Career EAP, outplacement and training for Australian organisations

Boutique, evidence-based, and built around your workforce. For the people you want to keep, and the ones you have to let go well.

Staff turnover is down. That's not the win it looks like.

AHRI's June 2026 Work Outlook puts annual staff turnover at 13.5%, the lowest since tracking began in 2023. In a normal market that reads as retention success.

It isn't. AHRI's CEO put it plainly: workers are choosing stability over movement, and stability is not the same as job satisfaction. Pay rises average 3.1% against inflation at 4.2%. Nobody's leaving because nobody can afford to.

What that looks like on the ground. Quiet quitting is the visible version - effort withdrawn, discretionary energy gone. Quiet cracking is the one that costs you. They're still delivering. Still competent. Still the person you'd trust with the difficult client. And then they fall over, with no warning, because there was never a resignation letter or an exit interview or a conversation where anyone asked how they were actually managing.

What follows is a stress-related claim, extended leave, and a role you have to backfill anyway. You lose the talent either way. This version just costs more.

What a claim actually costs. Safe Work Australia's 2025 statistics report 17,600 serious mental health claims in 2023-24 - 12% of all serious claims, and the fastest-growing category in the dataset, up 161% over the decade.

They're the most expensive claims you can carry. Median compensation $67,400 against $16,300 across all injuries. Median time lost 35.7 working weeks against 7.4. That's someone gone for the better part of a year. In NSW the average psychological injury claim rose from $146,000 to $288,542 in five years.

And it's regulated. Psychosocial hazards are now covered nationally. High job demands and low job control are named hazards you have a legal duty to manage, and work pressure drives around a quarter of mental stress claims. The duty applies whether or not the risk has been identified - not seeing it isn't a defence, and it won't be one in front of a regulator or a court.

It lands unevenly, too. Mental health conditions account for 17.2% of women's work-related injury and illness, against 8.2% for men. Women in midlife are carrying more outside paid work than at any other career stage - ageing parents, teenagers, the household admin nobody counts - and moving through reproductive health transitions that materially affect sleep, cognition and capacity.

Almost nobody is talking to you about it. The Menodoctor Survey of over 5,000 Australian women found 82% said menopause negatively affected their work, only 9% told their employer the real reason they were struggling, and just 12% felt supported. Circle In found 70% wouldn't raise it with their manager at all - while 52% said a manager who simply understood would have made a real difference.

So the conversation isn't happening, and the claim arrives instead.

This service opens that door. It gives your people somewhere to have the conversation, and gives you a way into it without needing to become an expert in something you were never trained for. One provider, doing work that sits between wellbeing and career and currently falls through the gap between the two.

The economics of doing something. The Productivity Commission found an average return of $2.30 for every dollar invested in workplace mental health. Comcare's research on workplace wellness programs found sick leave down 25.3% and workers' compensation costs down 40.7%.

Career EAP works on the job-demand and capacity end of this, while they're still in the building and while it's still cheap to fix.

So what is this, exactly?

Career development is a professional discipline with theory, ethics and a professional body behind it. In an organisational setting, it's the work of helping someone make sense of their working life while they're still in it.

That means:

  • Getting clear on direction and whether the role still fits

  • An honest look at workload, capacity and what's actually sustainable

  • Making real decisions rather than drifting toward an exit

  • Re-engaging with the job on terms that hold

  • Moving through transition without it becoming a crisis

It's non-clinical and future-focused. It sits alongside your existing EAP rather than duplicating it - EAP handles what someone brings from home, this handles what the work itself is generating.

It's not coaching. It's not therapy. And it's not a workshop that everyone enjoys and nobody remembers by Thursday.

Who this works for

  • Organisations who want to keep experienced people rather than replace them

  • Teams going through change, restructure or uncertainty

  • Employers who've noticed something is off but can't name it from an engagement survey

  • Anyone who already has an EAP and can see it isn't reaching the work-related stuff

  • Small businesses and single teams inside larger organisations - this doesn't require a head count to be worth doing

Who this isn't for

  • Organisations wanting volume-based, transactional delivery

  • Anyone after a fixed program with no room to adapt

  • Employers looking for a one-off session to demonstrate that something was done

If that last one sounds like where you are, I'd rather say so now than take the booking.

How it works

There are a few ways this shows up. Career EAP for people still in the building who need support to stay well in the work. Outplacement when roles genuinely go. And training or speaking for teams and leaders who need to understand what's happening to their experienced people before it becomes a claim.

The first two draw on the same method, which is set out below. Every organisation and every person arrives differently, so it isn't a fixed program, but it moves through recognisable stages.

1. Orientation and clarity

We work out what's actually happening for the person - what's shifted, what's driving the disengagement or the exhaustion, and what they haven't been able to say out loud yet.

2. Capacity and context

An honest look at workload, health, energy and everything they're carrying outside the job. Specifically the gap between what someone is capable of and what they can sustain, which are two different numbers and only one of them shows up in a performance review.

3. Career identity and direction

We work through what they're good at, what still matters to them, and what's genuinely not working in the current role or pathway.

4. Decision-making and planning

This is where the paths separate. For someone staying, it's role redesign, internal mobility, a sideways move, or staying put with different boundaries. For someone leaving, it's what comes next and how to get there. Either way it's grounded in actual Australian labour market conditions rather than wishful thinking.

5. Practical tools and career communication

Where relevant, resumes, LinkedIn and interview preparation - built with the person as an upskilling process, not written for them as a transaction. They leave able to do it themselves next time. This matters most in outplacement, where the market is the immediate problem.

How engagements work

Flexible, because organisations aren't shaped the same way.

  • One-to-one sessions for individual employees, whether that's ongoing support or a defined block

  • Small group work where several people are moving through the same change

  • Outplacement packages scaled to the number of affected roles

  • Training and briefings for leaders and HR teams who want to spot this earlier

  • Ad hoc or ongoing - some organisations use this as a standing referral option, others bring me in for a specific period

Delivered online, which works across multiple sites and for regional or distributed teams without travel costs. I'm based in Albury-Wodonga and work in person across the region, and elsewhere by negotiation if you need boots on the ground.

Let's Talk About What's Possible

Meet the Founder and Professional Career Development Practitioner, Narelle Vigor

Organisations come to me because they want career support that's professional and adaptable rather than a standardised program delivered to a spreadsheet.

My background spans corporate, education, small business and self-employment, across both major cities and regional Australia. That matters more than it sounds - geography changes what's actually possible for someone, and a national program designed in Sydney often doesn't survive contact with a workforce in Wagga.

I spent over five years subcontracting to a large national outplacement provider and working within Defence transition programs. So I know how large-scale services operate, and I know exactly where the standardised model stops being useful.

As a boutique provider I can build around your workforce rather than around my delivery model. I'm a Registered Professional Career Development Practitioner with the Career Industry Council of Australia and a professional member of the Career Development Association of Australia.

If you're not sure what you need, or you've got something specific in mind, let's talk it through.

Book a Complimentary Consult

Your Questions, Answered

  • Outplacement support is a structured service provided by an employer to help employees transition to new employment after redundancy, restructure, or organisational change. It typically includes career direction support, job search strategy, résumé and LinkedIn development, interview preparation, and practical labour market guidance in the Australian context.

  • This is a boutique, tailored service rather than a standardised, high-volume model. Support is adapted to your organisation’s context and each individual’s circumstances. The focus is on building capability and confidence, not simply producing documents or delivering generic workshops.

  • Yes. Outplacement can support employees exiting through redundancy, redeployment outcomes, end-of-contract, and other organisational change scenarios. The service is adjusted depending on the circumstances, timing, and support needs.

  • Yes. Services are delivered online, supporting employees anywhere in Australia, including metropolitan, regional, and remote locations. This allows consistency across multi-site or distributed workforces.

  • Outplacement support may include:

    • Career clarification and direction setting

    • Skills identification and transferable skills translation

    • Résumé and cover letter development (as an upskilling process)

    • LinkedIn profile development

    • Interview preparation and selection support

    • Job search strategy, including Australian labour market alignment

    • Confidence and career communication support

    Inclusions are tailored to organisational needs and employee cohorts.

  • Résumé support is included where relevant, but it is delivered as a collaborative upskilling process. Employees learn how to articulate their experience and adapt their documents over time, rather than relying on a one-off transactional writing service.

  • Career transition can be emotionally and practically challenging. This service is non-clinical and does not replace medical or psychological care, but it is delivered with care, professionalism, and pacing that respects the employee’s capacity and circumstances. Where needed, employees are encouraged to access clinical supports through appropriate channels.

  • Confidentiality is handled professionally and respectfully. Individual sessions focus on the employee’s career direction and transition needs. Organisational reporting, where requested, is typically provided in a de-identified, aggregated format aligned with your organisation’s requirements.

  • Yes. Outplacement can be delivered through individual sessions, small-group sessions, or a blended model. This is often useful where organisations are supporting multiple affected employees while still providing personalised guidance.

  • Outplacement can support:

    • Faster re-employment outcomes for employees

    • Improved confidence and career clarity

    • Reduced reputational risk during workforce change

    • More ethical and dignified transition experiences

    • Better workforce trust during organisational change

    Outcomes vary by individual circumstances and labour market conditions, but structured support typically reduces uncertainty and improves readiness.

Next Steps

Thirty minutes, no charge. Bring what you're seeing - the person you're worried about, the restructure coming, the engagement scores that don't add up - and I'll tell you whether this helps and what that would look like.

If it's not the right fit, I'll say so.

Book a Complimentary Consult Here