#TheWeekInCareers - Episode 49

Welcome to?#TheWeekinCareers ! If you are a first-time reader (and congratulations if so, you are now part of a 2900+ strong community!), this newsletter is my attempt at summarising some of the key?#Careers -related news from across the?#Careersphere ?each week, along with some of the talking points I feel are worthy of further debate amongst the?#Careers ?community! So, without further ado, on to the news!

What I learned from 1 year of #TheWeekInCareers... ??

As August drew to a close this year, it dawned on me that a special anniversary was coming up - that's right, the first issue of #TheWeekInCareers was released just over a year ago now on 26th August 2022, coming in at a slim 6-minute read and featuring reflections on Results Day 2022, the 'Silver Exodus' (regarding the influx of 50-64 year-olds in the UK leaving the workforce, at that time) and the brilliant Career Guidance for the 21st Century course , as well as the now ubiquitous #BestOfTheRest section, which in its inaugural segment included items from Charlie Ball , Jim Bright , Associate Professor Deirdre Hughes OBE and Alan Bullock RCDP !

With Year 1 out of the way and no plans to mothball the newsletter for now, I thought it was the perfect time to reflect on what I've learned from my first year of publishing a weekly LinkedIn / email newsletter and how I feel it's impacted my own development over the past 12 months....??

The Power of Consistency...

I follow a number of writers and influencers who talk regularly about the power of consistency (Sahil Bloom and James Clear are two that spring to mind, but the brilliant Squiggly Careers Podcast from Helen Tupper and Sarah Ellis has also been an inspiration here!) and I have to say, this has probably been my biggest takeaway to date from producing the newsletter. I originally started #TheWeekInCareers as a way to condense my careers writing into a single, targeted piece of content per week, as I was finding a couple of things were happening with my writing at the time:

1. I was writing or being approached to write for a number of publications (including Not Going to Uni, Trotman, FE News and others in the education/careers space) and finding it challenging to decide on which opportunities I was most interested in taking, as well as balancing my writing commitments with my day job as a Career Consultant.
2. I felt that there were topics, issues and happenings in the careers world that I really wanted to write about with a more personal take (e.g. the Education Select Committee sessions) and some ideas I had for features for a blog / article which simply would have been too self-indulgent for a single publication or website, that might naturally need to cover a broader audience.

From this starting point, #TheWeekInCareers was born! The first benefit of the newsletter was realised pretty swiftly, as I found immediately that having to condense my ideas for blogs / items and put out content once a week really focused my mind and made it much easier to commit / not commit to other opportunities, as I was keen to make a real go of the newsletter. The secondary, perhaps unintended benefit of producing the newsletter has most certainly been seeing the impact of writing consistently in regard to my profile on LinkedIn and the collaborations that this has led to (see below for more on this...). Putting out content once a week, at roughly the same time each week, I've noticed a healthy organic growth in the number of readers/subscribers (we're at almost 3000 subscribers now, which I find pretty mind-boggling!) but more than this, I feel that having this guaranteed regular content has helped me worry less about posting at other times (I too feel the effects of social media FOMO from time to time!) and naturally increased the number of relevant followers and connections I've accrued on the platform, as I've been able to present a clearer offer in terms of what folks get when they find me on LinkedIn (weekly content, clear format, consistent style and topical items). It's also helped me connect the various projects I'm involved in (such as #WeAreCareers), so there is plenty of cross-promotion and even cross-pollination of guests / guest writers across the two main extra-curricular careers initiatives I run.

A final advantage I've seen from producing the newsletter has been (from my perspective) a noticeable improvement in my writing, and I think part of this is simply the fact that I've had to stop worrying so much about perfectionism (historically, I've been quite bad when it comes to tinkering and tinkering with an article draft before sending it off for publication) and focus on producing content and posting once a week, rain or shine (minus a couple of holidays!). #TheWeekInCareers now feels like an important part of my working week outside of my day job and is something I have no plans to stop producing for the time being, based on the reasons above!

Unlocking opportunities for collaboration...

As mentioned above, another huge benefit of producing the newsletter has been the myriad opportunities for collaboration that have blossomed as a result of shout-outs for items and germs of ideas that have developed in to regular segments within #TheWeekInCareers. As MeetSabiha . and I have also found with the #WeAreCareers show, sometimes simply having a visible public platform / medium is enough to generate conversations with others regarding ideas for episodes / items and I've certainly found this with the newsletter! For example, the #MyWeekInCareers segment in the newsletter was very much the brainchild of the brilliant Mandy Green , who pitched the concept to me when we were having a chat about the newsletter and even provided me with connections for the first couple of contributors who shared their Week in Careers - we now have 12 volumes of #MyWeekInCareers and readers often tell me how much they enjoy reading about the work of other careers professionals, so kudos to Mandy Green for the inspiration on this one!

Producing a newsletter on a platform / medium like LinkedIn has also allowed me to reach a much broader career development audience (and beyond - more on this below!) than I might have done if I was solely putting something out via a mailing list or a more closed-off network (such as a community of practice). With LinkedIn, we obviously have the advantage of folks reposting the newsletter to their networks and sharing with a wider pool of professionals than I might be able to access by myself, and this has led not just to an increased number of CDPs reaching out within the UK but also internationally, particularly after I began promoting the #CareeringAroundTheWorld segment, which has proved really popular to date (a big shout-out to Jasmine Morton , JP Michel , Candy Ho (何甜茵) , Lucy Sattler , Paul L. Rainey, PhD and Gerald Tan Zi Ping for sharing their insights regarding the careers landscape in Canada, Australia, the USA and Singapore, respectively!). Having the newsletter as a platform has not only allowed me to benefit from some really useful collaborations (in terms of articles for the newsletter) but it's also given me an opportunity to return the favour by driving readers to other newsletters, blogs and vlogs that I've enjoyed or careers professionals who have supported me previously and have their own high-quality content that I feel others should know about. I've always felt the careers sector is a particularly collaborative and collegial community, and producing the newsletter over the past year has only reinforced this for me!

Taking conversations beyond the #Careersphere...

Much like #WeAreCareers, a part of the rationale behind the newsletter was to try and take some of my analysis and conversations about career development work beyond my own echo chamber and see if I could reach a wider audience on LinkedIn, particularly in relation to topics that I felt might have a broader appeal beyond careers professionals, such as educational policy, the future of work and the possible impact of generative AI. While I'd concede that on the whole, #TheWeekInCareers is quite evidently targeted at the career development sector, it has been interesting flicking through the analytics each week to see who has been reading the newsletter and what their professional backgrounds are - for example, these were the Top 5 job titles in terms of the readership for last week's newsletter ??

From my analysis of the newsletter readership to date, this feels like a pretty representative snapshot of who is reading #TheWeekInCareers - a nice mixture of career development professionals, educators, professional services / support services staff (usually based in educational settings) and a smaller group of individuals working in private sector, corporate or self-employed roles. Location-wise, the newsletter still maintains a predominantly UK-based audience (not hugely surprising, given the content!) but there are regular readers (just from those I know!) in Europe, Singapore, the UAE, Canada, Australia, the USA and New Zealand, and it always pleases me that #TheWeekInCareers continues to offer value to CDPs beyond the UK as well.

My next step with the #TheWeekInCareers is to try and extend the reach of the newsletter beyond the #Careersphere and towards key influencers in other sectors (such as early-career recruitment and educational policy), so that I am simultaneously able to surface key issues impacting the career development sector (such as a lack of funding / emphasis on career development work in secondary education from the English government) with an audience that might not always be exposed to the perspectives of careers professionals, and also to bring in new voices that can provide a different perspective on career development, education and the labour market to the core readership. If you are reading this and know someone outside of the career development world who might be interested in sharing their views, insights or opinions with #TheWeekInCareers at some point now or in the future, please do signpost them my way! ??

A huge thank you to everyone who has supported with the newsletter over the past year, whether you've written about the careers landscape in your country, shared your week in careers, submitted a guest blog or simply been a regular reader - I couldn't have made it this far without you all! ??

Have you considered starting a LinkedIn / Substack / email newsletter? Or like Lucy Sattler , Janet Colledge , Charlotte Steggall , Raj Sidhu , Anne Wilson SFHEA and others, are you already producing regular blog / vlog content? If you've not yet explored how a regular newsletter / blog might enhance your careers writing and professional development, please do reach out with any questions and if you're already doing this, let me know in the comments what you've learned so far from putting out regular content on LinkedIn and/or other platforms! ??

#MyWeekInCareers: Vol. 12???

It's time for another edition of?#MyWeekInCareers ! For those unfamiliar with this segment, it's an opportunity to hear more about the day-to-day reality of careers work from different careers professionals delivering quality CEIAG with clients in a range of settings! This time around, we hear from? Helen Hillier , who tells us more about her role as a Careers Adviser for the Isle of Man Government!

About Me

The Isle of Man is a stunning island which sits in the middle of the Irish Sea. It is 30 miles long, has a fascinating history, and is famous for the TT Motorcycle races. In 2018 my husband was offered a job here and after a lot of research, we decided to relocate. I was previously employed as Careers Guidance Coordinator at an 11-16 college in Leicestershire after passing my L6 Careers Guidance and Development qualification. I loved my job and enjoyed the daily contact with students, and at the time was involved with the early stages of the Leicestershire Careers hub, working with the LLEP and our Enterprise Advisor. However, there was an amazing island opportunity awaiting me. The Isle of Man is self-governing, so sits independently of the UK Education System, and in 2021 I was offered the post of Careers Advisor (Employer Link) for the Department of Education, Sport and Culture. My job is very rewarding, it combines meeting the CEIAG needs of students in a different economic climate with the beauty and uniqueness of island life. Here’s what a typical week looks like for me:

Monday

We have five high schools on the Island covered by myself and my colleague, Andy. We are both assigned to different schools, allowing us to build relationships with both staff and students. On Mondays I visit one of the two schools in the capital, Douglas. Each of our schools are a little different – and I enjoy adapting my practice to suit this. The demographics and sectors of work can differ, although agriculture, fishing, finance and STEM are dominant sectors across the island. It’s lovely to be able to see the beautiful scenery as I travel around, and if I get time, I’ll have my lunch somewhere by the sea – it always amazes me even if the weather’s not great.

Tuesday

I usually spend a second day at the high school in the capital, and this sometimes starts with an assembly. Because we are not physically in school all week, it’s important that students know who we are and how the careers service can support them. We also deliver in school sessions around employability and skills. We offer every secondary age student a 1:1 careers interview before they leave compulsory education, so I balance my time dependant on year group size. We try to see students during Year 10, starting with any students who may need our support a little earlier on. We provide 1:1 sessions for Year 9s around Key Stage 4 Option Choices and pull these into our school visits too.

Wednesday

On Wednesday I visit our most southerly high school and again, the trip down, even though it’s only 30 minutes away, is always a scenic one. We have recently completed some pilot studies into work experience placements with this school, so I’ll often have a catch up meeting with staff during my mid-week visit. We support each school with as many events as we can, including attendance at Key Stage 4 and 5 evenings. I’ll often see 6th formers during my visit too.

Thursday

I spend Thursday mornings at the University College of Man, where Andy and I offer drop-in sessions to students. The college offers courses from Level 1 right up to degree level, as well as school link sessions, and adult learning courses, so my meetings here can be very varied. The careers team also support UCM events and we work with the college Employability Skills Coordinator to support industry, skills and careers sessions. Thursday afternoons are often spent meeting employers as an additional part of my role is as Employer Link. The Isle of Man has such a great community spirit and we have some amazing employers and organisations who fully support and enrich the careers learning here. I attend industry events, network on LinkedIn or meet business leads for a coffee and this helps me to understand how best to facilitate the link between education and employment. Strong links with industry are an important factor for a smaller island labour market.?

Friday

The Careers Team usually meet on a Friday. As Andy and I work and travel across the whole island, it’s really good to have face-to-face conversations at the office. Our meetings allow us to consider our progress, address any issues and plan ahead for events and training. We work a full year, and although I sometimes miss term time working, the half terms and summer give me valuable breathing space to complete my own planning and CPD, allowing for time to review and develop my professional practice. We’ve recently been engaging more with primary education, and we are planning for our Island Employment and Skills event in November.

Challenges of the Work

Travel can be impacted in the winter due to our geographical position in the Irish Sea. I live on the west coast and sometimes the road across the mountain is closed, although I can take a different route. I live on the TT course itself which means I need to plan my day during race weeks - luckily it's half term during the main TT races!

Rewards

There’s so much going on around the island that you do meet employers and students out and about, which I really enjoy - it means that you can actually see where CEIAG fits into the bigger picture here. In the summer I attended an agricultural show and found myself slipping into careers conversations, just because I’m so fascinated by the depth and range of different roles on the island, which are so different to the ones I was used to in the Midlands! The work/life balance here is a bonus and is very much something that our students see as important in their own future careers too. I still can’t get over that some of my work meetings are sat outside a coffee shop by the sea!

Life as a Careers Adviser on the Isle of Man really is my very own dream job; I can combine a role I’m so passionate about as part of a small island team, working collaboratively with a wonderful community to ensure our young people are supported, motivated and inspired.

A massive thank you to? Helen Hillier ?for sharing her Week in Careers for the newsletter - a fascinating glimpse into what it's like to work as a careers professional supporting an island community and labour market, in what sounds like a hugely varied role and a beautiful setting in which to work! ??

I am very keen to use this segment in the newsletter to highlight just how diverse the?#Careers ?sector is in terms of job roles and the work that we do, so if you are interested in sharing your?Week in Careers?as part of a future newsletter, please just drop me a line! ??

Write for #TheWeekInCareers! ?

With #TheWeekInCareers now (hopefully) a well-established part of the careers content landscape, I'm on the look-out for new content more than ever - as much as I love writing and sharing my views on goings on in the #Careersphere, I'm acutely aware that often (as with our latest #MyWeekInCareers piece from Helen Hillier !) a fresh perspective can really help elevate the newsletter, whether it's hearing from members of the global careers community (#CareeringAroundTheWorld), finding out more about the day-to-day roles of different careers professionals (#MyWeekInCareers) or gaining insights about a topic or issue that I haven't covered previously in the newsletter (via the #GuestBlog segment). With all this in mind, I've put together a short video to say a massive THANK YOU to all of our contributors to the newsletter to date, as well as a sales pitch for those of you who might be interested in showcasing those writing chops moving forward...??

Have I persuaded you? If you've made it this far and are still interested in writing for #TheWeekInCareers, please drop me a DM on LinkedIn and let's make it happen! ??

The Best of the Rest: My Hot Picks from the wider?#Careersphere???

Try-A-Trade careers programme from Checkatrade – First up this week, news of a really useful sounding resource/programme from Checkatrade , which aims to help students in Years 10 and 11 learn more about career pathways in trades such as Plumbing, Carpentry and Electrician work! The Try-A-Trade programme provides teachers and career advisers with a hub of resources and content to share as part of their careers programme or careers fairs, as well as offering first-hand access to professionals already working in trades. Well worth a look for any careers advisers and careers leaders who are seeking to demystify careers in the trades!

AI resources for the #Careers community: Coming at you, thick and fast! – Following on from our last issue around the practical application of AI tools for career development purposes, there have been a couple of content drops this week that are worth checking out - up first, Anne Wilson SFHEA has put together a brilliant piece on how to use ChatGPT to write an elevator pitch (utilising the excellent CLEAR framework for prompting from Danny Mirza FRSA, MSc, MA, MBA ) and if you are after more case studies on how career development professionals are leveraging AI tools like ChatGPT in their practice, look no further than this new blog series from the good folks at Handshake , which includes a series of articles on how generative AI is changing the world of work and will soon feature case studies from a range of CDPs who are currently using AI tools in their work with clients. A great way to keep up with developments in this space!

Nailing the 'Why are you the right candidate for the job?' question –?Up next, a super useful blog from Barnaby Mollett on how to really nail the 'Why do you think you are the right candidate for the job?' question at a job interview - what I really like about Barnaby's piece is the way it doesn't just fire top tips at you but instead scaffolds how to approach answering this type of question, with three key parts of the answer (demonstrating highlights from your experience, noting relevant/matching skills and emphasising motivation) that are broken down in detail, with clear examples that can easily be used as a template/starting point for crafting your own answer. A really nice, practical blog to share with clients!

'Engineer the Story' Posters: New FREE resource! - What careers professional doesn't love a FREE resource?! With thanks to Heather MacRae for promoting these on LinkedIn last week, the Royal Academy of Engineering have recently released a series of cracking posters that showcase Engineering as a profession which values diversity and creativity - each poster not only highlights the professional expertise of the engineer in question but also the hobbies and interests that have fuelled their Engineering career journeys, making them a helpful resource for busting stereotypes around what type of individuals become engineers and showcasing a range of role models from within the sector.

#WeAreCareers Returns!?– We finish this week's newsletter with some typically shameless self-promotion, as my other baby, the #WeAreCareers show , returns for its 10th Season! As always, MeetSabiha . and I will be bringing topical careers chat on a range of issues impacting the career development sector, including episodes around career tools for action planning, AI x Career Development, an international perspective on careers work and thoughts on approaching LMI differently! The full schedule for Season 10 can be found below, with details of how to watch each episode, live or on catch-up via the Career Development Institute Facebook Community, LinkedIn page and YouTube channel dropping the week before the episode goes live! See you there! ??

I'm always keen to hear what people think of this weekly newsletter format (e.g. Is it helpful? Does it add value to what is already out there on LinkedIn? What might make it better/more digestible?) so please do drop me a DM if you have any thoughts!

See you all in the?#Careersphere ?next week for?Episode 50! ??