Job-to-Job Support

"If you unexpectedly lose your job when you are 51, it has a big impact on you. Just try keeping a cool head or taking the time to consider 'your future' (with or without work). You really do need some help with this, as I have found out. I had already tried to list what I thought I was good at and what I enjoyed doing. That is a good start, but you still don't have any idea which direction you ought to be able to go or how to do it.

Thanks to expert support from iScreen, I was forced - in a positive way - to keep on reflecting about myself. To weigh up the pros and cons. To make decisions about my principles. To be on the lookout for suitable vacancies and to present myself as strongly as possible during job interviews. In between the regular in-person meetings, we kept in contact by phone and email. Thanks to hard work, expertise and mutual trust, ten months of pleasant cooperation was rewarded by a new job that suited me!"

Mark Dijsselbloem

Participant in Job-to-Job Support

Challenge

If you hear that your job is soon going to disappear and that, involuntarily, you will have to go in search of a new challenge?

The employees of BioClinica were given the bad news that their office was going to shut down. BioClinica is an international organisation operating in the field of clinical trials and clinical research, amongst other things, providing services to various pharmaceutical and biotechnology organisations.

The members of staff in Leiden were offered the opportunity of taking part in iScreen's Job-to-Job programme. The goal was to support the employees in their search for new work. The focus was on developing skills so participants could take control over their own career paths.

Job-to-Job support

After getting to know the job-to-job coach, it was time for individual sessions. The participants' support needs and definition of the problem were extremely varied, so a tailor-made plan of action was defined depending on the individual's requirements.

In the course of the support process, the majority of participants passed through two stages:

A person-focused stage

Coping with the loss of the job. Reflecting on the what had happened and gradually distancing themselves from the situation.
Self-investigation on the basis of personal meetings and personality test questionnaires. This is how we tried to answer the questions: 'Who am I, what do I want and what can I do?'
Discovering their own talents, motives, weak and strong points
Building on personal qualities and skills
Practical considerations for making a sound and realistic career choice
Making a profile outline

A work-focused stage

Self-marketing: how do I 'sell' myself or make myself more visible?
Strategies for finding or creating the 'ideal' job
Drawing up a job application plan:
Vacancy analysis
Writing a job application letter and CV
Networking
Preparation and evaluation of applications or networking conversations

Workshops

In addition to these individual sessions, participants could put their names down for the following workshops:

Applying for jobs via LinkedIn

Goal: More effective use of the networking function of social media for career purposes.

In this interactive workshop, we answered questions such as:

How do I make a personal profile and where is it needed for the purposes of applying for jobs?
How do I build up a network and how can I make use of my contacts?
How can I increase my chances of being found for the right job opportunities?
How can I discover 'my personal job market'?
How can use my network as a stepping stone towards new career opportunities?

Job application skills

Goal: A good preparation for the job application interview.

Subsections of this workshop:

Important do's and don'ts
Preparing for application interviews
The importance of personal branding
What is the optimum way of presenting yourself during job interviews or networking?
The STARR method, often used during job interviews
Practice job interviews using your own case studies, involving participant, coach and improvisation actor

Job fair

To further improve the chances of getting a job, we organised a job fair during which DOCS Resourcing Solutions gave a presentation about opportunities in the labour market. Following this, participants could sign up for an individual meeting with a DOCS recruiter to enable concrete discussion about available vacancies.

Results

With the help of the coaches, the discussions, personal motivation and effort, almost everybody found a new post within 3 to 12 months.