On 10 June 2020, during the National Bipartite Employment Committee (Commission paritaire nationale pour l’emploi – CPNE), social partners of the French recruitment and agency work sector operationalized a system enabling job seekers to be skilled for professions for which companies encounter difficulties in recruitment. 

The Committee agreed to soften the rules in force to implement such a system called  “operational preparation for collective employment (POEC in French)”. Thanks to this initiative, private employment services may offer agency work candidates for POEC. “These training courses are aimed at both the acquisition of skills related to the professions appearing on the list determined by the CPNE as well as more general training actions promoting the professional inclusion of people (such as in particular the acquisition of transversal skills or preparation for employment)”. Following the training, there is no longer an obligation for the user company to hire the agency worker for a minimum period of six months.

The changes will enter into force on a temporary basis, from 10 June to 31 December 2020.

The recently agreed skilling system will further confirm the relevance of training for the recruitment and agency work sector, which by definition assigns workers to different sectors and companies, and therefore is well placed to assess on the skills in most need vs. the ones less required in the labour market. 

“In 2019, 11,000 POECs were accessed by agency workers. The training lasted between 41 and 400 hours and is used for many various professions in different sectors”.

This measure follows the ones adopted in April and May 2020. Indeed, “through a constructive and effective social dialogue in the sector, two unanimous joint decisions made it possible to issue recommendations intended for private employment agencies, user companies, and employees to inform them of compliance with occupational health and safety rules”. Based on the Committee’s third decision, training was increased by 35 hours and a fund for personal protective equipment for trainees was established.

Prism’emploi, the organisation representing more than 600 companies in the recruitment industry, led these changes. It advanced a further proposal to increase the flexibility of the industry by revising “certain counterproductive measures, such as the waiting period that obliges temporary employees to take a break between two periods of employment”.