Nokia Bridge Programme
How to deal with redundancy
Overview
Nokia Bridge is a program to support employees who as a result of restructuring are leaving (or are due to leave) their roles within Nokia. It aims to create meaningful opportunities for individuals and local economies. The company has taken a proactive approach to what can be a very difficult and painful process. The program includes investing time, money and expertise to substantially support re-employment in order to ease the burden during a difficult time for its employees. It offers a wide range of opportunities, possibilities and support which can fuel new growth for those communities which are impacted.
Impact
Affected employees are given access to the Bridge program immediately. 20 Bridge centres have been set up at sites across Nokia in 10 countries including China, Finland, India, Romania and USA. In addition to offering re-training, CV workshops and courses, Nokia runs targeted job fairs where local businesses can meet suitable candidates. Bridge offers training support and seed funding/support to those starting their own business, valued up to 25k per individual or up to 100k per start-up. Nokia has also awarded patents to some start-ups from its own portfolio.
Innovation
The foremost aim of Bridge is to help the employees to find their next step in life. However, there are also other areas that need to be taken into account. Communicating with local communities is an important consideration. Site and factory changes often mean local areas are affected as much as individuals. The Bridge Program works with local authorities to minimise disruption, building links with local businesses finding re-employment, training and start-up opportunities for employees.[/one_half_last]
Insight
What has not worked as you hoped; what you would do differently with the benefit of hindsight.
Perversely the greater the breakdown and the more dramatic the learning outcome, the better. Ideally though it is a learning insight that would be of value to the conference audience to hear about, so they could avoid the same pitfall.
Inspiration
The Nokia business has also benefitted from the Bridge program: the Nokia N9 and the first Windows Phone, the Nokia Lumia, were accomplished by teams who over achieved their targets during a time of great change in a large way due to the security network that they knew Bridge would provide them.[/one_half_last]
Speaker
Jennifer Rawsthorn
Head of Workforce Management
Nokia