Labour market insertion

In today’s fast-changing environment, anticipating the demand for skills in the future is challenging. This circumstance contributes to a growing mismatch between the workforce available and the one requested by employers. Additionally, employers often lack information about labour market trends and have difficulties to access qualified candidates. Recruitment becomes expensive and inefficient. Job seekers lack information about jobs, networks, soft and technical skills or work experience to find productive employment and self-employment. 

Creating interfaces between labour demand and supply

Swisscontact improves the linkages between enterprises, training providers, financial service providers and job seekers. Together with our partners, we enable local stakeholders to act at the interface between labour demand and supply. We also provide the required information, counselling, linking and matching services for enterprises and job seekers. Target groups may be general or specific. Combined with vocational education and training, labour market insertion also supports school dropouts and out-of-school individuals in their social and professional integration.

Our labour market activities lead to improved long-term employability and the potential for professional and personal progression for individuals, and improved business success for enterprises. This contributes to poverty reduction and resilient livelihoods.  

In labour market insertion projects, Swisscontact assumes the role of a facilitator and capacity builder. We catalyse innovations and bring together the relevant private and public actors to initiate change and take on ownership for delivering better and more relevant services.

Our fields of activity in labour market insertion

 Through our interventions, we seek to promote sustainable labour market insertion services in enterprises, education and training providers and communities. Our key services usually include:

• Access to labour market information for enterprises and job seekers, 
• Orientation and counselling services,
• Matching services, including application support for internships and jobs in the private sector 

We usually start with local interventions before scaling-up. Our projects create sustainable system impact, such as:

• strengthening of public and private providers of services for labour market insertion,
• facilitation of policy dialogue and stakeholder collaboration,
• strengthening the governance and diversification of services for labour market insertion
• improving quality assurance tools and mechanisms
• improving labour market information systems.

In some cases, these services are linked to unemployment insurance and active labour market measures.