Dumfries woman Julie Brachtvogel’s world fell apart after she was hit with redundancy – but now she’s back in work helping those who find themselves in similar situations.
Why Julie joined Fair Start Scotland
Julie proactively joined the Fair Start Scotland service as she was being made redundant from her role at Shelter Scotland. Working with so-called ‘vulnerable’ people, she already knew about the work of StartScotland.
Redundancy came as a shock after working with the charity for 15 years, and Julie’s health started to suffer.
How Fair Start Scotland helped?
Our engagement consultant Terri supported Julie through her redundancy situation and her subsequent application for Jobseeker’s Allowance. Once this was in place, Julie joined the service and started working with our personal advisor, Morag.
Julie enrolled on our health and wellbeing and employability workshops, which started to get Julie back into some kind of routine.
Getting the job
With her confidence returning, Julie felt ready to get back to work and landed an interview with StartScotland parent company Fedcap Scotland. She was successful and is now helping other people who found themselves in similar situations to herself. She is very thankful of the support given to her.
Julie said: “It really did help me to start a routine. It totally changed my mindset. It gave me hope for the future and help me find myself again.
“I am much happier; I have got my oomph back again! I lost myself after services had ended at Shelter Scotland and I now feel like I have a new focus in life. Something to get up in the morning for and making a difference in people’s lives again.”