Vibrance Employees Take on Valuable IT Training
A leading social care charity is taking part in a national pilot scheme to help empower social care employees with valuable IT skills.
Vibrance staff have undertaken the IT Skills Pathway initiative provided by the Health and Social Care Information Centre (HSCIC) to learn new skills that they can apply to their everyday work.
Ilford based, Vibrance, supports over 850 adults throughout London and the South East with learning disabilities, autism and mental health needs, offering a range of community services, low-support housing, nursing and care homes, short breaks, supported employment and self-directed services.
The IT Skills Pathway provides access to tailor-made training and assessment products covering the full range of abilities for users of the main Microsoft Office products from basic through to advanced.
Debbie Wallace, project worker at Vibrance’s Larwood Care Home in South Ockendon, Essex, who undertook the IT training said: “More and more of what we’re doing at work involves using a computer. Things like incident reporting are now done online and the future is likely to see even more things being computerised.
“It’s been very beneficial for me and I’d encourage other people to get involved especially if computing is new to you as it’s a great way to start learning. I’ll be encouraging and supporting other staff here at Larwood to get involved over the coming months for sure.”
David Trousdale support worker at Vibrance’s Mason Way Care Home in South Waltham Abbey Essex, who also took part in the IT training said: “I wanted to know more about how to use the computer as I’ve been entirely self-taught up until now. I completed the Entry Level course and found it really good.
“One of the residents I care for is keen to learn to more about using a computer and I now feel I have the confidence to show them how to do this. It’s a bit like teaching them how to cook. If I couldn’t cook then I wouldn’t have the confidence to show them how to and it’s the same with computers.
“It’s also increasing my productivity as I can carry out tasks more quickly than before – just little things like cut and paste or putting together a PowerPoint presentation. I also don’t have to rely on my granddaughter for IT advice anymore!”
Vibrance director of operations, Pete Chamberlain said: “It’s fantastic that we’ve been able to provide our staff with valuable IT training that will help them with their job. Not only will the training benefit our staff, it will also benefit our service users who want to learn more about IT themselves.
“We hope that in future we can use similar initiatives to give more of our staff and service users the opportunity to gain new valuable skills.”
Vibrance employs around 400 people and was named in The Sunday Times ‘100 Best Companies To Work For’ in 2012.