“An employer should Value Me because…”

The 2023-24 academic year is our fifth year of delivering the My Professional Self programme to groups of Year 9 students as part of the University of Portsmouth’s outreach programme. 

It aims to increase young people’s self-awareness, confidence and ability to positively present themselves in situations such as college or university applications and future job interviews. 

As one of last year’s participants articulated brilliantly, “Thank you for helping me find what, and how, to value the things that I really easily overlook.”

My Professional Self is based on Charlotte Harrison’s Value Me framework, which was developed initially for students on the suite of LLB Law courses before becoming a core activity in the spiral curriculum for the University of Portsmouth’s Personal Tutoring & Development Framework and a key part of the new Portsmouth Award. 

What is the Value Me Framework?

In discussions around graduate employability, much emphasis is placed (understandably) on the importance of gaining work experience and engaging with employers. To do that, students and graduates face the challenge of differentiating themselves in a competitive labour market. 

However, many lack the skills, confidence and language to present themselves convincingly to employers during the recruitment process or other employer encounters. Others avoid such opportunities altogether because they do not see the relevance of their skills and experience. 

The Value Me framework was created to help university students feel better prepared, and more confident, when engaging with potential employers. Students complete workshops, or independent online learning, on the five key pillars of the framework:

• skills,
• strengths,
• values,
• purpose,
• personality, and
• work experience.

The framework culminates in a presentation addressing the statement “an employer should Value Me because…”, which encapsulates the hallmarks of their personal brand and ensures they are clear about their value to a future employer. 

The findings of a longitudinal evaluation of Value Me (before a change of name), published in 2020, indicated statistically significant increases in employability-related self-confidence for students who completed all three presentations and, whilst acknowledging that cause and effect cannot be proved, the qualitative data from lecturers and students in that study indicated that students had learnt the skills of proactive self-promotion, presentation skills and impression management. 

It also indicated that students had transferred learning from the Value Me activities to ‘real world’ experiences such as interviews and workplace presentations. 

Addressing attainment raising in local secondary schools

It is widely recognised that educational attainment at Key Stage 4 is a key determinant of progression into higher education. Accordingly, the Office for Students (OfS) are clear in their expectations of universities for greater collaboration with schools to help raise the GCSE attainment levels of their local areas. 

Guidance from the OfS also indicates that effective approaches to addressing gaps in attainment should include addressing non-academic barriers to learning. These non-academic barriers may include low expectations of self, attitudes and aspirations, emotional regulation, but also exposure to positive role models. 

Following the success of the Value Me framework at undergraduate level in addressing such themes, the University’s Outreach Team contacted Charlotte to discuss creating a condensed version for younger audiences. 

My Professional Self takes place as a series of one-day events, each involving a number of local secondary schools and taking place on the University campus. Throughout the day, students explore how much they already have to say about what they can offer to an employer, team, college or university. To enhance the value for the school groups, we facilitate a soft networking opportunity with a group of local employers through a speed interview session.

The employers also listen to, and provide feedback on, the students’ final Value Me presentations. The involvement of employers such as Portsmouth Football Club, BAE and the Crown Prosecution Service presents an opportunity to impact constructions of identity and relationships through exposure to positive role models. 

Qualitative data from pupils and teachers indicated that students had gained confidence in talking to new people; speaking positively about themselves to others; speaking in front of a class either alone or with a small group; and presentation skills more broadly. 

Feedback included:

Where do we go from here? 

Having adopted the Value Me framework with both undergraduate and postgraduate students, and after conceptualising a version of the framework for use with early and mid-career academics, the My Professional Self workshops support our predictions that the framework would translate well to school-age pupils. 

In particular, these workshops have shown that it has potential to address some of the non-academic factors that underpin GCSE attainment among disadvantaged groups, such as low confidence and low expectations of future self. 

Working with Charlotte, we are exploring ways to expand the My Professional Self offer with extended employer engagement and in-school coaching and mentoring support. We can also see potential to develop tailored versions of the programme aimed at particular student groups.

Author: Kim Hill is Outreach Co-Ordinator at the University of Portsmouth. This article is supported by Charlotte Harrison, Principal Lecturer, Employability and work-related Learning and University Placement Lead.