Sarah Skold - Transitioning from L&D to Client Experience at Macquarie Bank.
What was your role/were your roles before attending Transition Hub? Learning and Development Consultant most recently, and various other HR roles before that.
What brought you to Transition Hub? I have always been driven by new challenges and change. I had been working in the HR space for 12 years, and over that time had been given some fantastic opportunities to take on different roles within this area. However, I felt it was time to step a little further out of my comfort zone and try something different. I had lots of ideas rolling around in my head but was finding it really hard to know where to start, and what to look for in a new role. I heard about Transition Hub and was immediately drawn to the idea of working with a group of people who all had a common goal of transition.
What was a highlight moment of the week for you? There were so many it is honestly hard to narrow it down! The ‘Design Thinking My Career ‘session was really helpful for me. I had become familiar with Design Thinking through my previous role, and I knew it was something that I wanted to incorporate in my future career, so having the opportunity to use it to brainstorm all sorts of whacky ideas about my future was really fun, engaging and motivating.
How did Transition Hub challenge you?
Transition Hub challenged me to clearly articulate what I wanted, and then to go out there and share that confidently with my network. Although I am a confident presenter and enjoy networking and meeting new people, I have always found it difficult to express my strengths and skills in a clear and concise way. Over the 5 days the Transition Hub coaches, and fellow participants gently guided me to a point where I felt genuine and comfortable talking about myself and what I wanted.
What has changed for you professionally since your Foundation Week experience? I have moved into the field of Customer Experience within retail banking, in a business that has a fantastic culture that suits me 100%! My role is to listen to our clients and communicate their feedback to the business in a way that can be easily consumed and acted on.
What is the most valuable aspect of Transition Hub for someone in a period of career change? The group environment just brings out the absolute best in everybody. Having a cohort of people all going through a similar but different experience is invaluable. It can often be a lonely and isolating period, where you feel that the pressure is entirely on you to create the change that you want. Having a team of people cheering me on was exactly what I needed!
What learnings from Transition Hub have you applied in your current work/life? Most importantly I have learnt to be confident in myself and my skills, and that it is ok to want something different and to seek that out.
How would you now define yourself in a professional sense? Not quite sure how to answer this one, but I would say that I am the happiest I have ever been in my professional life! I am working in an incredibly flexible business that is run on agile principles and is truly ahead of the game in what we deliver for our clients.
How would you describe Transition Hub to someone considering attending? Transition Hub is an intensive group learning experience that supports people who are considering a change by a) developing future work skills and b) providing the time, space and inspiration for them to think clearly about what they want for themselves and what they can bring to the world.
What can organisations gain by giving their talent the opportunity to attend Transition Hub? I have stayed in the same organisation but moved into a very different area. I have been able to become productive in my role so much faster than a completely new starter would have, because I have years of tacit knowledge of the organisation to work with. Operationally it has also been easier and cheaper, with no external recruitment process required.
Without Transition Hub, I don’t believe I would have been able to find this role, even within my own organisation. My role shift has inspired others in the organisation and helped to build collaboration across the business. Organisations that can harness the potential of their employees will be the organisations that succeed in the future, and Transition Hub is a program that will help your employees understand their potential, and how to use it across the organisation.
Transition Hub Alumni bio: Sarah Skold is a human-centred design expert, working across training facilitation, content design, coaching, project management and analytics. Sarah is passionate about the improvement of individuals, of systems, of organisations, and of the world we live in.
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