A promise is definitely a promise in our book
Oliver Bliss • August 18, 2021
Ways into Work continue to support the disadvantaged in Windsor and Maidenhead
What a journey…
For the past 20 years, Ways into Work has been working with the Royal Borough of Windsor & Maidenhead (RBWM) – Changing Lives, One Job at a Time. For those that don’t know, we originated as a council run service before spinning out as a majority employee owned, Community Interest Company in 2015.
Our RBWM contract supporting people with disabilities to find paid work came to an end earlier this year - we couldn’t be more proud of everything that we, our clients and employers have achieved in RBWM over this time. This includes having one of the best employment outcomes in the country – more than 3 times the national average, for people with Learning Disabilities.
We’d like to say a huge thank you to all of those in the council who supported us to change so many lives for the better. RBWM were regularly, through our efforts, in the top 4 Local Authorities nationwide for securing employment for people with Learning Disabilities - something we worked hard to achieve.
However, this is not the end of us working in RBWM. We are delighted to be continuing to work in the borough, supporting our clients and employers on other projects such as Building Better Opportunities and our Supported Internship Programme ‘Route to Recruit’ - ever aiming to increase positive outcomes for disadvantaged jobseekers for years to come.
But … simply getting people into work is not where the story ends …
From our experience of working in Supported Employment for the past two decades, we know that continued person-centred support for people with disability leads to long term
employment. We therefore make a ‘time unlimited support promise’ to our clients and their employers to ensure that, through life’s ups and downs, support is available to maintain sustainable employment. For us it is not just a ‘get a paid job numbers game’. We re-invest our finite earnings back into positively and permanently
meeting our social mission: Changing Lives, One Job at a Time.
One initiative set up with these re-invested earnings is our new Keeping in Touch team – KIT for short. They are the expert Employment Coaches who provide essential ongoing support to clients (and their employers) who are no longer funded under Local Authority or other commissioned contracts. Providing vital support in maintaining current skills, learning new tasks, considering career development and coping with change, our Employment Coaches continue the person-centred support that helps people with disabilities to stay in employment and grow. Crucially, they also manage relationships with employers that ensure business objectives continue to be met, thus securing the best outcome for all involved.
This team supports clients like Ian, who works at a garden centre and has a learning disability. We helped him back into work after a long period of illness and to adjust to working at a different location when the garden-centre he was employed at, closed.
Ian commented – “I like the continuous support as it assures me that if anything goes wrong, there is someone there to help me understand and sort out the issue.”
The KIT teams work not only helps clients sustain employment, but benefits employers as well - reducing repetitive recruitment costs by retaining valuable workers who diversify their workforce. Not to mention all the many benefits that diversity brings to their organisation.
This is something that everyone at Ways into Work are really passionate about - permanent positive outcomes … after all ‘a promise, is a promise’.
To learn more about supported employment and what we do, click here.
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An incredible good news story from one of our clients, who explains how the support from us has changed her life and helped her get her dream job!
When Rajpal first became a client at Ways into Work he had been struggling with looking for work and a good job match. Rajpal has a mild learning disability and mental health issues and had not worked for over ten years except to help now and then at his family’s supermarket. He had not worked for such a long time as he was not well enough to think about his career and life choices. When he joined Ways into Work as a Job Seeker and was assigned an Employment Coach who spent a long time getting to know him, doing a vocational profile and job matching. It was decided that the best first step was for Rajpal was to experience what different jobs and roles are like and what they would entail. Ways into Work then supported him in applying for various roles in retail and did mock interviews where he gained lots of practice. He secured a few interviews but was not offered any of the jobs. Rajpal had begun taking an interest in going to the gym and informed his Employment Coach that he would like a job at the gym. After approaching the employer, his Employment Coach secured an interview for him. He was so happy that at the interview when asked why he would like to work at the gym, he pulled out of his pocket a handwritten lengthy list of reasons why he liked the job and the skills he had to offer. This showed the employer his passion for the job and Rajpal was offered the job, working 3 days (24 hours) a week to begin with. As the leisure centre was 7 miles away, his Employment Coach supported him with applying for Access To Work transport to and from work. They also taught him and his parents how to claim his monthly ATW transport and supported him with the change of circumstances in his benefits. When Rajpal first started to work at the Leisure Centre he solely worked in the gym and his role included ensuring that all the equipment was working and clean, as well as dealing with lots of customer enquiries. This was quite a challenge for Rajpal to begin with, as it was a large premise and no two days were the same. With Job Coaching , Ways into Work was able to support Rajpal by helping to create a routine for him and also discussing with his supervisor a way of building new tasks into his days as the weeks progressed.
