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How to Develop your Skills at Home
Virtual Internships and Experiences
What is a virtual internship?
Virtual internships are flexible, online opportunities, giving you the opportunity to undertake remote experience. Many virtual internships exist in the fields of IT, sales, journalism, marketing, and software development.
Some employers will give you project work/tasks to complete over a period of time, and you may have regular catch-ups and support from the employer during your virtual internship.
Depending on the sector and nature of the role, you may not be able to undertake all the elements of a real internship, due to client / patient confidentiality. For example, handling client casefiles for a law firm. However, you are still able to experience some of the work of a trainee and the function of the business.
https://www.indeed.co.uk/Internship-Remote-Working-jobs - Indeed advertises remote internships
InsideSherpa host company-backed free open-access virtual internships. Their programs allow students to build career skills, gain experience and increase their understanding of different careers. Opportunities include those in Law, Design, Tech, Investment Management, Banking and more!
Companies include: Linklaters, JP Morgan Chase & Co, Accenture, Citi, White & Case, KPMG
Sign-up for free here: Insidesherpa.com
RateMyPlacement.co.uk has teamed up with Inside Sherpa and Development Beyond Learning (DBL), to launch a FREE work ready virtual experience. The work ready virtual experience consists of three modules. Each one allows you to build specific skills that translate into the workplace - Wellbeing and resilience under lockdown, virtual first impressions and remote networking.
https://www.ratemyplacement.co.uk/blog/work-ready-virtual-experience-free/
Online Courses
MOOC courses: Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs) are free online courses available for anyone to enrol. Visit here: https://www.mooc.org/
Subjects covered:
- Architecture, Art & Culture
- Biology & Life Sciences, Business & Management
- Chemistry, Communication, Computer Science
- Data Analysis & Statistics, Design
- Economics & Finance, Education & Teacher Training, Electronics, Energy & Earth Sciences
- Engineering, Environmental Studies, Ethics, Food & Nutrition
- Health & Safety, History, Humanities
- Language, Law, Literature
- Math, Medicine, Music
- Philanthropy, Philosophy & Ethics, Physics, Science, Social Sciences
Other online course sites
- https://www.open.edu/openlearn/free-courses - Open University free courses
- https://www.classcentral.com/report/free-online-learning-coronavirus/ - a full list of free online courses
- https://www.futurelearn.com/
- www.coursera.org
- #1 Excel tutorial on the net - https://www.excel-easy.com/ - Easy to follow, fully illustrated + 300 examples
- https://online-learning.harvard.edu/
- https://www.linkedin.com/learning - first month free
- Google Digital Garage- Over 126 online courses are available here
- Future You Podcast- A podcast run by Prospects for those at any stage of career planning
- Amazon Meet and Engage- Webinars discussing graduate careers with Amazon
- Edx- Various online skills and subject courses
- Alison- Free online courses
- Accenture Skills to Succeed Academy- online training and employability skills development
- Association for Project Management, MOOC Courses
- MOOC #1 – Business Fundamentals: Project Management – next cohort 11 May
- MOOC #2 – Project Management: Beyond the Basics
Learn to Code
- https://www.kaggle.com/ - data science and python
- https://www.codecademy.com/ - Includes HTML, CSS, JavaScript, SQL, Python, Data Science
- https://www.freecodecamp.org/learn/
- https://www.udemy.com/ - Python Core and Advanced
- Girls Who Code
Build your Commercial Awareness
Commercial awareness is having a good understanding of an organisation / company (how it works, how it makes a profit, it’s client, objectives, services, products) and the industry in which it sits (understanding how current news can impact the sector). You should have an overview of what’s going on in the market sector - Are there legal or regulatory changes on the way, or does the economic situation have a larger-than-usual impact?
Read more at: https://www.skillsyouneed.com/general/commercial-awareness.html and https://www.brightnetwork.co.uk/graduate-career-advice/commercial-awareness/an-overview/
Below, are a few links for building commercial awareness in some sectors:
Finance and Business
www.prospects.ac.uk - The Graduate Prospects website contains information on a range of job sectors, with useful links to further resources and information
www.berr.gov.uk – The Department of Business Innovation and Skills provides a wide range of industry reports.
www.ft.com/home/uk - this website allows you to search within the sections News, Markets, Industries and Companies. News searched can be drawn from the FT archives or global news resources.
www.reuters.com – Read the latest news stories from around the world. Sections dedicated to business, technology, international news etc.
www.bbc.co.uk - The BBC provides business news
The World of Business podcast - Insights into the business world from Radio 4’s in Business programme.
Business Daily podcast - BBC World Service’s daily podcast on the world of money and work from across the globe.
Today programme on BBC R4 - Today is the most influential news programme in the United Kingdom and sets the day’s political agenda each morning. If you want to quickly build awareness of current affairs in politics, business and society, then listen to this.
Actuarial Science
https://www.actuarialcareers.co.uk/career-advice/how-to-develop-commercial-awareness/ - overview of commercial awareness in this sector
https://www.theactuary.com/ - news
STEM Women are holding virtual careers fairs every Wednesday
Legal
https://www.legalcheek.com/ - market news
https://www.legalweekjobs.com/ - jobs and news
https://www.thelawyer.com/news/ - UK and international news
https://www.youtube.com/user/LawCareersNet - insights from recruiters, lawyers and the LCN team
Politics
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/politics
https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics
https://www.economist.com/
https://www.politicshome.com/<
https://www.huffpost.com/US and world news>
Psychology
https://www.psychologytoday.com/gb - group of renowned psychologists, academics, psychiatrists and writers to contribute their thoughts and ideas
https://www.bps.org.uk/ - The British Psychological Society
https://www.sciencedaily.com/news/mind_brain/psychology/ - latest research news
https://www.independent.co.uk/topic/Psychology
https://www.newscientist.com/article-topic/psychology/ - weekly science and technology magazine
Volunteer
Coronavirus support
- Local Council Lists: https://www.kent.gov.uk/social-care-and-health/health/coronavirus/coronavirus-your-questions-answered#tab-9
- Canterbury Council: https://www.canterbury.gov.uk/homepage/127/helping_in_your_community
- Volunteer Centre: https://www.ncvo.org.uk/ncvo-volunteering/find-a-volunteer-centre?view=map
- Do it.org: https://doit.life/ours
Specific Organisations
- Age UK: https://www.ageuk.org.uk/get-involved/volunteer/neighbourly-volunteering/
- The Prince’s Trust: Prince's Trust Online Mentors
- Zooniverse - take part in real cutting edge research in many fields across the sciences, humanities, and more
- Project Implicit - non-profit organization and international collaboration between researchers who are interested in implicit social cognition
- Be My Eyes - a free app that connects blind and low-vision people with sighted volunteers and company representatives for visual assistance through a live video call.
- Translators without Borders - Translators without Borders depends on volunteers to translate millions of words, but also to help us run the organization.
- Librivox - LibriVox volunteers read and record chapters of books in the public domain (books no longer under copyright), and make them available for free on the Internet
- Missing Maps - Missing Maps is an open, collaborative project in which you can help to map areas where humanitarian organisations are trying to meet the needs of vulnerable people.
- Smithsonian Transcription Center - Become a Smithsonian Digital Volunteer and help us make historical documents and biodiversity data more accessible.
- UN Volunteering - The United Nations Volunteers (UNV) programme contributes to peace and development through volunteerism worldwide. Online volunteering allows organizations and volunteers to team up to address sustainable development challenges – anywhere in the world.
- ZSL- Instant Wild - ZSL’s Instant Wild empowers you to take part in vital conservation work, bringing you LIVE images and videos from amazing locations all around the world. By identifying the animals in each image, you are contributing to conservation and making a positive impact on the future for wildlife.
- Child.org Indoor Corps - Join the Indoor Corps - volunteer from your sofa and help Child.org tackle the coronavirus crisis in some of the world’s most vulnerable communities.
Work Remotely
- Prospects have created a page specifically around the impact of Covid-19 on graduates searching for work experience and jobs.
- Linkedin article around remote working and how to use LinkedIn to find remote roles.
- Reed and various online recruitment firms have dedicated work from home/remote working pages.
- Employment 4 Students have a dedicated page for online freelance jobs for students.
- There are several blog posts (largely aimed at stay at home parents) that list different forms of remote working that are flexible.
- Upwork is an international website with many UK jobs listed. As the work is being done online, clients can take jobs from anywhere in the world.
- People per hour has a wide range of jobs on offer, with a good selection in creative arts, and employers’ pay rates seem reasonable. Freelancers can also sell their services for either an hourly rate or a fixed price for the entire project. Offers a full range of services.
Update your CV and LinkedIn Profile
- Sometimes it’s hard to find the time to update your CV or LinkedIn profile, but if you have some time to spare now, use it to create a standout CV or profile!
- Reflect on your recent experiences, such as a part-time job, a previous internship or placement, a voluntary role, an insight day you attended or involvement with a society, and start adding these.
- https://www.kent.ac.uk/ces/student/cvs.html - Our tips on style, format and content
- https://moodle.kent.ac.uk/2019/course/view.php?id=248 – Review our ‘CV and Cover Letter’ talk on our CES Moodle page. Under ‘Videos & Audio Recordings’
- Visit careers.kent.ac.uk – Book a 15-minute Quick Advice appointment, to have your CV reviewed by an Adviser.
- https://moodle.kent.ac.uk/2019/mod/panopto/view.php?id=311286 – Review our ‘Using LinkedIn’ workshop, if you are just getting started with creating your profile.
- Visit careers.kent.ac.uk – Book a 15-minute Quick Advice appointment, to have your CV reviewed by an Adviser.