New Work

Targeting groups at real or perceived risk of redundancy, New Work aims to improve signposting to new employment opportunities relevant to the economy and society of 21st century Cornwall.

Have you been made redundant or are you at risk of redundancy? New Work hopes to boost future employment opportunities by improving awareness of, and signposting to, new jobs. Sponsored by the Learning Skills Council, the project is reaching out to working and workless people, and removing barriers (real or perceived) that prevent them from accessing skills and future employment opportunities in Cornwall. The project will work with the people of Cornwall to demonstrate how they can achieve personal success and nurture individual talents in positive ways that are relevant to the economy and society of modern day Cornwall.

Update:

11th August 2010: Discovery Day at Carn Brea

The project team have explored the value of communication - what messages work and what don't, what approaches work and what don't. For example, outreach activities are unpredictable but truly insightful when they work. Business engagement is difficult but necessary. Community networks are pivotal, especially in a rural area like Cornwall, as are social and digital networks. Information (data) is likely to hold the key to the solutions. As are people, except they may not know it.

28th July 2010: Community Reporting

New Work is really keen to hear from people who are passionate about Cornwall and game for trying something completely different. This is a great opportunity to improve your CV, meet lots of interesting people and help bring some much needed to help to those facing redundancy or wanting to improve their skills so they feel more secure their employment future.

It's called a Community Reporter scheme but you don't have to have any media experience or knowledge – the most important thing is that you like talking to people, are good at listening, are enthusiastic about learning new skills and have some time to give over the next two months. You also need to be eligible to receive help from New Work – read about who we can help here.

Working with professional mentors, you'll be provided with full training and equipment and learn how to shoot and edit simple film clips, tell stories, blog and spread the word through social media – as well as improving your communication skills and confidence no end.

If you'd like to find out more and apply to be a Community Reporter, please email helen.gilchrist@newworkcornwall.co.uk

28th June 2010: Sandwich Van Outreach

As part of the co-discovery stage, we used existing Sandwich Vans to access a higher volume of participants in difficult to reach areas. Through this, we have learnt that people affected by redundancy and unemployment come in all shapes and sizes, with all types of skills and experiences. But one thing is certain - the more support and service people receive, the more engaged and confident they become in creating goals. Through further co-discovery and co-design, we are exploring the value of participants not just receiving advice and mentoring, but providing it too - peer-to-peer support where people help each other.

26th May 2010: You're Talking, We're Listening

After talking to almost two hundred people in the last few weeks, we are responding to what they, you, have told us by organising several workshops week commencing 7th and 14th June. These workshops are the start of a conversation between us and you about exactly how we can help, responding to your needs not ours, and also giving you some more general advice and support in the areas that interest you.

• Monday 7th June, 9-12.30 or 1.30-5. Life / career coaching: Assess your goals for the future and learn how to make them a reality.
• Wednesday 9th June, 9-12.30 or 1.30-5. Teaching: Want to teach or transfer your teaching skills to a new career?
• Thursday 10th June, 10-4. Digital Communication / I.T: Stay ahead of the crowd
• Monday 14th June, 10-4. Low Carbon Cornwall: Kick start your career in the growing environmental technology industry.
• Thursday 17th June, 10-4. Enterprise and Entrepreneurship: Advice on setting up on your own.
• Thursday 17th June, 6-9.30pm. New Work Workshop: Identify and access the funding and skills you need to help you on your way to your chosen career path.
• Friday 18th June, 10-4. Best Impression Session: CV writing, interview techniques and employability.

These workshops will all be held at Truro's Hall For Cornwall due to the central nature of Truro in Cornwall. If this is a problem for you, just get in touch and we'll see what we can do to help.

17th May 2010: Open Doors Workshop

Thank you to all the "Enablers" (those organisations who provide skills and support programmes in Cornwall) who attended our Open Doors workshop last week.

There were about 30 people present, of all levels. People who had made a career of getting others back into work, the ideal crowd to help us put the New Work directory of services to the test. After Rob had spent a few minutes introducing them all to the project we got into groups and started examining it.

The directory, or the Enabler's Matrix as we call it, is a list of all of the back to work services in Cornwall and who is eligible to use them. We had printed out giant versions of the matrix so the groups could scribble all over them.

We're now planning to contact Employers and Skills Providers in much the same way, so that when you get in touch, we can provide you with real insights into employment opportunies in Cornwall. read more

12th May 2010: Out and About in Cornwall

The New Work team have been travelling around Cornwall, visiting local people from Liskeard to Penzance. You can read about their travels and the stories that they have discovered by visiting the New Work Cornwall website here.

10th May 2010: My Adventures in the Big Red Van!

Emma and the team were all over the place last week in our big red van. We visited supermarkets all over Cornwall with our 1967 split screen camper, Scarlett, she turned some heads!

After the week was through we had over 150 people to get in touch with and had handed at least another 100 people our contact details, but most importantly we spread the word about New Work. With any luck all the people that spoke to us are now spreading the word to their family and friends that there is someone out there offering help that’s a bit different to everything else around. read more

Take a closer look at what we we're up to here...

3rd May 2010: Keep the Faith in Us

So...the Dott campervan is out and about. The team were in Lemon Quay Truro today, Redruth tomorrow (Penzance Wednesday, St Austell Thursday, Bodmin Friday). It's really interesting to read the feedback of all the lovely people we spoke to. Not one person who has been made redundant has received support from their employer. Why not? Virtually no one has heard of any of the skills and support programmes that are currently available to them. Again, why not? From today's learnings I wonder if the main problem is one of communication. Simples! read more

23rd April 2010: Finding Fishermen

My research buddy Lisa and I had a scenic drive down to Newlyn to have a chat with some fishermen today.

I started off by going to see W.Stevenson & Sons, a fish sales business that had recently made some redundancies. They were very helpful and gave me a massive talk on how the fishing industry works. I found out that instead of the fishermen being made redundant it was in fact the admin staff that had been let go.

From what I could tell it was jobs in admin that supported the fishing industry that were at risk, not the fisherman's jobs themselves. The fishermen were driving big cars, bringing in big hauls and I didn't see any sign of their industry declining. Emma Dyer

Are you in the fishing industry, is this the case?

14th April 2010: Word on the Street!

My name is Emma and I've just started helping with the New Work project. Over the last two weeks I've been out and about in Cornwall spreading the news about New Work. I've met a lot of friendly people, some with experience of redundancy, some lucky enough to have none, but all of them with something to contribute to the project.

I've met engineers that want to share their job searching tips with the world, ICT specialists talking about endless new job opportunities in their area and bank managers - ecstatic over the new lease of life redundancy has given them.

If everybody I meet on this project is as interesting as the people I've met so far it's going to be an exciting 6 months!