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As a parent, it’s with mixed feelings that you might receive an email from your child’s secondary school regarding taking your child to work for experience for a day. I suspect previously, this idea was founded on the concept of “following in the footsteps of your parents” but in modern days, it’s a little more complicated due to virtual working and cyber security. However, on the 21st and 22nd June, Clarity supported this initiative and welcomed four students (two from year 10 (15 years old) and two from year 8 (13 years old)). With some help from my colleagues, we hatched a plan to try and ensure they would receive the maximum benefit of a day in a work environment - the Clarity Team were amazing, stepping up to the challenge.
The days both started with the Business Manager welcoming the students and providing them with access to the Clarity learning material used for career development, modules which would help introduce skills which can be used in the workplace. These included (truthfully with a little parental influence) confidence building, emotional intelligence, anger management and anxiety management. During their respective days, the students actively participated in business-as-usual exercises which included assisting the Digital Team with security compliance checks and assisting the Knowledge Management Team with article research. This gave them an insight into how to run a company safely and some of the requirements of the job as a consultant. In addition to this, the students were invited to attend an employee development review meeting (1:1) to learn about the employee review process in place in a work environment. They were given an explanation about how the process is cyclical to assist with personal development and progression along career pathways – setting objectives, measuring progress towards goals and identifying areas for development.
The year 8 students were provided the opportunity to shadow a Leadership Skills learning course emphasising that learning continues after school. In turn, the year 10 students were invited to attend a team meeting with Clarity Consultants and Managers where individuals provided updates on the work they were performing and reflections on their work assignments (the year 10 students participated in the reflective practice sharing their thoughts on what had worked well during the day and what they would like to pursue further).
Feedback received from the students was very positive – Quote from a Year 8 student “Thank you for having us and we have thoroughly enjoyed watching you guys at work”. They particularly enjoyed the activities where they could contribute and see the output – quote from a Year 10 “Thanks for letting me help out!”. The Knowledge Management Team have since released their July Digest to the wider team with a special mention to the students contributions.
A big thank you was received from the students and an equally big thank you from me to the fantastic Clarity Team!
