Speaking about education, the company Železiarne Podbrezová is interesting in several ways:

• It has founded of a secondary metallurgic school (which works also as a Centre of VET for metallurgy, engineering and electrical engineering) 
• It has founded a secondary comprehensive school
• It has launched, together with the Office of Labour, Social Affairs and Family, a pilot project bringing work and learning to long-term unemployed

Železiarne Podbrezová, is  one of the biggest employers in Central Slovakia, with some 3200 employees. Another 1000 people work in daughter and associated companies. 3% of the employees are of Roma origin. At the moment a number of people at the company are retiring or leaving for other jobs. The company is looking for new employees. The labour market in the region is limited. Should they turn abroad and invite Ukrainians or Serbians as many other companies do now or address the local Roma people?

The Roma people compose the biggest part of the low-qualified and long-term unemployed people. They are losing their work habits and are difficult to employ.

How to help them?

Make them return back to school? Most of them are early drop-outs with no good memories of school years. The Slovak Plenipotentiary for the Roma Communities sees the problem in the fact that „we write off many people already in their childhood because they are diagnosed with light intellectual disability. These kids then follow a special school and there are not many options where to go further, just some 2 year programs at VET schools. The schools work well, but mainly produce workers for unskilled positions. And many of the Roma children are enrolled in special schools just because they do not speak good Slovak or do not adapt well in new school environment.“

To set up special employment? The long-term unemployed people need some time to adapt to working conditions, learn how to assess the quality of their work, etc. To do this, they need time and support. The social enterprises, transitional labour market enterprises can help as they employ people for limited period of time while they gradually learn and get used to working.

In Železiarne Podbrezová they started a project called „Chance for Everyone“ which makes it possible to employ up to 70 new people. The Office of Labour, Social Affairs and Family in Brezno called up the registered job seekers, others came upon the invitation of the company. The first round of competition welcame some 300 people. They were shown a film on the work in the ironworks and those who stayed interested went further through the competition and medical checks.

The employer then signs a work contract with the selected job seekers for 6 months, with a 3 month probation period. If they succeed, they will be offered an unlimited work contract, and can be promoted to more demanding work positions. During the first 3 months they will be paid directly by the Železiarne, but then they can become a part of the project, lasting 12 months. It means they will be supervised by coordinators who will work with them individually and patiently, stresses the management of the ironworks.

The first experience from the first quarter of 2019 says that there were some absencies by new employees and also it was discovered, that not all of them could write and count properly. Here come in the mentors/Roma coordinators who help the new employees withe various things, teach them and make their integration in the enterprise possible. The company for example set up a different wage system – weekly payments so that the new employees learn how to manage their money. Also other measures are helpful, like covering travel expenses and grocery shopping via special pre-paid  cards.

Conclusions?

Clearly, we are going in direction of individualised approach. When there is a possibilty to pay attention to employing long-term unemployed and support them so that they gradually acquire working habits and other skills (payments, saving, transportation...) it is for the benefit of the employer as well as a new employee. However, this is doable for large employers who have capacities to set up special schemes for a group of new employees. In case of smaller employers it would be helpful to have an intermediatery agency that would take care of these support functions. In any case, the joint effort  of „working and teaching/learning“ seems to be a way forward in reachin gout to long-term / low-qualified  unemploed people.