Greenwich School Of Management – Programme Centre 

 Perceptions from the client side based on direct experience and observation of interactions between staff and  peer group during March 2005

Programme Centre - Objective :
                                                     To provide facilities and assistance for job seekers who have been unemployed for 2 years, or more, as part of the governments New Deal scheme.

Programme Centre – Background :
                                                            The programme centre is located within the Greenwich School Of Management based in Meridian House – a large brick built establishment housing a wide variety of academic based institutions. Clients arrive for the 12 weeks session soon after completing a 13 week Intensive Activity Programme (IAP). For the new client it is a refreshing change to poorly adapted commercial premises as often used by rival companies offering similar programmes. The building has good transport links from the areas that the client base is sourced from. Fares can be claimed for bus travel, and surprisingly for mileage by car, but to the disappointment of some clients, not by travel by more reliable train and Dockland Light Railway. (It is possible, but unconfirmed, that this is on instructions from the Job Centres who specify, and pay for the services provided).

The facilities : 
                         The principle facilities provided are -
• Computers (Internet or word processing)
• Telephones
• Newspapers and journals
• Stationary (including postage)
• Fax machine
• Help and advice

These are all well provided for apart from the help and advice .  This has some failings which will be discussed further. The “household” facilities also seem to be very good. The building is adequately heated and ventilated. The toilets seem clean and tidy , but only one soap dispenser and hand dryer for three washbasins seems strange.  There is a canteen which serves food at a subsidised price, but this has not been visited yet.

Initial observations : 
                                   Upon arrival all clients will have had at least one prior experience of the obligatory induction talk. As is usual, it was somewhat tedious, but necessary, and delivered in a competent manner. This was supplemented by the usual handouts providing a written version of the information.  The staff appear friendly and less officious than some met on previous programmes.

 Although not part of the programme, a positive aspect is that many clients recognise people they have met on previous programmes and can share experiences of their job seeking. The fact that other people are having the same difficulties finding work in shared areas of industry can be a great morale boost when there are suggestions made, both implied and implicit, that the clients are either not trying hard enough, or doing something wrong.

Day to day observations :
                                           Resources seem to be readily available with up to date newspapers, and plenty of computer time available. Some mild friction between staff and clients is emerging. Staff find it hard to believe that some clients would prefer to use their home computers for word processing or internet access. There would appear to be a valid argument that the client would prefer to use a computer that has no restrictions, has all the clients files on it, can used without pre-booking, and can be safely left with files still open on it. In addition to those advantages, the clients can set their own rules with regard to eating, drinking, or smoking within the vicinity of their own computer. The counter argument would seem to be that unless the clients are observed to be doing internet job searches they are in breach of the conditions laid down by the Job Centres. This is an argument that can itself be countered by the client offering printouts of the results of their home job searches. There does seem to be a subliminal suggestion that “we provided all this stuff so you had better use it”.

Some conclusions :
                                Without access to the original contracts, or any published data, it is impossible to reach a measured conclusion. Therefore the conclusions made will be subjective, based upon actual experiences of this programme, and previous programmes.

 References to “the system” in the next paragraph should not be read as only relevant to the services provided by Greenwich School of Management, but to the whole apparatus set up for job seekers as overseen by The Job Centres as part of The Department Of Work And Pensions.

 It is difficult to find any fault with the resources provided. The staff have to attend to a large mixture of different people with different abilities, different expectations, and different temperaments. For the most part they do remarkably well in coping with these different people. The one general failure of the programme is almost certainly a failure of the system rather than what can sometimes appear to be a failure of the staff. The system itself is very much a “one size fits all” approach. That gives the staff very little leeway to differentiate between those clients who have had a history of long periods of employment and are left with a limited, but often highly specialised skills base, and those who have had a much more varied work history. Suggestions that clients are not trying hard enough, or are doing something wrong, can be a negative experience for both these types, but perhaps more so for the former type. Such claims can be made with little actual research into the real activities of the client beyond asking a few superficial questions about where they are looking for jobs. It would probably be beneficial to both staff and client for a staff member to first acquaint themselves with the clients CV, and then sit with them for 30 minutes while examining job adverts in a newspaper, and/or a search on the internet. That would enable the staff member to learn first hand the difficulties the client was having. In addition they may be able to add some reasoned debate to encourage the client to apply for jobs they would not normally consider. (A subset of this is provided by the Adult Directions computer programme. It is of some use, but comes a poor second to real human interaction).

Final conclusions :
                       In the final conclusion the programmes stands or falls on its results.  Whether it provides value for money to the tax payer is outside the scope of this discussion. Undoubtedly some parts of it are very useful to most clients. Despite that, most clients see it as chore to attend, and an intrusion into their private life in a way that is very different to the way in which employment would constrain their lives. Perhaps the greatest incentive it has to offer is to push the boundaries of  job seeking so the clients can get out of the programme quicker.