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8.45am
The first job of the day is to check my emails and messages. As usual there are a few that need action before my first appointment.
9:30am
I meet my client, Jerry, who’s starting an office work placement this morning. I met his new manager and did some disability awareness training with some of the people that he’ll be working with. Jerry tells me he’s had a letter telling him his disability and employment benefit claim has been rejected. I make a note to follow this up.
11am
Back at the office and I’m helping a colleague by doing a practice interview with her client, Marie. I’m pretending to be the interviewer. This makes the interview feel more real as Marie doesn’t know me as well as my colleague. We use a scoring system to give Marie constructive feedback.
12 noon
I catch up with telephone calls and emails that have gathered during the morning. Today there is the usual diverse range of issues including an email from a client who has decided to apply for a job that I spotted and passed on to her yesterday. This is good news. I will support her to make an application at our next meeting.
There’s just time to action Jerry’s problem with his benefit claim before lunch. I chat to our Welfare Rights Officer who can support Jerry to appeal his claim.
1.00pm
My afternoon kicks off with a client ‘initial meeting’. This is the first meeting that potential clients have with Into Work after they have been referred to our service. The purpose is to determine whether Into Work is the best service for them. It is always held in a private meeting room.
The potential new client is David. He has Williams Syndrome which isn’t something we have dealt with before. I’ve carried out some online research for this meeting but it is important that I ask David to explain about his condition in his own words and how it affects him day to day. We discuss David’s current activity, network of support, previous employment history, e
2.30pm
I type up notes from the initial meeting with David. Luckily my Team Leader is available for a quick chat about how it went. We agree that David is suitable for a service from Into Work. I ask our Project Administrator to transfer him from the ‘referral list’ to the ‘service waiting list’.
3.00pm
I spend the next hour doing research for a number of my clients. I am currently supporting a few people who are interested in law work. I follow up a list of law firms in Edinburgh, researching appropriate contacts to approach for a later marketing exercise.
4.00pm
The final job of the day is to record information about the work that I’ve done. I write up notes about today’s meetings, transfer paperwork to client files, and record all the direct client work that I’ve undertaken on a database for our project funders.