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Giving yourself the best chance in the race for jobs
John Baker puts together his plan for invisibility. Photo: Peterborough ET
The job market is currently more competitive than ever, so any little advantage and skill that an applicant can pick up might be worth its weight in gold. Deputy features editor John Baker explored two ways of boosting your chances when it comes to the dreaded application and interview.
UNEMPLOYMENT in Peterborough fell during November by its largest margin in more than a year.
The number of people claiming Jobseeker’s Allowance fell that month by 161 to 5,182, taking Peterborough’s unemployment rate down to 4.6 per cent, the lowest it has been since May.
While this was bucking the overall national trend, it remained adrift of the national average of 3.8 per cent.
And in the past two years the figure has dropped sharply in October or November, only to rise in the new year, suggesting claimants were picking up seasonal jobs.
In recent weeks several prominent retailers have warned of job losses, while Friday’s budget announcement of jobs going at Peterborough City Council will not have filled anyone with hope.
A vast number of people are looking for employment, and the search is made even more difficult if an application is flawed, the job-seeker looks in the wrong places, or suffers from poor communication skills or a lack of training.
Peterborough Regional College boasts courses in everything from childcare to horticulture, and languages to GCSEs, for school leavers, apprentices and adult learners.
The aim of a course is usually to boost the chance of employment but the college also offers a number of additional ways to help with applications and opportunities. Here are some of the ways it can help the job-seeker.
- It has set up a job brokerage service, PRC Employment Service, which works with employers and Job Centre Plus to help identify vacancies and to develop the training offered by the college to better meet the needs of local employers.
- It offers a range of flexible training courses including qualifications in Job Search and interview skills and units in a number of vocational areas such as customer services and construction. To date, over 70 Job Centre customers have been through these courses.
- A recruitment fair in October 2011 saw 24 companies speaking to over 500 unemployed people about vacancies in their businesses. Over 30 people found work through the fair.
- It plans to develop the number of employers it works with and expand the training provision so that more people can benefit from these courses.
Employment service manager Jon Wyllie manages the college’s activities to support people finding work.
Mr Wyllie said: “While recruitment is always slow at the beginning of the year, there are still jobs being advertised on a regular basis and there is a generally positive feeling from the majority of job-seekers we speak to.
“There are a number of barriers that people face, and these vary greatly between different social groups – for example, language skills are often a barrier for the many immigrants in Peterborough, while work ethic has been identified as a significant barrier for young people.
“In terms of CV writing, I see many examples where the applicant is failing to use their CV to its best potential. Issues include poor spelling and grammar, not using a clear structure, not clearly highlighting skills that are relevant to employers and not successfully identifying and describing relevant skills in a way that sells them to an employer.
“There is plenty of help available with CV writing and I would strongly recommend that anyone looking for work starts with making sure their CV is as effective as it can be.
“It’s the first thing an employer will see, and with potentially hundreds of other applicants it is vital that people make their CV stand out for the right reasons.
“Attitude, appearance, passion and an understanding of the business are more vital than ever when applying for jobs, due to the high volumes of applicants.”
n Peterborough Regional College, based at Park Crescent and Eastfield Road, offers a range of full, part-time and evening courses appealing to new students of all ages.
Courses available include – fashion skills workshop, cutting men’s hair qualification, web design, health and social care BTEC, book-keeping and more.
It hosts an open day on Thursday, January 26 between 2pm and 8pm where potential new students can have a look round, apply and enrol for part-time courses starting before the summer.
Staff at the College’s Park Crescent information centre are now taking enrolments and enquiries. To contact them call 0845 8728722 or log onto {http:// www.peterborough.ac.uk/|www.peterborough.ac.uk}
Improving your communication skills to help you sell yourself properly
HOW can you prepare for a string of questions under high pressure from people you’ve never met before?
The common advice for a job interview is to learn about the company, try to predict the questions, dress smartly, and emphasise your good points.
Everyone remembers their worst job interview. Mine was at a certain broadcasting company which may be funded by a certain monthly tax.
My biggest error (of several) was pure bad luck. Applicants had been asked to critically evaluate a broadcast piece from the previous week in preparation.
I delighted in revealing my dislike for a piece on a local council, only to discover that one of my interviewers had produced that piece – the only one she had created all week.
She was unimpressed, but had I been a more skilled communicator I may have been able to retrieve the situation. Instead, I started thinking about the journey home - fate had decided to slam my hand in the door as I extended it for the handshake.
Other times your careful preparation might fall apart. What if you’ve forgotten everything you learned? What about the curveball questions? What if the first question goes badly and you never recover? And what if you’re not a good speaker in every day life?
Twice a month, at The Farmers restaurant in Yaxley, people of different ages, experiences, races and gender build up their communication skills in a friendly environment through entertaining each other in a series of speeches.
They are Anglia Communicators, a group formed in 2002 as part of the Toastmasters International worldwide movement of which there are more than 300 groups in the UK alone.
Some of the speeches are prepared on a given topic as participants make their way through the Competent Communication manual. This book is organized into ten separate projects, each with its own individual focus or objective.
An effective tool in developing your speaking skills, the manual never tells you exactly what to do or what to speak about, but rather it provides a set of guidelines for you to think about as you prepare your speech.
Each one was evaluated on criteria including eye contact, movement, use of grammar, the number of umms and aahs, and whether they managed to effectively use the ‘word of the day’, which on the first meeting of the new year was ‘recommence’. Later the best speech, evaluation and ‘table topic’ (see below) would be announced.
The speakers work in many different spheres – at the Post Office, running their own jam and preserve companies; in health and fitness, and as marketing consultants. Each was attempting pieces from different stages of their manuals and they were all of an extremely high quality – from Shirley Hallam’s tale of kindness from a Belgian stranger, to David Ward’s argument for gardens over concrete, and Manik Biswas’ magic numbers, a tale of numerical trickery using visual aids. Some were light-hearted, others more serious.
The other part of the evening involved the table topics, in which a speaker talks for two minutes on a subject which is literally handed to them when they take the stage.
Our table topics master Tracey Walker had chosen posers from the Daily Mail ‘Definitive Questions’ section.
Four people took the plunge, three of whom were guests, and my question was ‘what would you do if you were the invisible man for the day’.
I can’t remember the exact details, but I made a couple of quips about obtaining stories through underhand means and listening to the Posh players’ banter in the dressing room, before my story tailed off into the inevitable naughtiness.
Let’s be honest, what would any male do if they were invisible for the day...
Time of speech - 1 min 57; Number of ums and ahhs – 11; winner? - No; Fun – yes.
It’s this twin approach that provides the balance between preparation and improvisation; diligence and humour; a clear reasoned argument, and a free-flowing expression and imagination.
Even if you’re not having a job interview, there’s the chance to make new friends, and learn about new topics, and have a good laugh.
President Sandra Stout said: “When people first come we have an icebreaker speech where they introduce themselves, but they don’t have to do a speech.
“We have the umms and ahhs count and there are some here who don’t do any, because they are quite polished.
“But it’s all about development. We have had some who were very nervous when they arrived and now they are very confident.
“Everyone here is friendly and only too pleased to help.”
Anglia Communicators meet at the Farmers on the 2nd and 4th Mondays of each month at 6.30pm.
For more information go to www.angliatoastmasters.co.uk
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Comments
There are 3 comments to this article
Page 1 of 1
bubbles13
Wednesday, January 18, 2012 at 10:33 PMBob 44 You can always come along we have other clubs nearby, in Huntingdon and Cambridge depends where you are. You can improve your skills and have fun too
bob44
Tuesday, January 17, 2012 at 05:05 PMAs usual - the only comment is negative an racist - this is a piece which is giving suggestions on how to improve yourself and you have to bring it down to race - shame on you. If you have nothing worth saying then please refrain. I think the Anglia Communicators should be applauded and that system used much more often. If there was one closer to where I live I would love to take part. In fact it is exactly what youngsters need and I suggest that all schools in 6th form and PRC should be doing this sort of 'club'. Perhaps they already are - but unless it is 'reported' then we have no way of knowing this exists.
J J Carter
Monday, January 16, 2012 at 09:36 PMThe only race getting jobs in Pottyborough is the Polish! (see what I did there...?)
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