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Boilerplate
The Center for Employment Opportunities (CEO) has for over 30 years offered immediate, effective and comprehensive employment services exclusively to men and women with criminal records. CEO’s programs help participants regain the workplace skills and confidence needed for a successful transition to a stable, productive life. During the past 10 years, CEO has made 10,000 placements in hundreds of New York City businesses. Findings from an independent, random-assignment evaluation of CEO programs show that people who enroll in CEO have significantly lower rates of recidivism on a variety of measures—including a 40 percent reduction in reincarceration for a new crime—two years after joining the program, an effect rarely seen in rigorous studies such as the one CEO underwent.
The CEO Model in Brief
Step 1: Transitional Work: CEO provides immediate, time-limited, paid employment for people coming home with criminal records. The type of work tends to be that which a person can learn relatively quickly, like maintenance, repair and grounds keeping work. Transitional work serves as an employment lab, teaching employees how to work. On the work site, people learn the workforce behavior skills that employers say they most want in the entry-level workforce, including showing up on time, taking direction from a supervisor, being a good co-worker, working hard, and using good communication skills. During the last three years, over 8,000 individuals have participated in CEO’s transitional work program, and CEO has provided valuable maintenance, repair, grounds keeping and light demolition work to its government agency customers through a cost effective, innovative, earned income model.
Step 2: Job Placement—Entering the Permanent Work World. CEO serves as a free-of-charge employment agency and human resource support provider, supplying qualified entry-level employees from our pool of participants. CEO participants stay on transitional jobs for an average of two months before being placed in stable, full time jobs. In the last year alone, CEO has worked with 500 New York City area employers in industries as diverse as food services; retail/wholesale; manufacturing; human services; construction; maintenance; and warehouse.
Step 3: Job Retention, Support and Follow-Up Services. Job retention and follow up are essential to the success of CEO and our clients. CEO’s incentive-based job retention program, Rapid Rewards, provides monthly cash payments to all participants who sign up for the program and attain certain employment milestones. Participants also get workplace counseling, crisis management and long term career planning from a team of CEO retention specialists. Currently, retention efforts follow a participant for one year after placement into an unsubsidized, full time job. In the last two years, CEO has almost doubled its six month employment retention rate to 60% of those who started a full time job.
The Center for Employment Opportunities (CEO), was launched as a demonstration project by the Vera Institute of Justice in the 1970s to test this idea: what would happen if, instead of meeting barriers to employment, people coming home from prison or jail were offered immediate paid transitional work. CEO, an independent nonprofit organization as of 1996, is dedicated to providing immediate, effective and comprehensive employment services to men and women with recent criminal convictions in New York City. Our highly structured and tightly supervised programs help participants regain the skills and confidence needed for a successful transition to a stable, productive life.
The CEO Model in Brief
Step 1: Transitional Work: CEO provides immediate, time-limited, paid employment for people coming home with criminal records. The type of work tends to be that which a person can learn relatively quickly, like maintenance, repair and grounds keeping work. Transitional work serves as an employment lab, teaching employees how to work. On the work site, people learn the workforce behavior skills that employers say they most want in the entry-level workforce, including showing up on time, taking direction from a supervisor, being a good co-worker, working hard, and using good communication skills. During the last three years, over 8,000 individuals have participated in CEO’s transitional work program, and CEO has provided valuable maintenance, repair, grounds keeping and light demolition work to its government agency customers through a cost effective, innovative, earned income model.
Step 2: Job Placement—Entering the Permanent Work World. CEO serves as a free-of-charge employment agency and human resource support provider, supplying qualified entry-level employees from our pool of participants. CEO participants stay on transitional jobs for an average of two months before being placed in stable, full time jobs. In the last year alone, CEO has worked with 500 New York City area employers in industries as diverse as food services; retail/wholesale; manufacturing; human services; construction; maintenance; and warehouse.
Step 3: Job Retention, Support and Follow-Up Services. Job retention and follow up are essential to the success of CEO and our clients. CEO’s incentive-based job retention program, Rapid Rewards, provides monthly cash payments to all participants who sign up for the program and attain certain employment milestones. Participants also get workplace counseling, crisis management and long term career planning from a team of CEO retention specialists. Currently, retention efforts follow a participant for one year after placement into an unsubsidized, full time job. In the last two years, CEO has almost doubled its six month employment retention rate to 60% of those who started a full time job.
The Center for Employment Opportunities (CEO), was launched as a demonstration project by the Vera Institute of Justice in the 1970s to test this idea: what would happen if, instead of meeting barriers to employment, people coming home from prison or jail were offered immediate paid transitional work. CEO, an independent nonprofit organization as of 1996, is dedicated to providing immediate, effective and comprehensive employment services to men and women with recent criminal convictions in New York City. Our highly structured and tightly supervised programs help participants regain the skills and confidence needed for a successful transition to a stable, productive life.
