The 6-month paid placement in a charity was the best career decision for me at this stage. I was a returner, as well as a switcher, and struggling to find jobs that suited my skills. My background is as an Integrated Advertising Art Director, with more recent project management experience. I had also been volunteering for the past few years and reached a point in my life where I wanted to return to meaningful work.

Maya Bhose, the founder of The Well Placed, organised the interview process and supplied the interview questions ahead of time. This was a great opportunity to get straight my decades of transferable skills and to reflect on their relevance to the available role, as well as research the charity in question.

I was placed at Age International – Age UK’s sister charity – as the Campaigns Intern, working in a newly formed Campaign team. Their work is dedicated to responding to the needs, and promoting the rights, of older people in low and middle-income countries across the world. I think this made the most of my public facing communication skills, as well as allowing me to take on a whole host of new skills and tools. I also worked across the Comms team and the fundraising Individual Giving team, giving me a deeper insight into how the organisation worked.

What I will take away from the experience, is the opportunity to gain an understanding of how a charity is structured, which is quite different to an advertising agency. I learned what the different departments are and what roles there are within them. I also enjoyed being placed in a small charity as I could see how each department successfully interacted with each other, meaning everyone could work towards the same goal, without repetition.

Unfortunately, the placement did not lead directly to a job for me, but I do feel armed with knowledge and a CV that now reflects my time in a charity. Which will ultimately give me more confidence to apply for jobs in the charity sector in the future. I would highly encourage anyone struggling to change sectors to apply for a place in this programme.