MORE than 300 people were helped to prepare for work at Careers Wales’ road show in Newport last week.

The ‘Are You Ready For Work?’ road show addressed businesses’ concerns that many school leavers lack the right attitude for entering the work place by offering young people one on one employability makeovers. It follows the recent announcement that a total of 100,000 people were out of work in Wales between March to May as the unemployment rate rose from 6.2 per cent to 6.6 per cent.

Touring Cardiff, Newport and Wrexham, school leavers got into the mindset for entering the workplace with CV masterclasses, up to date labour market information from trained Careers Wales advisers and live job vacancies which they could apply to on the spot.

Young people also received consultations from Aimee Bateman, a high-profile careers mentor and founder of Career Cake, who explained how to use social media and networking to find a job, and Claire Rees, stylist from Style Me Red, who provided fashion advice for young jobseekers looking to impress in their first interview.

Kelly Bryant, 19, from Chepstow who visited the road show at Newport Retail Park, said: “I think the road show is a great idea, as it gives people a chance to speak to careers advisers on their own doorstep rather than going to seek it out, and being in a less formal setting really helps too.”

Richard Spear, chief executive at Careers Wales, said: “Sometimes you need to go back to basics and give young people guidance on the real deal clinchers when it comes to applying for a job. [Y]oung people need to do everything they can to give themselves that extra edge, and our expert careers advisers, guest careers mentor and stylist at the road show have certainly helped with that this week.”

Visit www.careerswales.com or download the Careers Wales app on iOS or Android.