Southampton City Council

The Employment Support Team is Southampton City Council’s employment support service offering information, advice, guidance and support to people who are disabled, disadvantaged or long term unemployed to find work or training.

The Employment Support Team can help by: 

• Talking to people about what kind of work they would like to do
• Helping them to realise what skills and abilities they already have, to help them find the right job for them   
• Researching & applying for training courses 
• Assisting to fill in application forms and create an up to date CV
• Helping to look for jobs and contacting employers
• Talking to employers if people are worried about how their health or disability might affect their chance of getting a job
• Setting up work trials and taster sessions
• Supporting into voluntary placements
• Working alongside people in the job to help them learn and settle in if necessary 
• Giving support to access benefit advice
• Signposting to other services for support such as debt, budgeting, housing
• Listening to how the job is going and giving advice if and when it's needed
• Retention support to keep an existing job

We offer one-to-one tailored support as well as running 6 work clubs across the City.  The Employment Support Team also offers a 3 day employability course in different venues across the city.

Eligibility for support depends upon certain criteria for individual projects. To find out if someone is eligible please contact us.

Currently in Southampton, our projects support: 

• People who have a sensory impairment
• People who are blind or visually impaired
• People with learning disabilities
• 15-24 year olds who are NEET
• People with mental health issues who access Southampton's Community Mental Health Teams
• Perinatal mental health 
• People who have been unemployed for more than 2 years with a health marker
• Council residents – TEEM