Ladbrokes staff invest in their future with Nextstep
A Sefton based Ladbrokes Call Centre is closing its doors in March, making 230 staff redundant.
In response to these redundancies, nextstep have dedicated two advisers on-site to provide impartial information, advice and guidance to all staff, to help them plan their next career move. Sue Christian and Kerry Goodall began delivering group work with the staff in December 2009, working alongside partners from Job Centre Plus, Hugh Baird College and Crosby Training.
A fantastic response was received to these sessions, with 200 staff taking up the offer of a one-to-one interview with nextstep. Both advisers report lots of successes with the people who have accessed nextstep support finding jobs, even staff who were on maternity leave or long-term sick volunteered to come in for their nextstep interview.
Sue Christian explained, "Ladbrokes have shown that despite the difficult decision to close the call centre, they remain a really good employer. Communication with HR and all the team here has been great and actually made our job easier because there's such a supportive culture here."
Many of the staff have now got new jobs lined up to go to, and lots have enrolled in ECDL courses being delivered on-site by Crosby Training and Hugh Baird. Nextstep will continue to support Ladbrokes staff into new jobs or training when the call centre closes, by providing support from the Connexions centres around the area.
Ladbrokes HR Manager Tim Savidge wrote personally to thank nextstep for their valuable support, "In short, the arrival of Connexions has been a huge success.
Interest has been high and much of the credit must be given to both advisers, Sue Christian and Kerry Goodall whose enthusiasm and diligence has been commendable."
