Work

[neil]

Lmao @ the blonde thin chinstrap and goatee

[Cod Eye]

Has anyone got any experience/tips about transitioning back into full time employment after a long time out?

My disability is well under control now thanks to the meds really doing their job, so last week I decided to try and get back into work after about 9 years of working sporadically for myself. i was lucky enough to get an interview for a full time position in the public sector last Friday, asked back for a second interview on Wednesday and was offered the job(which I accepted) a few hour later. Now I'm panicking, though. It's been so long since I had a structured 9-5 job I'm worried it's going to be too much for me in the early stages. Has anyone got any advice on how to prepare/handle the change, please?

I don't start until early December due to them moving offices, so i have a little time to get things sorted...

[ReturnOfTheMack]

Today I got a phone call from one of my service managers to offer me a role in the council bereavement services. Only temporary to start, but it will likely lead to a permanent job. 

 

Not the career path I imagined when I trained to be an actor...

[Kookoocachu]

On 11/13/2021 at 12:18 PM, Cod Eye said:

Has anyone got any experience/tips about transitioning back into full time employment after a long time out?

I’m in the same position, I’m desperately trying to get back into work after a 13 year break (I’ve done the odd shifts for mates but that’s it).

finding someone that will give me a chance is proving a bit of a nightmare and getting me down. I’m honest with them about my MS but I tell them how well I’ve been managing. I’m either not hearing back from employers at all or just “unsuccessful” without even getting an interview. 

[Cod Eye]

4 hours ago, Kookoocachu said:

I’m in the same position, I’m desperately trying to get back into work after a 13 year break (I’ve done the odd shifts for mates but that’s it).

finding someone that will give me a chance is proving a bit of a nightmare and getting me down. I’m honest with them about my MS but I tell them how well I’ve been managing. I’m either not hearing back from employers at all or just “unsuccessful” without even getting an interview. 

Have you thought about doing some voluntary work? I started by volunteering at the Citizen's Advice Bureau a couple of days a week, mainly to show any possible employers that I could physically cope with a days work. It did seem to work, as it indirectly led to the job I'll be starting soon. 

Edited November 15, 2021 by Cod Eye

[Kookoocachu]

4 minutes ago, Cod Eye said:

Have you thought about doing some voluntary work? I started by volunteering at the Citizen's Advice Bureau a couple of days a week, mainly to show any possible employers that I could physically cope with a days work. It did seem to work, as it indirectly led to the job I'll be starting soon. 

I’ve done a few voluntary things. English Heritage, charities, parish council stuff. I think what’s also not going in my favour is the fact that I’ve been out of work for so long and not really qualified in anything but healthcare.

[Sphinx]

I'm looking for a desk chair for working from home but am getting bogged down in the myriad options. I'm 6ft 3 and would ideally like a headrest but there are so many options that basically look the same to me so I thought I'd put it to the people of UKFF to see if anyone happens to have any suggestions. I can stretch to £200 if it's really worth it but ideally £150 tops.

[69MeDon]

I need some advice, if anybody has any on this.

So, I started a new job, as I mentioned in here. I work in event sales for a financial news and information outlet. They have one well-established, well-known event in the structured finance industry. They have four other, not as well-established events and a new one they're launching early next year. Prior to hiring me, they didn't have anyone dedicated to trying to bring in paid event delegates - they were heavily discounting, giving away passes by the boatload, the guy doing sponsorships would just hand a sponsor 20 passes (which they weren't even using all of). I did some analysis and they were lucky to be hitting 20-25% paid. One of their events recently, pre-pandemic, had only 7 out of 140 delegates paying. So, I've come in, I've upped the marketing (they don't have a dedicated marketing person, it's just me), I've said no more just handing out passes for almost nothing. I've been really, actively working on this properly for a week now and my direct boss just asked me "based on responses so far, albeit limited, what would you be happy to say the paid delegate numbers for this upcoming event would be?" I guess, essentially, I can kind of set my own target, within reason. The trouble is, given how they've devalued their events by throwing discounts or free passes at anyone who happened to ask for one the last decade, I am not sure how to respond. In other places I've worked, I'd be saying 100-150, but I don't know how likely it is that I, in 12 weeks, will be able to increase their delegate revenue by almost 100% on a brand new event, and given their history of handing these passes out. But I also don't want to say 50 or 60, because that does sound low and they might start really questioning that. On the one hand, I would rather underpromise and overdeliver than the other way round, but I also have to be careful in how I present this.

So, yeah, any advice would be appreciated!

Edited November 17, 2021 by 69MeDon

[Joe Blog]

I don't work in that type of environment but I always go with 

'Under promise, over deliver'

Too many people do the opposite and look worse for it. I would rather have a crowd of 60 who all paid rather than 120 with only 30 paying. 

Edited November 17, 2021 by Joe Blog

[Jesse]

Is it the kind of place where you can give both bands? Having worked in gaming events up until the pandemic we'd often be pretty blunt about these things internally, and often to clients. Set expectations based on their past approach that it may be a slow turnaround so the 50 or 60 number with the expectation that it will be a longer transformation (and presumably budget accordingly to that progression) but offer that if you see a smaller effect than expected based on their past approach that you could hit that 100 number early.

[Briefcase]

I don't know how these things work or even what it is, but always worth throwing exclusivity things in with the paid if you have the budget or the material to make this happen. Everyone loves exclusives/freebies and at least that justifies something of a difference between paid & free if you do end up giving free passes away.

Edited November 17, 2021 by Briefcase

[CTXRussomark]

You want to position it in the exact same way you just have on here.  "Based on the prior business model and historic data I would generally expect to see "X" number of paid visitors.  Where we should he aiming to get to is "Y" with increased focus on marketing and reducing giveaways, but it's going to take more than one event to see the full benefits.  For this event I would consider "Y" a success and a good sign of progress that we can continue to build on for future events".

[69MeDon]

1 hour ago, CTXRussomark said:

You want to position it in the exact same way you just have on here.  "Based on the prior business model and historic data I would generally expect to see "X" number of paid visitors.  Where we should he aiming to get to is "Y" with increased focus on marketing and reducing giveaways, but it's going to take more than one event to see the full benefits.  For this event I would consider "Y" a success and a good sign of progress that we can continue to build on for future events".

Thank you (and also to everyone else that replied). This is exactly what I needed to hear! Got a meeting about this at 10, so that's what I'm going with.

Edit: turns out I was worrying for no reason - before I even got into my working and telling them 60-70, they said they were thinking 35-40 so...awesome.

Edited November 18, 2021 by 69MeDon

[Tommy!]

I returned to work after time off sick and my manager didn't conduct any back to work assesment. I always thought they should be completing that straight off to make sure I'm safe to be on site, am I wrong there?

Much like a couple of offices I've worked in they don't really care as long as stuff gets done and generally overlook the odd cuts and erratic behaviour as long as I don't freak out the norms, so it's especially a box ticking job for them anyway, but it's made me question my prior understanding of the process.

Edited November 19, 2021 by Tommy!

[Kookoocachu]

As previously mentioned I’m trying to get back into regular employment after a good 13yr break (for those who don’t know I have MS). 
I’ve applied for all I can and either I’m still waiting on hearing anything or I can’t even secure an interview. 
A couple of jobs have come up but they’re fixed term contracts of 6 months or a year. Would you apply for these also? I don’t really want to be back to square one after the term is up but I also think maybe I’d have more luck in securing another job if I’m already in work. The jobs themselves aren’t really what I want to do, but unfortunately I don’t really have the luxury of being able to pick and choose.