How can you best prepare your clients for the real world? Create a service experience that reflects the reality of the workforce (and what it means to be an employee).
To do this, you need to recreate and replicate a workplace. All too often clients leave our services and aren’t prepared for the workforce.
We need to work together to create people that have a voice, develop their ideas, and can hold a business conversation.
Involve your client in identifying their own employment interests. Implement a service that goes beyond crisis response, beginning the process of working towards employment.
Build a picture of employment.
Reinforce this early on by asking the right questions as early as possible. This helps them understand that employment is a key focus. There should be no closed questions to encourage further conversations. Frame them in a way that the client needs to think for themselves and have an opinion.
Here are a few examples:
- Think about a time when you did something that you enjoyed. Could be a job or something you did in your spare time. What did you enjoy about it?
- Remember a time when you need to do a task and it came naturally. It could be in a job, study or general day-to-day tasks. What was it and what did you find came naturally to you? Have you thought how you could turn this into an employment opportunity? Why or why not?
- What industries or work environments don’t you want to work in and why?
- Think about businesses that you shop at or businesses you just like to visit. Name these and identify why you are interested in these.
- Describe what the ideal job or workplace would look like for you.
Once you start to visualise their employment opportunities, it’s time to explore their skill set. Identify new tactics to help address skill gaps. These might include on-site mentoring, referral into short courses, and employment provider support.
Think about all the skills, talents and knowledge you need to possess within yourself, not only to become employed but to keep a job.
Valuable employability skills include:
- Being able to consistently meet deadlines
- Having relevant and quality conversations with other people
- Asking smart questions and acting on the information given
- Maintaining a certain image and identity that is appropriate and in line with the corporate image
- Taking direction and delivering on the standards and expectations of other people
- Serving other people’s interest and needs – not just your own
- Creating a consistent level of work/output that meets the deadlines and standards of other people
- Making people feel comfortable and at ease
- Being able to address concerns and find solutions
- Being creative when faced with challenges
- Certain level of persistence and commitment to tasks
- Reasonable level of literacy, numeracy and computer skills
- Always being focused on organisational outcomes
- Being able to respond to people in a respectful and mindful manner even when challenged and under pressure
- Respecting other people even if their personalities and opinions differ from our own
- Willing to take chances and try a different approach.
Give your clients the best the chance of gaining (and keeping) a position that’s suited to them. If you need help putting the frameworks in place, talk to us.
At Kiikstart, we’re dedicated to helping people have more choice, influence and control about how they live, work and learn. If you’d like to hear more about what we do, contact us today on 0428 593 400 or enquiries@kiikstart.com.