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Coronavirus didn’t stop Click Travel running its annual work experience initiative. Chief executive Jill Palmer talks to Abra Dunsby about the success of its recent virtual workshops.
When the UK went into lockdown Jill Palmer, chief executive of travel management company Click Travel in Birmingham, decided it was time to give back to her local community and put the wheels in motion to host a virtual work experience workshop for local teenagers.
“The pandemic has obviously had an effect on children, so we wanted to reach out to them, including those from lower socio-economic backgrounds, to give them an insight into the workplace – even though it was a bit different to the normal way we’d do work experience,” explains Palmer.
The inspiration came after Palmer attended a virtual networking lunch featuring special guest and record-breaking British cyclist Mark Beaumont, who talked about his lockdown experience.
“He drew a grid about work, family and community and talked about how he’d taken action in each of those spheres during lockdown. I thought: I need to do something for the community and I’m going to make this [virtual work experience] happen.”
Palmer asked for volunteers at Click Travel to help organise the two days of virtual work experience, which took place on 17 and 18 August, and had plenty of willing helpers. “We had five or six employees volunteer, including some who recently joined our Click Start graduate scheme,” says Palmer.
The company promoted the work experience on their social media channels and also used their contacts at local colleges in disadvantaged areas of Birmingham to offer the opportunity to teenagers aged between 15 and 18.
“In the end we had 20 kids attend from nine different schools,” says Palmer. "It was brilliant to see so many young people take the opportunity to join. We know that many work experience placements have been cancelled all over the country because of the ongoing pandemic, so it was great to organise a way to make sure the opportunity wasn’t lost.”
Click Travel created a virtual website ahead of the workshops and asked the teenagers to sign up for sessions based on their interests.
The sessions, which took place over Zoom, were designed to give the students a taste of different areas within the business including marketing, sales, customer service and product engineering.
“Activities included learning how to code, trying their hand at sales and finding out how to use social media to promote themselves and get a job in the future,” says Palmer.
The coding class was a particular success, with almost all students attending, as was a Q&A with recent Click Start graduates, during which the students could ask questions about getting into the jobs market. Each session culminated in a virtual quiz to solidify what they’d learnt and make the experience interactive.
Palmer says the experience not only helped the students, allowing them to learn “many transferable skills” such as “customer service and basic coding” and to “increase their confidence”, it also helped Click Travel too.
“The team enjoyed it so much and learnt a lot. The young grads who put it together all worked across departments for the first time. They learnt leadership skills and worked on social media, outreach and planning.”
Click Travel has worked on various initiatives over the years that help young people and those from disadvantaged communities succeed at work.
“We run work experience ever year and have focused on welcoming children from lower socio-economic groups around Birmingham by building up relationships with colleges via our head of people,” says Palmer.
The company’s four-year-old Click Start graduate scheme, which helps young people kick off their careers in travel, has proved a big success. “Each year we take at least two grads for operations and two for tech. The scheme has been superb in terms of growing talent through the organisation.”
The TMC also employs apprentices and regularly works with the One Million Mentors scheme to offer mentorship to people from diverse backgrounds, helping them build career and development opportunities.
Click would certainly consider employing work experience students in the future, and hopes to host more virtual work experience workshops next year, says Palmer.
The TMC has already taken some key learnings from this year to move the scheme forward. “I know that access to technology is an issue for young people from deprived backgrounds so no doubt there’s more we can do to reach them and engage with them next time,” she says.
Palmer hopes that by continuing to take on work experience students, Click Travel can inspire young people to develop successful careers, no matter their background or what sector they might end up working in.
“Working with young people and helping local kids is something that’s very close to my heart. Their resilience during this lockdown period and the way in which they’ve adapted to challenges presented to them has been inspiring.
“It’s so important to me that we give young people opprtunities and if they want to work in travel, even better.”
John Wood, 16, attended Click Travel’s work experience workshop. He offers his perspective.
Why did you decide to take work experience with Click Travel?
I wanted to do work experience this summer but my placement was cancelled because of Covid so I signed up.
How did you find out about the opportunity?
My mum had seen a post about it on social media.
What did you learn?
Quite a lot really. Most of the day was about how to use different skills in lots of different situations. I took the coding session and it really showed me what goes on behind the scenes at Click Travel.
How did you find the experience?
I really enjoyed the day and the people were so nice. I had never used Zoom previous to the day but it worked fine.
How important do you think work experience is in helping you decide what you want to do in life?
I think it’s good to try lots of things first because you might try something and not like it. I really enjoyed the coding session where Rob [Curran] showed us how he builds the website for Click Travel. I took Computer Science for GCSE and Rob showed me how you can use the skills in the real world.
Has the experience made you consider a career in business travel or travel tech?
I’ve always felt it sounds quite cool to work in travel since it’s what my mum has done for a job for most of my life and the day certainly helped me lean towards a career in travel.
