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C2 and Guys and St Thomas

The Client

The Training and Development Unit at Guys & St. Thomas’ (GSTT) NHS Trust supports over 18,000 staff at the trust. The unit ensures all staff within the trust were developing to their full potential by offering in-house training. The trust was keen to retain its workforce, especially within the Bands 1-4, and as such wanted to establish a Careers Service which staff could access to identify how they could progress their careers within the trust.

Their Challenge

C2 was approached by GSTT to support the Training and Development Unit in two ways. Firstly, to establish an in-house Careers Service to be made available to all staff working at the trust, primarily marketing it to staffs at Bands 1-4. Secondly, to provide mentoring to 4-Training and Development Unit staff to develop their careers guidance skills and to support them in completing the NVQ 4 advice and guidance accreditation.

Our Approach

C2 worked closely with the Training and Development Unit to establish a marketing strategy to launch the Careers Service within the trust. This involved participating in road-shows at the trusts two sites, writing articles for the internal staff magazine and utilising the staff intranet to raise awareness. The marketing was further enhanced by promoting the service to departmental managers using personal emails and flyers.

Over the course of 1-year, a regular careers drop-in service was established and a programme of generic workshops focusing on Job Hunting, Completing Applications and Preparing for Interviews was introduced.

Training and Development Unit staff undertaking the NVQ accreditation honed their guidance skills by observing the C2 Careers Consultant and were gradually encouraged to take lead during the sessions. C2 also delivered sessions to help the team hone in their guidance skills which included, Careers Counselling Skills, Understanding Careers Theory, Dealing with Challenging Clients and Incorporating Coaching Skills in Guidance.

Outcome

By the end of the 1-year contract, the Careers Service was fully established and was attended by over 1000 staff from the trust. In the 2009 Chief Executives report, the Careers Service was highly commended. With C2’s support the Training and Development Unit staff successfully completed their NVQ accreditation and are continuing to deliver careers support to staff at the trust.

Feedback from the Client

“The support from Saiyada has been fantastic. Over the last year I have become confident in my guidance skills. It was very helpful to be able to observe Saiyada, and learn from her approach. It made the transition into doing the sessions on my own much easier”

Joel Ryden
Work Placements Coordinator, Training and Development Unit

“I didn’t know what to expect from C2 and was so impressed with the service. Saiyada took a lot of time to understand how we worked at the Trust and helped us market the Careers Service really well. She supported us in undertaking a 6-month review and left us with a clear strategy on how we could continue developing the service in the long-term. It was also great having someone from outside the Trust as Saiyada brought with her lots of fresh ideas”

Melanie Taylor
Learning Manager, Training & Development Unit

“I found the Careers Training by C2 really helpful and interesting. Saiyada and David, took their time to understand our needs and tailored the sessions to they were of use to us. During one training session, we were asked to bring case studies and between them they provided alternatives on how we could have approached the situation. This was incredibly useful as I went away with lots of new ideas”

Rachel Harrod
Redeployment Coordinator, Training and Development Unit