that individual needs vary enormously. One size does not fit all. A process of customer segmentation defines their needs and products and services are developed to meet those needs. So someone with no qualifications looking to develop IT skills needs to be treated differently from a budding entrepreneur. The latter, in particular, needs to be taken out of the system and supported on their own individual journey.

Surely the time has come for the Department for Work and Pensions, JCP, government agencies, the Chartered Institute of Personnel Development (CIPD) and any other professional body in this field to get together to develop a new, more radical, segmented, truly customer-focussed model? A model that is fit for purpose and one that will adapt and endure future (inevitable) economic and social crises. Linking this to support for business - the creation of new businesses and support for those with potential - is critical.

The CIPD is predicting some 600,000 job losses in the public sector by 2012. Where else are the jobs we so urgently need going to come from?