STUDENTS from a North Yorkshire college have recently taken part in a series of employability workshops delivered by energy firm National Grid and national charity Young Enterprise.

Designed to prepare young people for the recruitment process and entering employment, the Young Enterprise ‘Grid for Good’ pathway programme consisted of three different sessions including insight, teambuilding and upskilling.

The insight session held at Selby College featured a quiz which was designed to introduce students to personal profiling, which is often used as part of National Grid’s recruitment process. The students were able to discuss their findings in small groups, as well as gain insight into opportunities at National Grid and the wider energy industry.

As part of the teambuilding exercise, the students were given a problem-solving task based on a scenario regularly used by National Grid at its assessment centre – enabling them to understand the skills a major national employer is looking for.

The final session, upskilling, consisted of tasks for work readiness training with members from National Grid’s recruitment team. They provided the students with advice on how to showcase their skills in the very best way to get noticed and be successful in their future job applications.

The students were also introduced to some mock interview competency-based questions and were trained on how to prepare a STAR (situation, task, action and result) structured answer.

Rebecca James, work placement coordinator at Selby College, said: "Our students found the workshops extremely beneficial and interactive, helping them to gain a better understanding of the skills they need to thrive in employment or within the energy sector.

"We are looking forward to running the programme again in the new academic year to ensure that more of our students can benefit from the initiative."

Question and answer sessions were also held with National Grid volunteers, where students could ask questions about working in the energy sector and how they can access other Grid for Good pathway programmes.

Students Alesha Tomlinson, Ashley Dutu, Hollie Downes, Jack Midgley, Joshua Coneyworth, Lewis Harrison, Noah Sykes-Scott and Sarah Ridley, were presented with certificates upon completing the programme.

"It was great to be able to bounce ideas off others in the team and gain feedback from members of National Grid’s team", Jack Midgley said.