Greater engagement between the Ministry of Defence (MOD), employers and other organisations is the key to getting service leavers from the UK’s armed forces into work, suggests Hugh Andrée, founder of ex-services recruiter ForceSelect.

Speaking at the launch of ‘Joining Forces’, a report compiled by ForceSelect’s charitable foundation on how to improve resettlement of the UK’s service leavers at the House of Commons yesterday, Andrée said: “It is important to engage more with employers to find out where service leavers can reasonably find employment.”

Andrée said he was working with three or four major employers with a view to involving them in a powerful working group focusing on how to help the UK’s service leavers to find employment. The other members of the working group that Andrée expects to first come together early next year will be the MOD and Andrée himself.

“I will sit in the middle and make it work,” said Andrée. The idea is to set up a pilot scheme, he said, adding: “This is a process of evolution.”

One of the recommendations in the report launched as the UK’s armed forces prepare for large scale redundancies, is that employers offer extended work placements of between three and six months. There should also be better co-operation so employers play a role in designing the skills pathway to employment outside the services.

Andrée said it was also vital to give service personnel more time to prepare for Civvy Street while still serving, though he acknowledged this was difficult given the constant pressure on the UK’s armed forces.

Commander John Warden, the Navy’s head of resettlement, told Recruiter that this was already happening in the Navy. “The aim is to get away from a resettlement package at the end of your career,” he said.

For example, he said that as part of their initial training Navy recruits gained at least a Level 2 Apprenticeship.

Gavin Free, chief executive of the Employability and Skills Group (esg), a provider of skills, apprenticeships and employment services, added: “Using employers to inform the government’s Work Programme is very important.”

Other recommendations from the report were:

• a case management approach based on an individual’s needs not on rank or years of service
• the military covenant between the government and the military should be extended to include local government
• more support to help service leavers with housing

As recruiter.co.uk reported 15 November, the government-funded Career Transition Partnership (CTP), which works to get ex-armed forces personnel into work, reports it is being approached by over 80 new companies a month.