Graduate Spotlight: Shania

Last summer, 27 of our incredible Envision Graduates were warmly welcomed by our fantastic corporate partners for a truly unique work experience opportunity. These opportunities were carefully tailored with partners to meet the needs of our young people, offering them an ideal first step into the world of work and the chance to put their Essential Skills into practice.

We’ve gathered feedback from our young people and it’s safe to say that every young person this year has had a fantastic time on work experience and will be heading back to school with even more confidence in their abilities and their next steps after school. Of the 17 young people who shared feedback, 94% strongly agreed that the Essential Skills they learned through Envision prepared them for the opportunity, 100% felt comfortable in the workplace they joined and 94% rated their experience as 5 stars.

A massive thank you to Kennedys, NFP, HS2, Federated Hermes, Alliance Bernstein and Baily Garner for creating such meaningful opportunities for our young people and giving them the chance to be heard within your organisations. We can’t wait to provide even more work experience opportunities for our young people next summer!

Shania joined Federated Hermes as a Diversity, Equality and Inclusion Intern. Together with her team, Shania worked on a project to research and find a way to promote Federated Hermes’ “Community for All” network and encourage employees to engage with the new strategy.

Why did you take part in the Envision Programme?

I joined the Envision programme to help build confidence in myself, and I definitely have! I usually wouldn’t put myself forward for new experiences but by the end of the programme I felt confident enough to take part in work experience and push myself out of my comfort zone.

Can you tell us about your time at Federated Hermes?

Going to Federated Hermes gave me an insight into what it’s actually like to work – I’d never worked in a professional place like that before. On the first day I was nervous, but working with a team of people my age meant that I knew I wouldn’t be on my own. The workplace was so welcoming, and they made sure everybody was included.

What was your favourite part of the week and why?

I really enjoyed presenting our project back to the Federated Hermes team on the last day. I had to use a lot of determination to make sure the project was completed because we had a lot to do, and we all had different ideas that we had to find a way to combine. To see all of our hard work come to fruition in our presentation was really cool.

How do you think this opportunity will have helped you for the future?

Envision really helped me to understand skills and the importance of them and this opportunity gave me the chance to test them out in the real world! I now feel confident that I can use the skills I have learnt in any workplace, I won’t feel as nervous starting my first job.

What would you say to another young person considering whether they want to take part in work experience?

I’d recommend that they don’t hide away from the chance, it’s a really good opportunity for them to build their confidence and put all the skills they learnt through Envision to use.

Before I did work experience, I didn’t really see the benefit in doing it, but now I feel like I can see myself in the workplace and see how I will use my skills in the future and forever.

Do you have any final comments?

Ursula and Jo from Federated Hermes were really helpful and accommodating! Being in a workplace can feel like a lot of pressure and be overwhelming but they gave us the space and time so that we could really learn from the experience at our own pace – this helped me a lot.