Smoke and Mirrors, The Illusion of the Employment Services Sector pulls back the curtain on the dark side of outcome based, government funded employment services. Despite the billions of tax dollars invested, the sector itself has become a significant barrier to employment for underrepresented groups, the very populations it is funded to serve. With the demand for ‘good news!’ stories to propel governments to election wins, the problem is created by politicians, perpetuated by public servants, and sustained by employment service providers— all magicians behind the illusion.

“Smoke and Mirrors” reveals the secrets that have perpetuated a broken employment system for at least 3 decades. Now is the time for the big reveal as never before has there been such interest in the future of work from so many players: government, employment service providers, education, industry, academia, evaluators, sector-specific associations, and business consultants. No doubt most of these players know the tricks and would like to be part of the solution.

Although there is no silver bullet solution, there are things that can and must be done. In this book, Sarah and Angela present practical solutions - thrivival practices - to nudge the employment service sector in the right direction.

Sarah and Angela use a cheeky and humorous writing style to communicate the very serious issues at hand, and show readers how they can stop being complicit in poor service delivery.

Together, Sarah and Angela bring a corporate memory that spans 3 decades of government funded employment service programming and delivery, primarily in Canada. They have worked with many government departments and thousands of management and front line staff working in hundreds of organizations.

With this book, it is the authors’ hope that their readers will learn they have more power than they think they do to improve their services for marginalized populations.

Sarah Delicate lives in Clarington, Ontario, and Angela Hoyt calls Gananoque, Ontario home.