Supporting workers with webinars
Through Covid 19 lockdown the Bakers Union and Learning Services have kept ourselves busy by attending every webinar that has been advertised! If we received an email for an up and coming event we have shared it with the team so we can all participate.
There has been a wide variety of topics from workshops on how to create a CV with impact; Q&As on Health and Safety; Wellness for older workers and midlife reviews; Online Safety; Mental Health to my personal favourite, Laughter Yoga, which I think we should watch every Monday morning to get ourselves motivated for the week.
We have attended with a variety of providers: TUC, Gov Connect, Learn My Way, unionlearn; Unions21; IER; ACAS; Class and some of these have had up to 800 attendees!
These webinars have prompted much discussion amongst the team and kept our brains motivated and focused and if someone couldn’t attend then we cascaded our information or they catch up on YouTube.
We attended TUC Congress (something we never do) and the annual unionlearn conference in November. We, as a team, normally attend this event but this year we watched from the comfort of our homes.
In September I was asked to take part in a webinar by unionlearn, entitled ‘Build Back Better’.
I had two questions to answer:
- ‘How has the BFAWU been supporting its members facing redundancy and what strategies for support have worked well?'
- ‘What advice or tips would you give to union reps that have members at risk of redundancy’?
To say this was daunting is an understatement but I set to work.
I worked on the first question saying how we used to support redundancy and that, while we still wanted to help people facing redundancy, it would have to be done in a completely different way with Covid. I explained that my colleague Karen and I worked through this all on emails. I wrote questions for people to answer so we could write their CVs and we kept our emails light so we could give them a good experience. I said how we had got them to complete the BFAWU IAG (information, advice and guidance) app and SkillChecks and sent them the Interview Skills pack, and how it hadn’t been easy but we had had some lovely feedback.
The second question was a little harder, we know exactly what we do but putting it in to words is difficult. I wrote my answer and was happy with it but on the day completely changed it! I spoke about asking Job Centre Plus and Agencies to come on site to do workshops. I also spoke about the Money Advice Service website and how they have books that can be ordered or downloaded. I spoke about being patient, friendly and smiling. I also spoke about Mental Health, not just the person sitting in front of you but, dealing with people who are facing redundancy can impact on a reps mental health too.
I talked about our website and if people wanted to contact me after the webinar they could and my details were on there. I also mentioned our new learning platform, Litmos and how we have courses on there like Interview Skills and many more.
Well, I did it, I must say if you are asked to participate in one of these webinars, give it a go, you don’t know what you can do until you try!
These webinars have been a lifeline to the outside world and helped us, but for Covid these wouldn’t have happened. We have learned so much and I hope that they carry on in the future.
