Forget a 'Great Resignation' - I started again from a gritty redundancy!

After 20 years of working in international education at university, I found myself at the mercy of an all new pandemic-accelerated period of neo-economic rationalism taking place in the tertiary education sector. It's a short story as far as we (for I was not alone) were concerned: No international students, no work! My involuntary (and unpaid) redundancy was disorientating, swift and gritty.

But after 5 months of limited success as a self-employed contractor, and endless job applications, I was offered a job as an Employability Skills Trainer with an RTO. Employability Skills!? What the hell did I know about what it takes to be employable? After all, I'd been effectively unemployed for the first time in my adult life. Whether it was my fault or not didn't make a difference to me. I still felt that I had nothing to offer.

But then the job began, and with the help of a special colleague and friend who showed me the ropes, I started to see how I could make a difference in the lives of young people taking the course to meet their welfare requirements. All of the doubts and all of the confusion gradually disappeared as I learned more about and reflected on my own challenges to enter (and indeed stay in) the job market.

All of the barriers that people have, internally and externally; all of the hoops employees need to jump through to start earning a decent wage; all of the airs and graces, the bells and whistles - the smoke and mirrors! Playing by the rules of the workforce game; knowing what (and what not) to say to whom, when, how and why! Knowing how to be assertive without sounding confrontational and aggressive. Knowing how to think critically and negotiate respectfully and, ultimately, effectively. It was a whole new world that school leavers were facing and often these 'soft skills', these interpersonal - employability - skills were seriously lacking. Never mind finding a definitive industry to work in!

There are numerous pathways to employment, just as there are numerous roles out there to fill. I felt a kinship with the young people I was helping, because in that moment, I felt like somebody had pressed rewind on my own story and I was right back at the beginning too, graduating from high school with no clear idea of what was expected of me and no idea what I really wanted to do.

I was both the trainer and the student. May it always be so.

Happy Learning.

GW