European-Works-Council Separation Director

The mandate

A commercial-vehicle group plans to divest a product division spanning shared assembly plants, engineering centres and sales entities in nine European countries. Transaction teams have produced different employee numbers and decision dates, while country leaders are drafting local information without a stable transnational narrative. Management needs a consultation architecture that is factually coherent and respects formal processes without pre-judging outcomes.

The twelve-week deliverable is a transnational workforce fact book, decision-and-consultation map and country-ready management toolkit. Milestone one fixes perimeter, decision status and representative landscape in week three; milestone two reconciles impact data and alternatives in week six; milestone three designs sequencing and response governance in week nine; milestone four delivers approved evidence, country adaptations, risk log and implementation handoff.

The client will provide employee populations, organisation and work-location data, transaction decisions, shared-role dependencies, social plans, collective arrangements, representative agreements, country counsel advice, business alternatives and communication drafts. Acceptance requires figures to reconcile across European and country materials, decision status to be explicit, representative questions to have accountable evidence owners and country teams to reproduce one update after a perimeter change.

Consultants will not provide legal advice, conduct formal consultation, negotiate with representatives, announce decisions, select affected employees or manage the transaction. Management and authorised representatives retain those responsibilities. The team may challenge whether evidence supports a proposed narrative and whether sequencing is operationally feasible, while counsel determines jurisdictional requirements.

Outputs must preserve known facts, proposals, alternatives, unresolved decisions, country variation and employee data protection. One European story cannot erase legitimate local distinctions, and local packs cannot contradict the approved transaction state. Delivery support beyond week twelve, bargaining, social-plan negotiation or individual selection is outside this engagement and requires separate scope.

Why this is external work

Transaction leaders need confidentiality and speed, while country HR teams need accurate information suited to their representative processes. Internal teams are too close to evolving deal assumptions to arbitrate every inconsistency. External transnational employee-relations expertise can create a dependable fact architecture without replacing management negotiators or country counsel.

What you will own

• Reconcile workforce population, location, employing entity, work dependency and proposed transaction treatment across nine countries.
• Map European-level and country representative bodies, agreements, calendars, information dependencies and management decision gates.
• Distinguish decided, proposed, assumed, alternative and unresolved content in every workforce and transaction narrative.
• Build a question-and-evidence system linking representative challenges to accountable business, HR and transaction owners.
• Sequence transnational and country activity around confidentiality, operational cutover and meaningful response time.
• Prepare management toolkits, data tables, leader briefings, adaptation rules and controlled version histories.
• Deliver the fact book, consultation map, response governance, country playbooks, risk log and implementation handoff.

Candidate qualifications

• Led European Works Council and multi-country employee-representation design for a major divestment or restructuring.
• Reconciled employee impact data across shared plants, functions, entities and evolving transaction perimeters.
• Distinguished management decision, proposal and alternative clearly enough to sustain credible workforce information.
• Sequenced transnational and country processes with counsel while avoiding unauthorised legal interpretation or negotiation.
• Built controlled evidence-response systems that management teams used consistently under sustained representative challenge.
• Transferred adaptable country toolkits, version controls and approved facts to internal leaders before live consultation began.

Non-negotiables

• Can conduct six Brussels-led European and country workshops within the twelve-week delivery period.
• Will disclose employer, buyer, works-council, union, law-firm and transaction-adviser relationships.
• Brings transnational separation consultation architecture; single-country redundancy programme experience is insufficient.
• Accepts no authority to advise law, consult formally, negotiate, announce decisions or select employees.

1. 49 words maximum. Describe a transnational consultation where country workforce numbers contradicted the central transaction perimeter.
2. 49 words maximum. How would you label information that management has not yet decided but representatives must understand?
3. 49 words maximum. Which client inputs must remain controlled before country materials can be adapted safely?