Personal support and employment training at Life Skills Centre in Soho
The Life Skills Centre aims to provide a well-rounded and practical curriculum of personal and professional support, in order to assist those who are currently homeless, or who have recently experienced homelessness, back into lasting employment and independence.
The Life Skills Programme runs for a period of 12 weeks and opens with a two-week period of engagement, designed to introduce new participants to the House, their new group, the team within the House and the job roles available at Quintessentially Soho. During this time, the programme's Life Skills Coaches offer one-to-one sessions, team building seminars and run specific personal development workshops.
In Week 3, participants undertake an intense period of professional hospitality training with Off To Work, to prepare them for their work experience shifts in Week 4.
Weeks 4 to 11 consist of a mixture of onsite and offsite training, work experience shifts and a concentrated personal development schedule. The multi-purpose nature of the site allows the programme to offer a supported and well-rounded 8 week period of training and work experience. The programme is complemented by a range of therapies, and cultural activities and opportunities.
Towards the end of the programme, the focus shifts towards post-programme arrangements, and helps participants to finalise CVs, build up confidence and fine tune interview techniques. Our most recent employer partner, Debenhams, now provides a complimentary, bespoke shopping day for all our participants, to deck them out in brand-new interview clothing. The BBC supports the programme by staging mock interviews and helping participants to document their progress throughout the programme on DVDs and podcasts. In these final weeks, the Life Skills team works with various businesses in and around Soho to assist participants into further employment and appropriate work experience placements offsite.
Listen to first-hand accounts from participants on the Programme:
| James | |
| Maria | |
| Leon |
News about the Programme and the charity is published in our newsletter, which is available for download: Spring 2011 Newsletter (PDF 492Kb)
