SESA Takes Lead with Active Labor Market Measures
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On October 14, 2008, through the support of the USAID Social Protection Systems Strengthening Project (SPSS), as well as other public and private partners, the State Employment Service Agency (SESA) of the RA Ministry of Labor and Social Issues (MLSI) held its 4th Job Fair – this time in Gyumri. The Job Fair attracted 41 employers and over 1000 job seekers. 150 current vacancies were advertized, and employers collected CVs for anticipated openings, as well.
Armenia’s largest job fair was held in Yerevan last year with SPSS showing SESA the steps to organize it. The Yerevan fair in October 2007 attracted 5,000 job seekers and 100 employers in a venue, where labor market demand and supply could meet. The 2007 job fair gave SESA a unique opportunity to promote its infrastructures and services as it develops an active employment strategy. SPSS provided considerable employer and job seeker training so each could make the most of the opportunity.
Since October 2007, SESA has conducted 3 job fairs in May-June 2008 in Yerevan, Goris and Abovyan with active participation by its various partners, resulting in filling 223 job vacancies out of 600 within 3 months. Evaluations proved that the employers started perceiving the job fairs as an efficient human resource management tool, while providing valuable exposure of their businesses, and the job seekers could not overestimate the role of job fairs as the best facility to find jobs quickly.
Based on the success of the SESA-implemented Job fairs in 2008, six more are budgeted under State funding for 2009. Ms. Sona Harutyunyan, the Head of State Employment Service Agency, stated that Gyumri was selected in 2008 because it has the highest unemployment rate in the country, 12.9 percent. One of SESA’s purposes is to give the opportunity to every single citizen the freedom of selecting the job they want, as stipulated under the Armenian Constitution.
Job fairs allow job seekers to understand their choices. One of the main directions of USAID SPSS Project support is to build the capacity of SESA to roll out active labor measures in Armenia, which include job fairs, job clubs, group job search, employer services, labor market surveys and internal performance measures. The core management principles for active measures are customer services efficiently provided, with continuous improvement and accountability. SPSS and SESA fruitful cooperation resulted in increasing responsive approaches by SESA to the job seekers’ and employers’ needs.
