• Integrating business development services with cooperatives and social and solidarity economy enterprises. This helps in terms of resources and risk-sharing, particularly for MSME owners and entrepreneurs. Cooperative formation will also increase the willingness of service providers, including commercial banks, to serve entrepreneurs who might fit into higher risk categories. 

• Linking cooperative structures to finance as a measure of sustainability. In Ethiopia, PROSPECTS established a partnership with a local commercial bank as part of the programme. Meanwhile, incorporating financial education into cooperative training to enhance members’ financial literacy played a key part in various programmes.

• Positioning cooperatives as entry points for service delivery and outreach in areas like labour rights, occupational safety and health (OSH) and social protection. For example, in Jordan, services were provided through cooperatives, including through the Agricultural Guidance and Employment Units (AGEUs).

• Cooperatives can operate as employment centres within high-performing agriculture cooperatives, offering career guidance and job-matching services that reflect the daily and seasonal characteristics of employment in the sector.

• In Ethiopia, Kenya, Uganda and Sudan, cooperative structures were supported as a part of value-chain development. This involved helping individual refugee and host community producers/farmers organize into collective groups where they could pool resources and production and therefore gain both bargaining power with buyers and access to markets.

• Cooperatives can be formed in the process of implementing EIIP. For example, in Kenya, cobblestone technology was introduced to install and repair roads, using an EIIP approach linked to TVET courses in cobblestone paving, maintenance and related works as part of efforts to expand vocational training in refugee-hosting areas. In the first rollout of the programme, 50 young people were trained in paving. These same trainees were also supported in forming a workers’ cooperative, so that they could collectively manage the work. In Ethiopia, 16 graduates from a technical vocational course on cobblestone paving were in the process of forming a cooperative with a view to being issued a trial contract to complete a 500-metre cobblestone road in Kebribeyah. 

• Facilitating access to finance through Village Savings and Loan Associations (VSLAs), which provide rotating loans to cooperative members.

• Because employment services play an intermediary role between workers and employers, they are, out of necessity, integrated within wider employment and business development support. For job-seekers interested in self-employment rather than waged employment, referrals into BDS can help them develop business plans and related skills. For instance, in Uganda, rural employment services were run with employment and business development officers. This helped provide labour market information and guidance to refugee and host community entrepreneurs who were starting or interested in scaling up their businesses. It included referral into business training and business plan competitions.

• Connecting cooperatives and social and solidarity economy enterprises with BDS can help members improve social and economic objectives. MSME owners and entrepreneurs may also benefit from operating in a cooperative structure, which can support the pooling of resources and risk-sharing. A cooperative structure will also increase the willingness of service providers, including commercial banks, to service entrepreneurs who might fit into higher-risk categories.

• BDS should be operated alongside other programmatic areas that support a holistic enterprise development support system, notably access to finance and partnership with financial institutions that are able to serve refugees. Several countries sequenced SIYB and other BDS training with financial education and the provision of financial products.

• BDS can support value-chain development by helping actors along the value chain establish and scale up enterprises, often taking advantage of value addition. 

• BDS can also support construction contractors who are involved in employment intensive investment programmes (EIIP). Contractors involved in EIIP are local businesses, so they too can benefit from BDS to manage and scale up their operations. The ILO already supports contractor training from the perspective of increasing capacity to bid for EIIP contracts, but contractors can also benefit from BDS.

• As young people participating in Job Search Clubs (JSC) explore their own interests and capacities, they may find they are more suited to self-employment than waged employment, in which case having a pathway to other types of BDS is advantageous. 

Skills profiling tools help identify job-seekers whose skill sets are better suited to business development services. The link with SIYB can be particularly useful, because of the limited formal-sector job opportunities in the areas where PROSPECTS operates. In many cases, entrepreneurship serves as one of the few viable livelihood pathways for young refugees and host community members. 

• EIIP workers may be interested in starting their own construction-related businesses. A referral pathway to business development services tools such as SIYB could be a valuable add-on, ensuring that skills acquired during the EIIP continue to be used to good effect and are not lost. 

• PROSPECT has been able to support the formation of contractor cooperatives as part of EIIP interventions. In Kenya, young people who were trained in paving were also supported in forming a workers’ cooperative, so that they could collectively manage contracts and serve as subcontractors for more construction work in EIIP and public works in the future. 

• Access to Public Employment Services can help EIIP workers transition into long-term employment and navigate opportunities for upskilling and certification.

• Work-based Learning (WBL) can also link to EIIPs, where skills learned in training can be applied within the EIIP as part of WBL. For example, in Iraq, the EIIP work provided an opportunity for TVET students to apply their skills in practice in installing solar panels, painting, plastering, gardening and masonry. Selected candidates first underwent life-skills training facilitated by UNICEF and EIIP theoretical training supported by the ILO, followed by practical rehabilitation of the TVET centres themselves. 

• When developing value chains in the agriculture sector, as demonstrated in Ethiopia, building infrastructure can improve connectivity to market, which can link to EIIP intervention to address quality or inadequate storage issues. This positions EIIP within a wider market system. 

• EIIP can also be an entry point to build awareness of labour-intensive methods, laying the path for future collaboration and implementation with a range of partners. For example:
  • in Ethiopia an awareness-raising session with UNICEF, including contractors employed by the organization, included information on the EIIP strategy in UNICEF school construction and expansion projects;  
  • in Uganda, the project partnered with UNHCR to construct community centres, which also served as centres for Mental Health and Psychosocial Support (MHPSS) and employment services. PROSPECTS led on the construction side, using an EIIP approach, while UNHCR helped identify and refer refugee workers to work on the sites;
  • in Iraq, UNICEF referred young engineers who had participated in its life-skills training to opportunities to serve as EIIP site monitors. UNICEF had to understand what EIIP entailed, so that it could make informed referrals of young people, particularly young engineers, and avoid raising the expectations of those who did not meet the required profile. Establishing a common understanding with partners on what EIIP entails is essential in such joint operations. 
     

• Beyond referrals of job-seekers to skills training, clear links were made between skills profiling and developing the capacities of employment officers, whether through training career counsellors and employment officers in the use of profiling tools such as SkillLab, or introducing European Classification of Skills, Competencies, Qualifications and Occupations (ESCO) to help determine the skills needs of employers. 

• Cooperative representatives were engaged to collect information on job vacancies among their members. 

• People participating in employment services training sometimes decide to start their own business after the training, so it’s important in that case to point them towards enterprise training. For instance, in Uganda, rural employment services were run with employment and business development officers. This helped provide labour market information and guidance to refugee and host community entrepreneurs who were starting or interested in scaling up their businesses. It included referrals to business training and business plan competitions. On the other hand, people taking BDS may discover that they would be better off seeking employment, so they need to be referred to employment services.

• Employment services can help make referrals and screen youth candidates for work-based learning (WBL) programmes running in the area. 

•  Job Search Clubs (JSC) can be delivered as active labour market programmes (ALMPs) for young people.

• Access to public employment services can support EIIP workers through the process of formal employment, which may involve getting a work permit or having their skills profiled and matched to the type of labour needed. It can also support their transition from EIIP work, to more permanent employment.

Information about labour rights and international labour standards can also be incorporated  into employment services. For example, PROSPECTS Jordan trained cooperative representatives to play a role in providing information on labour rights and collecting follow-up information on the conditions of work where placements had been made. Similarly, in Lebanon, training with the community development centre (CDC) staff also includes employment service delivery and rights at work. 

• WBL is part of TVET, so its operations should align with national recognition and certification systems. WBL may be followed by RPL or skills recognition, as this makes job-seekers’ existing knowledge and skills more visible to employers. If people have skills profiles or certifications, it will also be easier to refer them to WBL and to screen candidates.

• Employment service providers can be an important contact point for WBL candidates. Not only can they help advertise and make referrals into WBL programmes, they can also conduct skills profiling that helps screen candidates. This includes PES, as well as career guidance offices in schools, universities and training centres.

• PROSPECTS Iraq introduced Job Search Clubs (JSC) after it had already rolled out SIYB and work-based learning (WBL) with the Ministry of Youth and Sport and the Ministry of Labour and Social Affairs, which created a natural link between JSC and WBL as well. 

• WBL can also link to Employment-Intensive Invest Programmes (EIIP), where the practical application of skills can be applied. For example, in Iraq, an EIIP that rehabilitated MOLSA TVET centres and MOYS youth centres provided an opportunity for practical application of skills in solar-panel and air-conditioning installation and maintenance, painting and gardening. Even though using WBL trainees meant it took more time and cost more to complete the work than using EIIP workers from the general population, this approach provided the trainees with practical opportunities and work experience. Similarly, in Ethiopia, a two-month theoretical training course on cobblestone installation concluded with the students helping to install cobblestones in the pathways leading to a TVET satellite centre that the programme had installed with the Jigjiga Polytechnic College.

• Having links to business development services – whether through referral to the ILO’s own programming or to that of PROSPECTS partners, INGOs or national institutions – can help individuals progress along career paths that align with their interests.

• Skills profiling tools can be integrated into employment services to better access rural and refugee hosting areas. This was done in Uganda via mobile caravans for RPL candidates in rural areas that were remote from RPL assessment centres.

• Skills profiling can also help identify skill sets among jobseekers who are better suited to entrepreneurship than waged employment. Referrals can be made to business development services, such as Start and Improve Your Business (SIYB) training.

• There are clear links between Employment Intensive Investment Programmes (EIIP) and skills profiling, where TVET training institutions play a role in developing the skills of workers to build and maintain infrastructure work. For the purpose of skills recognition, where courses end in formal certification of skills, this can help EIIP workers transition into longer-term work in the construction sector. For instance, in Kenya, PROSPECTS partnered with the Vocational Training Centre and Department of Public Works in Lodwar to establish a cobblestone production training course, targeting young people who participated in EIIP. In Uganda, EIIP was used to construct multi-purpose community centres inside refugee settlements, which provided employment services to the settlement’s residents.

• Skills recognition processes emphasize that learning happens in a wide variety of contexts and situations. These include formal learning, often in a recognized institution and which is designed to produce specific learning outcomes and lead to a nationally recognized certification. They also include non-formal learning, which is intentional learning but often not certified, such as short training courses undertaken in the workplace, apprenticeships in the informal economy, or short courses offered by civil society organizations and other actors. They can also encompass informal or experiential learning, which occurs through work experience. RPL assessment and certification are conducted according to occupational, qualification, or industry standards that reflect the competencies required for a given profession at a certain level.

• RPL training can also be used to provide information on labour rights, including occupational safety and health, that is targeted to the profession and occupation that the candidate is pursuing. Though this is not standard to RPL, the PROSPECTS-supported training course launched prior to RPL assessments often introduced modules on labour law and occupational safety and health (OSH).

• Cooperative representatives can help collect information about job vacancies among their members. 

• There's a connection between financial inclusion and the extension of social protection, in that refugees’ inability to open and own a bank account can be a barrier to their participation where social protection benefits are paid into bank accounts. 

• Financial inclusion was also pursued based on needs identified within value-chain development initiatives. For example, in Ethiopia's milk value chain, producer cooperatives were enabled to open bank accounts, and a digital platform was introduced to facilitate direct payments between producers and processors. 

• Incorporating financial education into cooperative training to enhance members’ financial literacy plays a key part in various cooperative training programmes. For example, linking cooperative structures to finance was also a measure of sustainability, as shown in Ethiopia, where PROSPECTS established a partnership with a local commercial bank. 

• Operating business development services (BDS) alongside other programmatic areas is best done in a holistic enterprise development support system, notably including access to finance and partnership with financial institutions that are able to serve refugees. 

• Financial education is often incorporated into broader enterprise development initiatives such as Start and Improve your Business (SIYB), business training and cooperative training. This approach ensures that people gain financial skills alongside business skills, enabling them to make informed borrowing decisions.
• The programme incorporated digital payment methods into financial inclusion initiatives such as Digitalise your Business (DYB) training.