Companies urged to 'rent' employees to charities to stave off job cuts

Finance | Celina Ribeiro | 7 Jan 2009

Charities can ‘rent' workers from commercial organisations as part of a new online scheme to stave off redundancies.

StaffShare, a Work Wise UK response to the economic downturn, has launched a pilot version this month, two months after delays saw the scheme miss its original November start date.

Rather than make staff redundant, the website encourages companies to offer their under-utilised but skilled workers for short and medium-term secondments to not-for-profit organisations. Not-for-profits can register a staffing need and will have to pay StaffShare a 7.5 per cent commission on the daily wage value of any ‘secondees' taken on.

It aims to deliver a range of employee expertise, with workers touting skills including IT, marketing, public relations and management already on offer.

The scheme will remain exclusively for not-for-profits during the pilot period, scheduled to last until March. However, while expressions of interest in StaffShare have been made by charities, none have yet signed up. A Work Wise UK spokesman told Charity News Alert that third sector organisations may have to compete with the corporate sector for secondments sooner rather than later as high levels of interest from companies could push the site to end its pilot phase early and open up the scheme to all organisations.

With the unemployment rate now at 6 per cent, according to the latest Office of National Statistics figures, the initiative has won the backing of trade union organisation TUC.

Brendan Barber (pictured), secretary general of the TUC, said: "The TUC hopes that lots of organisations sign up to this innovative scheme which will keep people in employment whilst allowing third sector organisations to draw on specialist expertise.

"StaffShare is part of a new approach that is needed if we are to avoid the waste of talent and human tragedies that occur if companies rush prematurely into redundancies when conditions start to get tough."

Who's Who: Celina Ribeiro

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