Erol Dwyer has been volunteering with Steps to Work since November 2011. Working in Seren’s HR Department, Erol is designing a new Access database to register and monitor all the work experience placements, trainees, re-employment posts and volunteers working across the Group members. As this work continues to grow we need this now to record the activity and monitor success and outcomes.

It was during a difficult time in his life last year when Erol, who receives support from reach, was offered a work placement in Seren’s FM & Procurement team, replenishing refreshments and carrying out health & safety checks. Erol said, “This helped me a lot and gave me a reason to get out of bed in the morning! Kevin and his team have been so patient and understanding, supporting me at work. Steadily, I have built up my confidence.

“As I have asperger’s syndrome, structure plays an essential role in my life and this work experience has really helped me with my discipline and routine”, said Erol, who told his support team that he wanted a fresh challenge and a chance to use his ‘A’ level in IT, for which he has a passion. Using his technical creativity and planning abilities, Erol is also finding out that there is a lot of problem solving, trying to establish the best way of implementing the database. Erol has now increased to three sessions a week and is coming into work earlier and finishing later to get the job done because he says he is finding the work is “mentally challenging and rewarding”.

“This is really the essence of Steps to Work. Our aim is to help people find their potential and take up opportunities that may not come easily to them. I want to thank Erol for all his work and I will be helping him with his next step, of finding future employment”, said Kate Aspinwall, Project Manager.

Erol is now looking forward to finding some ‘guinea pigs’ to test out his new database which should be completed by the end of January.