People are central to our success, let us introduce you to Tessa, and her story…

People are central to our success, our values centre around people and one of our values is around diversity.

We’d like to introduce you to Tessa.

She came to work with us through a company called Job Support and has been with us for 18 months.

Job support places people with intellectual disabilities into paid jobs. These services provide recruitment, job matching, job training, and ongoing support.  Focusing on something fundamental to us and that is what people can do, rather than the usual focus on what people can’t do.

When Tessa first came to work with us, she was very shy, the world was daunting to her, and needed a lot of support.  JobSupport helped construct a list of jobs the filled her days.  Be that going to the post office, taking cheques to the bank, doing the shopping (we have a lot of coffee drinkers.. so milk is always in demand), cleaning the windows, stacking the dishwasher, and cleaning the kitchen (which was always immaculate, her attention to detail was impressive and beyond the rest of us)… just to name a few.

Tessa made herself an invaluable part of our team, doing jobs we did not have time to do, with precision we did not have patience for.  During her time working with us, we have seen her grow and develop her skills significantly.

Her smiling face lights up a room and her positive attitude towards everything she does makes her a joy to be around.

As a company, employing Tessa helped us understand everyone has different skills and those skills are valuable.  She also taught us to embrace life and give everything a go (at our Christmas party we went to Top Golf, her concentration when she tried to hit the golf ball was second to none, and the celebration when she did had everyone smiling and enjoying the achievement with her).

Tessa’s growth in confidence whilst she worked with us, has meant that she has recently moved on from us.  Although this was a very sad day for us, it was because she grew in confidence and can now tackle what is a very scary world for someone like her with enthusiasm.  She is now studying to improve her numeracy and literacy two days and in a week is about to embark on more Acting Classes which is a deep passion of hers.

We are in the process of replacing Tessa (well… as much as that is possible) and would highly recommend any other companies thinking of doing a similar thing to jump in and give it a go.

The mission of Job Support is “To place, train and maintain as many people with a significant intellectual disability into quality jobs in the regular workforce that meet both their employment needs and the needs of the employer.”