CAREER CROSS-ROADS
DO YOU NEED EMPLOYMENT COUNSELLING?
Have you come to a career cross-road in your life, when you have to enter the labour market for the
first time, change a career or want to move up the career ladder? Or did some other life event
happen to you, such as that you were recently retrenched, became a person with a disability or
discharged from a correctional facility and this causes you concern regarding how you will earn your
daily living in future? Very often life places barriers in your career path, for which you might need a
little help to navigate your way around.
The Department of Labour, through the Labour Centres, provides an employment counselling service
specifically assisting unemployed and underemployed people finding it hard to obtain an incomegenerating or skills development opportunity to overcome their barriers and prepare them for the
world of work.
What is employment counselling?
Employment counselling aims to activate or re-activate the unemployed and underemployed to
make informed career choices about the world of work, enhance your employability and overcome
your barriers to the world of work, to enter an income-generating or skills development opportunity.
Employment counselling is a process by which you are assisted to identify your own career strengths
to choose an income-generating or skills development opportunity that will be best suited to you.
Career strengths might include careers interests (what are you interested in doing), aptitudes (what
can you do), life or work experience and skills already gained (for example computer skills, fixing
technical equipment, teaching). Careers and labour market information is provided as integral part
of the process, to assist you to make an informed choice for a future or alternative career. The
process also entails raising your employability through further skills development and/or life skills
programmes, such as work ethics and job preparation and the removal of barriers to entry into
employment. A variety of methods are used, such as group employment counselling, self-help
pamphlets, careers exhibitions and job fairs.
How is employment counseling different from career guidance?
Employment counseling is different from career guidance, because it is aimed at the unemployed
and underemployed and how to prepare you to move through a transition or change in your work
life. It is not aimed at learners still at school who must make a once-off choice for further studies,
but rather assists you in times of unemployment and underemployment right through your working
life, from the period of school-leaving to retirement. Employment counselling often also focuses on
people who experience barriers to employment, to overcome these, so as to enter work and skills
development more easily. Employment counselling should ideally have as an end result placement in
an income-generating or skills development opportunity. It therefore serves labour market goals, by
helping people to find work and contributing to alleviating unemployment and poverty and assisting
the most vulnerable to enter employment (employment equity). It also serves human resource
development goals in that it helps people access skills development and contribute to them choosing
suitable learning programmes.
The Department of Labour does not provide employment counselling to learners who must still go to
an educational institution, since the idea is that you must be ready and available to work, before you
can be assisted. There are many other service agents that assist learners and the Labour Centres can
refer you to these. The Department of Labour’s mandate is to assist the unemployed and
underemployed.
Who can be assisted?
All unemployed and underemployed are assisted, but special attention is paid to the following
groups, since they find it particularly hard to access employment:
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Youth-those 16 years and older
Women
People with disabilities
Retrenchees
Soon-to-be-released offenders, ex-offenders, parolees, probationers
Rural people (outreach service)
Entrepreneurs wanting to set up small businesses and co-operatives.
The special needs of the above groups are being addressed in the special employment counseling
programmes. The employment counseling service is a new service of the Department of Labour and
currently still being developed.
What benefits does employment counselling have?
Employment counselling has many benefits for you. You can:
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Obtain an understanding about your own set of abilities, interests, career preferences and
how the work experience and skills you already have, can contribute to a future career or
study choice. This will mean that you will be really happy in your career and will even find it
enjoyable to go to work;
Gain career information so that you can understand exactly what will be expected of you in a
specific career and whether you will enjoy it and be suited to it;
Gain information about the study course you will have to follow, where you can find
bursaries or loans, and how to apply
Gain labour market information, so that you can know which careers are in demand (scarce
skills) and choose a career field in which you will find work;
Receive information on a variety of issues in the world of work in the form of pamphlets;
Gain assistance with decision-making;
Choose a career that matches your true potential;
Choose your own career, so as not to be influenced by what others say or want or choose for
you;
Learn about small business and co-operatives
Receive assistance with job-hunting, CV and interview preparation;
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Receive assistance to enhance your employability by attending a range of life skills
programmes, such as work ethics and dealing with retrenchment;
Be referred to skills development and income-generating opportunities if available;
Be referred to other service agents who can even assist you more;
Can be ensured that your family’s training money is spent wisely and that you do not drop
out of training institutions because the course is too difficult or not what you expected;
What if you experience barriers to employment?
Most people experience barriers in today’s labour market, because the number of jobs in the labour
market is too few for the number of people and the economy does not create enough jobs quickly
enough. It would perhaps be more correct to say that some people experience more barriers than
others. If you have additional barriers, the chances are slimmer that you will be able to compete
with those who have less barriers.
Barriers to entry into the labour market could be issues outside of your control, such as attitudes
and policies of employers or the economy, or inside yourself, such as your own attitudes and limited
skills. The following could be barriers to entry in the labour market:
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You have a general degree such as a BA degree, which is not in demand;
You have no work experience and employers are not willing to give you work experience,
repeating the cycle you find yourself in;
You do not know how to handle an interview if you are called for a job interview to sell
yourself to the employer;
You do not know how to maximize your job-hunting;
You do not have additional skills or attitudes, that can make you attractive to the employer,
such as computer skills or a driver’s licence, work ethics, being a self-starter, good leader or
good organiser;
You could have a criminal record;
You could be a woman and find it difficult to speak up during an interview or to obtain a
promotion;
You could be a person with a disability and find that employers do not want to hire you due
to their lack of understanding of reasonable accommodation;
You are in a state of shock about a retrenchment or recent injury with resultant disability
and have trouble adjusting to that, without even having the energy to think of the future;
You have a good business idea, but do not know how to move forward.
You do not know where to get training for a small business or co-operative
You do not know how to get a loan for your small business or co-operative
The special employment counseling programmes of the Department of Labour is designed to help
you find other possibilities to solve the barriers standing in your way to finding employment. The
Career Counsellors also have databases of other support organisations that can assist you in
overcoming your challenges, to which you can be referred.
What can you expect?
The employment counseling session will be at least two hours long, so it is suggested that you bring
your own water, cool drink or food with you, to prevent that you become too tired and hungry and
lose attention. Also rest well the previous night, so you can make the most of the opportunity. It
might also be necessary that you come back on another day for further information, so be prepared
to pay for transport, since the Department of Labour cannot arrange that. All information about you
will be dealt with confidentially, and you will provide consent if it is to be shared with employers or
training providers who might want to hire or provide skills development to you. The topics covered
in the employment counselling session will differ according to the needs of the group and group
members will be given the opportunity to state their requests for information. It will mostly cover
issues such as career interest, aptitudes, skills, careers information and labour market information or
job-hunting, CV-writing, interviewing skills and work ethics. Some employment counselling sessions
will have a special focus, such as small business and co-operative information only.
Who will assist you?
The Career Counsellor at most of the Labour Centres in the cities and towns throughout South
Africa, has the necessary special training to assist you with employment counselling.
Where can you access employment counselling services?
The employment counseling is provided in the Labour Centre, or very often also in a community hall,
in the correctional facility or community correctional centre, during an exhibition or job fair, at the
employers’ premises (retrenchees), at women, youth and disability interest group venues or during
careers information outreach sessions.
How do you make an appointment?
You can register on the Employment Services system of South Africa (ESSA), the Department of
Labour’s job-matching system by visiting any Labour Centre. You can also phone your closest Labour
Centre and find out which dates have been set aside for employment counselling in general , or for
the special employment counseling programme for the group to whom you belong, in order to make
an appointment for yourself. Contact details for your closest Labour Centre are available from
www.labour.gov.za.
Life is a journey, employment counselling gives you direction!