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Identifying Skills & Upskilling
The process of Upskilling is learning new skills which will aid you in your current and future roles. The use of technology has allowed people to upskill themselves at much faster rate as learning material and advice is readily available online. Upskilling will allow you to stay accustomed to best practices and stay competitive in the job market.
Steps to take after being made redundant
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Managing your time and planning.
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Retraining for your job – upskilling.
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Creating or updating your CV.
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Social Media Presence.
1 Managing your time and planning
It is important to use the time after redundancy wisely and in a structured way, talking things over with friends and family and taking care of your mental health.
There are a number of useful tasks that you can consider to help you cope with redundancy:
- Get regular exercise. Not only will your body benefit but it will boost your self-esteem and increase mental alertness.
- Retraining opportunities. These can be short courses delivered in a classroom setting or online courses which you can complete in your home.
- Research the employment availability in your area, identify the many organisations and services which can help you with job preparation and job applications like Newham Our Newham Work.
2 Retraining for your job – Upskilling
- Redundancy can mean new opportunities and the chance to retrain for a new career.
- Gaining qualifications in a new area and upskilling are good ways of improving your chances of getting your new job and upskilling can give your confidence a boost.
- There are lots of retraining choices after you’ve been made redundant including apprenticeships, internships or distance study courses at college or university.
- There are a number of part funded and fully funded training opportunities available across most sectors.
- Locally, the Newham Adult Learning Service, Newham College for Further Education and the Building Crafts College deliver a wide range of courses to upskill residents.
Please speak to a Our Newham Work Personal Advisor for more details about your training requirements.
3 Creating or updating your CV
It may be that you do not have a CV or your CV is not up to date. It is important to ensure that you identify the following:
- Your existing skills
- Your transferable skills
- Your key skills
- Your interests and hobbies
- Volunteering and community work
4 Social Media Presence
Social media has become an integral recruitment tool for employers. There are a number of social media sites that you can use to promote yourself, which ones depends on the tye type of jobs you are seeking.
- This is the most popular networking site used by most employers.
- Maximising your exposure can be achieved by optimising your profile, creating your network, joining groups, accumulating recommendations and endorsements.
- This is a good way to establish your personal brand while demonstrating your social media skills.
- It is also a good way to obtain information and insights about a company where you might want to work.
- It is a good way to get insights in a company to later demonstrate how you could be a good fit.
- Instagram also provides a vehicle for to post visual representations related to your professional or academic projects.
- Many employers place job vacancies on Facebook.
- These can be found by searching for “Jobs on Facebook” via the search window.
- The greatest value of Facebook is the opportunity to request the assistance of your networks with your job search as they may be aware of jobs related to your interests.
- Join groups of people with common interests to network with.
- Develop and promote your professional brand by posting information of interest to individuals in your field.
- A benefit is the free-flowing communication which allows you to link directly to recruiters and hiring managers.
- Simple search facility - #recruiters and other keywords related to your industry.