From long-term unemployment to a self-employed career
Our Inspiring Families programme launched in January 2017 and supports people who are unemployed and experiencing a family issue back into work.
Inspiring Families is funded by the Department of Work and Pensions and the European Union via the European Social Fund. So far over 360 people joined this programme and we helped over 50 find work. Read on to find out more about how we helped Alan regain his confidence to find work.
Alan’s story
Alan was 53 years old when he came to us to join our Inspiring Families employment programme. He had worked in a variety of jobs: he was a baker, a builder, and a maintenance person for TfL. But in 2015 Alan was made redundant and since then struggled to get back into the job market.
Alan tried many routes to employment, but none of them seemed successful. He got caught in what he calls the “politics of being unemployed…running here, running there” going from course to course and from employment provider to employment provider. He felt that he was being sent on courses that he didn’t need, and felt that his ambitions weren’t being listened to at all.
Until he came across Renaisi and our Inspiring Families employment programme.
Working with Alan
We assigned Alan a dedicated employment advisor, who took the time to really understand him, his needs and experience, then built a programme of support tailored to him. This support programme included:
- Helping Alan to create a CV that helped him stand out
- Providing him with access to a wide variety of job opportunities
- Working with him to improve his skills and confidence through a range of training courses
- Providing him with support and advice on becoming his own boss
“Renaisi is completely different. When I go there I speak to everybody. If someone looks at me they say, ‘alright mate’… it’s a bit friendlier, more human.
Alan
Results
By joining our Inspiring Families programme, Alan realised that self-employment would be the next step for him, and since then focused his job goals on a select few areas: “everywhere else I was overspreading myself… I’d go for six different things and hope to get something. Now I’m focusing on just two, and there are loads more opportunities coming up.”
The experience he had with us was different. He tells us he feels at ease in our office and is becoming more confident again: “It’s a welcoming, relaxed and productive environment.”
Now that I’ve done this employability programme set up by Renaisi I can see a bit of a pattern. I can choose what I want to go for. So I do feel a bit calmer… I feel like things are taking shape… I don’t know what I was doing wrong before but I know what I am doing right now.”
Alan, self employed
