As above, just took voluntary redundancy (was in IT devo. role) and now want to make the move to IT project management. It appears to be a logical move for many developers, but I need to get training eg PRINCE2, Agile etc.

Now…..a mate who was made redundant a year or so ago managed to get £14K of training paid for by the government/DWP when he was claiming JSA. I’m meeting up with him shortly to get tips as he told me there are hoops to jump though in certain ways (!), but just wondered if anyone else has experience of this and what you need to do etc. Btw I’ve only been redundant for the past week, so not even a month in to JSA yet.

I made an enquiry, and was told I have to provide evidence that my lack of training/certification in a specific area was the one thing that was preventing me from gaining employment.

They didn’t elaborate and how and what ! Probably depends on your local Job Centre, if they have any budget left to spend that year etc, how much your contact can be bothered helping you. At this time of year you might be quids in as they spend the rest of their budget under the Local Government Use It Or Lose It Policy.

That was for a scheme for those made redundant – you weren’t daft enough to admit to JSA that it was voluntary were you ?

Thanks hels. I was forewarned that I’ll have to be persistent! Perhaps I need to attend an interview or 2 for PM roles….

That was my plan – then hassle the recruiters relentlessly to email me with feedback saying that my lack of Agile certification put me out of the running.

(Then I decided to bugger off to NZ instead, and now I’m back have enough contract work to not be eligible for JSA pittance. But good luck, and do let us know how you get on !)

Could you use your redundancy money to pay for some training? Isn’t that sort of what it it is for?

Could you get a job with the training and experience you currently have ?

If the answer to that is Yes, why would the government fund training for you because you want to change your career ?

I’m not going to get involved in a debate about the moral fors and againsts of this. I have my opinions, other’s have their’s.

This thread was simply to ask the question of anyone else who has gone through the process and get feedback.

go to job centre
Sign on
Ask about response to redundancy =also known as Rapid response service
you have 13 weeks from redundnacy date to claim

I forget if Prince 2 is still covered as I dont do this much anymore – it used to be but I think it has been withdrawn but not certain – i thinkl you may need a job offer to get it
you can get training related to your last job where there is a manadatory qualification ONLY in the 13 weeks – well you can also get it but you have a right in 13 weeks
IT WONT FUND RETRAINING IT NEEDS TO RELATE TO PREVIOUS JOB
IMHO they wont fund prince2 as it wont get you a job anymore than me getting bodyguard trainign ois a forklift licence will let me do those jobs as i have no experience and currently there is enough fok with the quals and experience – i would not advise paying yourself but that is your choice
You can e-mail me if you wish on this
you sure your mate got 14 k – never heard of anything apporaching that tbh.

Thanks Junkyard.

Check with the Job Centre, there used to be funding available for more or less any training up to 6 months from your start date of claiming JSA. I used to deal with people 12 months+ unemployed and we had to do some creative thinking to access funding for training at that point. The reasoning goes, if you’ve not bothered before 6 months then you obviously aren’t interested. Most of the people we dealt with were never informed that training funds were available.

It may have all changed with “The Work Programme” starting, I got out just before they rolled it out.

It has changed the current govt has pretty much cut everything.

you can apply for flexible support Fund as well but anything above £350 is a non local decison and goes to a “decision maker”
they fund all sorts seen graduates get £2k for TEFL for example

I’m not going to get involved in a debate about the moral fors and againsts of this. I have my opinions, other’s have their’s.

I wasn’t meaning anything to do with morals or rights and wrongs.

I was just meaning that if you are able to get a job that you are currently qualified for and have experience of doing, then what would be the incentive for the government to fund you to do training for something else ?

You would just then be qualified to do something else, but have no experience so less likely to get a job in that area.

Nealglover – thanks for explaining > see your point you’re trying to make

I’m assuming you’ve tried to find dev roles but haven’t had much luck. It’s a bit of a catch 22 situation really as IMHO a qualification won’t get you a PM role, experience will.

I probably wouldn’t hire someone as a project manager if they had come from a technical role and had no experience of being a PM, although I have moved people internally to PM roles. You should certainly adapt your CV to highlight how you have applied project management methodologies to your previous roles. You may find a recruiter willing to take a punt to recruit a junior technical PM.

Prince 2 courses are not training courses (unless you’ve found an actual training course!), it’s a certification course (i.e. to get you through the exam). The certification is supposed to show that as a PM you employ Prince 2 methodology – although anyone could pass it, even a school leaver.

I would suggest applying for junior project management roles (PMO or project analyst), or development roles that require a certain amount of project management to gain more experience.

Agencies are tricky as you’ve got to get past the people who are rejecting your CV because you don’t have the appropriate tick in the box.

Quick questions;

– Where are you?
– Whats your skillset?
– Which industry are you in?

Quick update on the above….

I did manage to get one course paid for (and luckily the one I wanted most) – PRINCE2 (foundation plus practitioner). Seems the key thing was that it was on a list of courses offered by a training provider that Peterborough job centre has a contract with.

I’ve been told there’s no money for any other courses…..but it was good at least to get one course paid for!