The Goulburn Murray Local Learning and Employment Network has good news for Shepparton youth hungry for work: there are plenty of entry-level jobs in the region and employers are eager to hire and train young people.
While the pandemic has badly disrupted some employment sectors, a new report published by four GMLLEN youth interns in late October contained surprising findings.
“The key message for me that came out of it was that there’s a lot of hope,” GMLLEN project co-ordinator Lisa Kerr said.
The interns interviewed 15 Shepparton employers in high-growth industries about opportunities for young people, and the feedback was overwhelmingly positive.
Employers in Shepparton want to give young people work, because they bring new skills, modern perspectives and fresh energy.
Prior to starting the project, intern Abbey Monk, 20, thought there weren’t many jobs available in Shepparton for young people looking to launch a career.
She learned the pandemic had created competition for workers across the board, with many industries crying out for new talent.
“Each employer that we talked to said they were hiring and looking for people,” she said.
“There are jobs in the community, and they said they were willing to train young people, you didn’t have to have the qualifications.”
The 15 employers interviewed represented a broad range of industries, including Goulburn Valley Health, Goulburn Regional Pre-School Association, Teller Collective, Unilever, Furphy’s and Foott Waste Solutions.
Intern Tom Saxton, 20, said the GMLLEN How Work Works report findings matched what he’d witnessed first-hand.
“I’ve got friends who before COVID-19 found it really difficult to get a job because they didn’t have prior experience,” he said.
“They’ve actually been able to find employment really easily now.”
Mr Saxton said the GMLLEN research indicated employers were keen to connect with young people who were “willing to give it a shot and willing to learn”.
“They’re wanting people who want to work and give it their all,” he said.
The final report based on the GMLLEN interns’ research was prepared by policy, research and strategy expert Jeanette Pope, and is the third in her How Work Works series.
As well as providing a snapshot of Shepparton’s employment sector, it offers invaluable insight and practical advice to young jobseekers, and is freely available online.
Intern Brea Dorsett, 22, said she was surprised to learn employers weren’t looking for the stock-standard CV she’d been taught to write in school.
“When an employer sees a generic CV template they just throw it out, even though that’s what we do in school,“ she said.
“They want to know about you as a person, and your core values, your attitude, your willingness to learn – those sorts of things.”
The industries experiencing the highest growth in the Shepparton region were identified as health care and social assistance, education and training, information media and telecommunications, and wholesale trade.
Despite the sunny outlook in terms of jobs available, the report acknowledged youth and employers were still struggling to find each other.
“Both sides of the labour market are wanting the same thing, they just don’t know how to get there,” Ms Kerr said.
Young people have little chance to meet employers, are not hearing about pathways in school, and the process to find work is difficult to navigate – particularly for those on their first job hunt.
Miss Dorsett, who was also a mentor at the Education First Youth Foyer, said the report found a lot of job opportunities were made available through word-of-mouth or networking.
“It’s hard for people from a disadvantaged background to develop those soft skills, because they aren’t necessarily nurtured in the home,” she said.
The internship itself was the kind of opportunity more young people should be able to experience, according to Mr Saxton.
“I really want more of this,” he said.
“Because if we did this during school, then you’d be getting young people talking directly with employers and all those kind of things.”
The report suggested funding rural careers education, more support for vocational pathways, developing alternative forms of work experience, and funding a ‘youth tab’ on the GROW Greater Shepparton jobs portal.
Ms Kerr said GMLLEN was eager to collaborate with GROW Greater Shepparton to make the findings of the report accessible to young people in the region, and intern Tawnee Vocale was instrumental in exploring those possibilities.
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