St. James’s Place is offering virtual work experience to 1,000 young people, providing a week-long taster for those interested in a career in financial services.
The experience takes place over five days, from July 11 to July 15 and will offer those aged 17-21 insights into the various roles that exist within financial services.
SJP said it provides them with an opportunity to talk to real practitioners from more than a dozen different disciplines.
SJP's head of academy Andy Payne, said: “At a time when work experience opportunities have been hard to come by, this is a great chance for those from all backgrounds, educational qualifications, geographical areas and more to take part in an interactive work experience programme.
“This is a comprehensive taster of what working in financial services looks like. Having a virtual work experience programme that is accessible and flexible means that we are removing barriers to participation and opening up the opportunity to all.”
The virtual experience offers dedicated training sessions covering topics from winning your dream job – personal branding, CV writing and winning in an interview, through to generating a personal development plan.
Virtual classroom teaching sessions cover such topics as harnessing social media and presenting to win.
In addition, the programme includes the opportunity to work on a dedicated project, where the winning team will take home £500. At the end they will be presented with a certificate to mark their attendance and participation.
Places will be allocated on a first come first served basis and there is a registration website with an application form for those interested.
SJP said the virtual work experience programme was first developed during the pandemic in response to the lack of in-person opportunities and has been run on three previous occasions, in October 2020, April 2021 and October 2021.
The wealth manager said more than 5,000 young people have already utilised the programme to build an awareness of what a career in financial services could look like, with the intention that it provides a programme to attract candidates for a career in financial services more generally and SJP in particular.
Last year, SJP rolled out a virtual reality technology for training and role-playing across the business, allowing it to increase academy numbers this year.
sonia.rach@ft.com
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