Like so many, in the world of transferable skills training we scrambled in 2020 to switch to providing our support online with little prior training or experience to draw on. The switch was a deeply challenging exercise – and many of us have had very positive experience, and we appreciate the many benefits that come from digital practice. Nevertheless, for some there were stiff obstacles of skills gaps, schedule clashes and content or method that cannot be easily converted. The experience of trial and error can be a stressful one, so it was clear to the CUSO in Switzerland that, after a solid eight months of work, action and rush behind us, we needed to provide an opportunity for our trainers to listen to and support their risk-taking, as well as to recognise and share our combined learnings.
In this podcast, Ilaria Orsi, head of the transferable skills programme at the CUSO, is joined by Maura Hannon, a trainer with the CUSO and expert in social media and digital work communication in general, and by Verity Elston, head of career advice for the Graduate Campus at the University of Lausanne. They summarise the discussions held with the CUSO trainers over three separate workshops in December 2020, covering:
– The experience of switching to online format: what people miss, what they enjoy
– The learnings and best practices shared by trainers and programme managers
– The ongoing challenges as we continue to provide our support online in 2021
You can find informtion on CUSO, the Conférence universitaire de Suisse occidentale here: https://www.cuso.ch/
