Smart Workforce Solutions

Layoffs, Downsizing, & the WARN Act

Services to Businesses Facing Downsizing 

The Missouri Career Center is here to help your business in the good times and the not-so-good times. If you find your company facing a reduction in your workforce, our Rapid Response program may be just what you need.

Rapid Response is a strategy designed to respond to major layoffs and plant closings by quickly coordinating services and providing immediate aid to affected companies and their workers. Rapid Response teams will work with your company to customize public and private efforts to minimize the disruptions of a major layoff on your company, affected workers, and the community.Employers who are expecting a layoff or plant closing, or who wish to learn more about the services Rapid Response can provide to businesses should contact the Rapid Response Coordinator at 417-629-3000.

The more quickly Rapid Response is begun, the more time is available for workers to overcome their fears and begin their re-entry into the workforce. Early intervention allows employers and workers to communicate about worker concerns, to take advantage of services to transition workers to new employment, to initiate peer worker projects, and to identify, design and oversee layoff aversion and incumbent worker strategies. Rapid Response services are customized to each layoff and to each company’s needs and expectations, and most services are provided without cost to the employer.

During Rapid Response, specialists in helping workers cope with job change will gather information on workers’ needs and begin to organize the services necessary to help you get back to work. Additionally, Rapid Response on-site meetings will introduce workers to representatives of many other programs that can help them in the time of transition. Perhaps the most important of these Rapid Response partners is the array of job seeker services in the Career Center.

Meeting Governmental Reporting Requirements for Layoffs

Under certain conditions, the Worker Adjustment and Retraining Notification (WARN) Act requires employers to give their workers 60 days notice before a plant closing or mass layoff. All employers are encouraged to provide notice to the State Dislocated Worker Unit as quickly as possible. Some States also have plant closure laws, and those state laws may be different. The local Rapid Response Coordinator can assist with the referral for state reporting of larger layoffs.  A state-level contact and resource page is also available online.

Layoffs Caused by Foreign Trade

The Rapid Response team will work with your company to provide information on the Trade Adjustment Act and the benefits your workers can receive if the layoffs are a result of foreign trade. Your company, the Rapid Response team, or the workers themselves can file a trade petition with the United States Department of Labor. The local Rapid Response Coordinator can provide the referral for businesses or job seekers interested in Trade Act services.