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How to make career changes easier than ever

The average UK employee is said to spend 1/3 of their working life dissatisfied; due in part to heavy workloads and unproductive team members failing to pull their weight. However, despite this lack of vocational fulfillment, 77% of unsatisfied employees are reluctant to leave a job they dislike because they feel they lack the required skills to pursue a different career.
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The average UK employee is said to spend one third of their working life dissatisfied; due in part to heavy workloads and unproductive team members failing to pull their weight. Contributor Bruce Rayner, CEO at consumer finance specialist – Duologi.

However, despite this lack of vocational fulfillment, the majority (77 percent) of unsatisfied employees are reluctant to leave a job they dislike because they feel they lack the required skills to pursue a different career.

Research shows that this not only affects staff productivity, but can also cost UK businesses billions of pounds worth of lost revenue. For this reason, more needs to be done to address workplace happiness. Retraining is one way to bolster job satisfaction rates. It provides people with the opportunity to learn new skills and gain expertise that could help them pursue a more fulfilling vocation – whether this is within their current company or externally.

Yet, as it stands, a significant number of adults feel unable to access such opportunities due to costly fees and busy lifestyles. This highlights that – first and foremost – employers and training providers need to focus on making it easier for individuals to pursue a career change regardless of their circumstance, but how?

Offering more flexible, affordable and tailored courses, to suit the needs of those open to re-education, is one way of achieving this. Doing so will create a greater chance of maximising the number of course enrollments year after year and – in turn – help to increase staff performance and drive business success. With this in mind, let’s explore the importance of making courses available to all and the most effective ways of putting this into practice.

Be flexible
Given that those most dissatisfied at work are aged between 35 and 54 years old, many prospective trainees may have a family and a full-time job. For this reason, learning options need to be as flexible as possible.

Offering 24-hour access to online learning materials and conducting sessions outside standard working hours are just a couple of ways that courses could be adapted to suit the needs of a wider range of people. Aside from assignment deadlines, ensuring there are few study-related time restrictions will also contribute towards make these courses more appealing.

Brighton School of Business and Management is a great example of a flexible training provider. It offers a variety of online distance courses that allow students to complete tasks in their own time, wherever and whenever is most convenient for them. As more education establishments follow suit and employers start to offer similar courses on a widespread basis, there is potential to trigger a rise in enrollment rates.

Affordability is key
Although many businesses provide training budgets to employees in-house, for students enrolling in external courses without workplace funding, cost is a major obstacle. To remove unaffordability from the equation, education and training providers should offer flexible finance plans, such as 0 percent interest rates and buy now pay later policies. Adopting these forms of credit will help individuals from all backgrounds access a range of courses by eliminating the possibility of mounting interest rates, allowing prospective students to pay for courses at a later date and distributing payments into manageable installments.

Alternatively, ‘earn as you learn’ options are a great way for people to pursue a new career path without additional costs being a worry. Offering the option to study part-time whilst working and learning on the job allows businesses to train employees to fit their own internal requirements. Staff members, meanwhile, have the opportunity to accrue on-the-job experience alongside their studies, providing them better skills for the future.

A personalised process
Each prospective student has their own individual requirements when it comes to training courses, so it is important to avoid a ‘one size fits all’ approach. Allowing consumers to alter courses to fit their specific interests and needs could therefore encourage more people to return to education. Creating a ‘pick and mix’ style offering – in which people can choose to study specific modules – will help to personalise experiences and provide students with expertise relevant to their individual requirements. Moreover, rather than studying broad subjects, tailored courses allow people to focus on improving targeted areas before applying for a new role; ultimately helping to improve their chances of recruitment. This is particularly beneficial for businesses that require candidates to possess a particular set of skills. As a result, recruiters could expect to see an influx of applicants better suited to their vacancies.

Making it a reality
To truly help make career changes easier than ever, businesses and training providers need to commit to altering the current offerings on the market. Key to this is making affordability, flexibility and personalisation of courses top priorities. This will remove certain obstacles currently preventing people from pursing fulfilling vocations. If implemented correctly, businesses could see improved success rates as more productive, skilled and motivated employees enter the workplace.


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