Claire joined the Pathway to Employment with a huge desire to secure a paid job. She had been briefly employed in the past in a couple of jobs which hadn’t worked out.

A number of factors contributed to this, including the employer not understanding what reasonable adjustments would support Claire to do her job, not providing them, no on the job support to ensure she was successful, lack of understanding about disability and lack of disclosure about her additional learning needs.

Her focus during her time on the Pathway to Employment was learning to take her time, slow down, to learn skills systematically and to pay attention to the detail. Especially when searching for an appropriate job.

Claire received interview coaching and was accompanied to the interview by our Employment Development Manager to act as an advocate.

It was made clear that it was Claire’s interview and that having someone accompany her was simply as back up and to remind her of any key information she should share when talking about her skills and experience and to help her when talking about her additional learning needs and any reasonable adjustments needed.

Claire did fantastically well. Her passion for customer service shone through and really impressed her interviewer, Ginny O’Gorman. Ordinarily, Compass UK usually focuses on recruiting full time staff to work in their food service offering at Jaguar Land Rover.

However, Ginny said she could see Claire’s passion and potential, and with the knowledge she would be supported by the Pathway to Employment team and there were some reasonable adjustments, she knew Claire would be a great asset to her team.

Claire is now helping to trailblaze the use of Assistive Technology in the workplace via our partner Access Hospitality C.I.C to increase independence and reduce anxiety.

See the featured article online here: warwickshireworld.com/news/

Penny joined the Pathway to Employment with a passion for customer service. Having proved week on week that she understood how to provide great service to our customers in the community cafe, we asked her to support a couple of events.

Her confidence had grown and we knew she would be great. At our book launch, Penny welcomed everyone who attended, spoke to them, directed them to their seats and gave them information about how to buy the book. She did such a fantastic job and made everyone feel so welcome.

Getting to know Penny, her passion for customer service was clear but we also learnt that one of her interests was also a great passion, horse racing.

She has a huge amount of knowledge about the sport and loves to attend race days. We always want to help our Trainees find a job in an area they are passionate about, where possible, so we approached Stratford Race Course.

After an interview and a look around to meet some of the staff, Penny was offered a Race Day job. Such an exciting day.

Penny often works at one of the private events on the day, welcoming customers and making them comfortable. Penny really knows her racing and is incredibly knowledgeable about jockeys, horses and stables and can share that passion with the race day goers.

A late diagnosis and lack of support at school was compounded by the Covid Pandemic and the isolation that ensued. Jon’s mental health was suffering, his anxiety was high and his confidence was at an all time low.

He joined one of our 4 part online learning courses, very much in the background, during lockdown. This interaction inspired Jon to muster enough confidence, with the support of his family, to join the Entrust Care Partnership Pathway to Employment initiative once we were able to open our community cafes again.

During his 12 months on the Pathway to Employment, his confidence grew dramatically. We started slowly and he took time to notice the things which made him anxious and worked on ways to manage these feelings.

He said that coming to the cafe each week gave him purpose and a reason to get out of bed. This was the first step to his success.

Jon didn’t know what job he wanted to do so he worked with our Employment Development Manager to explore his personal skills and needs alongside his transferable skills.

They looked at different types of businesses, locations, hours and job tasks. He knew that having ADHD meant he worked best with a variety of tasks which can be repeated.

This was the start of the search. Jon had never had an interview but with coaching and support on the day, he shone and secured a role in a garden centre restaurant. His contract is now permanent and he is going from strength to strength.

* Trainee name changed to protect anonymity.

Emily is a gold and silver medal winner for gymnastics. She won her medals as part of the team at the Paralympics in Beijing. She loves drama, wrestling, fashion and being with customers.

After the height of the Pandemic was over, like many of our Trainees, Emily’s confidence had been knocked a little. With the support of her parents, she joined the Pathway to Employment with a desire to work and to use the skills she had learnt at college and during a work placement. Working in a cafe is definitely her thing. With the additional support we offer in our Community cafe, Emily was able to shine.

Interviews can be challenging for so many of us so we always offer support to attend them, not just prepare for them. Nerves can take over and we can miss opportunities to share all that is brilliant about ourselves. We supported Emily during her interview and talked about reasonable adjustments.

She is now working at C3 Coffee as an Assistant and is loving every minute. Emily is a bit of a celebrity locally and we can’t wait to see how she excels here as well.

Finley loves all things catering but he also loves dancing (with the Entrust staff and customers) and art. He joined us to put into practice the skills he’s learnt at college and to help him become work ready.

This involves, not just the practical elements of the job but also arriving on time, working with peers, stamina, motivation, time keeping and using initiative.

Getting to know Finley has been a pleasure and learning more about his personal skills helped shape the direction of his job search. Finley loves older people and they love him, he has the most infectious smile and is such a lot of fun.

He attended some of our enrichment activities focussed on growing in confidence and he was a natural at drama. So it made perfect sense when the idea of entertaining and talking to older people came up.

Finley is Assisting the Entertainment Coordinator at a care home, with the support of one of our Entrust Partners. It’s safe to say, he is a hit with the residents. This first job is the starting point to gaining more experience and confidence in the workplace, whilst he works his way towards a role in catering.