Becoming a Union Learning Rep started a mid-life learning journey for Sally Joyner – and last December she won the ‘Pride of Shropshire’ Learner Award 2016.

The same week she had also been busy presenting Dyslexia awards at ceremonies to fellow learners in her area. Sally said:

I had a great mentor when I first started learning lip reading and now I enjoy supporting others".

Sally, a Royal Mail worker for 30 years started her learning journey many years ago however it was to be many learning experiences later that led to her career change in 2013.

She was frustrated that despite enjoying her job at Royal Mail she wasn’t being successful in her application for other roles.

Sally said:

I had a great laugh and really enjoyed my job as a postperson, but even when I improved my skills I wasn’t picking up the jobs that I was applying for. I just wasn’t being encouraged by anybody to use my initiative."

Finding out she was dyslexic was a real game changer for Sally and when she became a ULR for Communications Workers Union (CWU) in 2005 she focused on improving her English and maths and many other courses that took her interest. 

I never even thought that I was going to end up being a teacher or run my own business. I just wanted my skills and talents to be used to my full ability."

She organised and participated in lots of workplace learning courses so that she could recommend them to her members, and took destiny into her own hands before becoming aware of the unionlearn ‘Mid-Life Career Review’ resources available.

It happened organically for me. As a ULR I used the unionlearn website and staff in the regions for face-to-face support; sadly this layer of support is no longer available."

It was around then that she was drawn to lip reading. She had taken sign language courses before and wanted, not only, to support her profoundly deaf colleagues, but all the other colleagues who were hard of hearing. She had noticed that they wouldn’t come to union meetings or engage in learning.

In 2013 Sally took redundancy to focus on her dream of becoming a lip reading teacher. After working to change her habit of ‘talking too fast!’ she completed her teacher training in Manchester and now runs courses in partnership with the Workers Educations Association (WEA) for NHS patients, as well as organising her own private classes across Shropshire and the Midlands.

Sally is still active in her local branch of CWU but feels that there are still more branches that could engage more with the learning agenda. In terms of unions generally Sally thinks that there is a challenge as to how they can engage and support workers who move jobs more frequently than in the past. 

Nobody stays in the same job for life these days and resources such as the mid-life review packs could help many individuals to make the right choices."

After such a busy and successful 2016, this year has brought its own challenges. Sally has been busy networking with other self-employed people to build her business and continue to get involved in young enterprise, women in rural areas and dyslexia awareness locally.

Sally added:

I need other people to bounce ideas off and to give myself a break from working from home."

Despite the hard work and busy time Sally is still addicted to learning:

I am doing an online course at the moment about building my business and marketing but I need to start making some money now!"

She is a keen user of social media, using it to promote her business and much of her work comes from recommendations. She works with partner agencies such as Women in Rural Enterprise and Age UK.

Sally is happy to provide talks across the Midlands on Health and Well-being days and can be contacted on [email protected]