Lanzaderas de Empleo

Promoters:

José María Pérez "Peridis", Fundación Santa María la Real del Patrimonio Histórico.

Country:

Spain

A peer-to-peer support system of heterogeneous teams of unemployed people who, working through commitment and solidarity, reinforce skills, generate collective knowledge, become visible and collaborate in order to obtain employment.

What solution does the innovation propose?

The initiative aims to remove unemployed people from isolation, loneliness, discouragement and invisibility and, using teamwork and peer-to-peer mentoring, move them into a proactive attitude to finding work. The unemployed participants help each other and, with support from society, find the energy, motivation and knowledge needed to succeed. Specifically, Lanzaderas de Empleo (Employment Shuttles, in English) seeks to promote: - Personal development and self-esteem. - Employability, through the development professional skills. - Entrepreneurial spirit. - Connection to the environment.

Recognitions

This Works Summit by Ashoka (2016). Gran Cruz de la Orden Civil, Spanish Government (2016). José María Pérez "Peridis" is an Ashoka fellow (2008).

Impact evidence

Outputs

Since the programme was launched in 2013 until May 2017, 362 Employment Shuttles were set up throughout Spain, reaching more than 7,000 unemployed people.

Outcomes

The average job insertion rate for participants is over 60%.
Participants obtain better, longer and more satisfactory job contracts than other unemployed people in Spain.

SROI

Each Euro invested in the project yields € 2.8 of socio-economic value.

Sources

Data provided by the organisation and an external study that compared results using a comparison group: Fundación Telefonica (2016) “Evaluación del impacto social de las Lanzaderas de Empleo. Programa de empleabilidad joven de Fundación Telefónica”.

How does it work?

Teams of 20 people of different profiles are created to support each other to find a job. A set programme of activities is carried out free of charge in a suitable, stable place with the support of a competent professional coach and under the responsibility of a public or private institution. The teams’ overall objective is to seek employment, but also to promote entrepreneurship and update professional and personal skills through supportive, peer-to-peer collaboration. At the heart of the programme is the participants’ commitment to help each other. The coach facilitates the process, planting the seeds for professional and personal growth and empowering participants to lead the programmes themselves. The programme lasts for five months and has a fixed schedule (four hours a day, three or four days a week), covering self-awareness, planning and action. Individual coaching is oriented to the development of skills, active job search strategies, emotional intelligence… Most of the time is devoted to practical group sessions where participants work as a company structured into departments in which each member has a particular responsibility. The team visits companies and presents the project, seeking employment for all of its members. When participants find a job they remain committed to the programme for its full duration. Teams across Spain are connected for mutual support.