Sarah
Sarah is an Administration Assistant at The Eddystone Trust in Plymouth. Sarah has a learning disability.
Sarah’s words
“Well, they
(Pluss) got me this job as I didn’t know about it. I came home one day and I
said to Mum we had better get a bottle of champagne. She said ‘what
for?’ and I said ‘I got a job’. All my family supported me and how wonderful
the job was.
Now I am one of the staff and I have got a paid job. It feels wonderful. My first paid job. I work in the office. I never dreamt I would work in this office...my dream. I feel like a grown up Woman and I am glad I have got this place. I like this place because all the people here treat me so well, I make them happy and make new friends.
The things I am doing on the computer include making special charts of people’s birthday, what people drink. It is for people who have caught HIV, so I am doing packs of 25 condoms, you name it. That is one of the jobs they have given me.
I feel like a young woman - I am proud of myself. I am glad I have got the job. I feel much better – this team are a very happy family.”
Vanessa Jones,
HIV and Community Team Leader
“Sarah is
multi skilled. She has been able to adapt to whatever has been asked of her
since she has been here. She is able to take whatever instructions are given
and lots of the work that we have here can be quite varied.
Sarah is very good at mail-outs, very good at specific work. She will have a list in front of her and can work her way through it well. She works very well unsupervised.
She has really good personal skills. She is very friendly, completely reliable and is actually always the person who turns up for work, even when everybody else doesn’t!
Sarah mixes well. She brings more of a human touch to work because it is working for a small voluntary agency and we are all very busy, we don’t always have lots of time and Sarah is the one that grounds us, reminds us that we need to take the time to appreciate the people around us. She gets on with everybody and I have never had a bad word said about her.
She is always approachable, friendly, just nice to have around and she is good at her job, very good at her job.
Sarah will continue to develop. I came into the organisation as the admin worker over 9 years ago and I have adapted my role - so what is good for me is good for Sarah! There will be changes - there is answering the telephone, answering the door, meet and greet, make a cup of tea, phone up to us to tell us someone is coming in. All these things she found very difficult when she first started. So she is continually progressing and we are continually looking at ways in which we can stretch her.”
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