Printing ink manufacturer Siegwerk has been supporting young people for years through the YouthCan! initiative. Together with SOS Children's Villages, Siegwerk organizes workshops to strengthen the employability of young people. In Vietnam - one of the joint lighthouse projects - a training course with a subsequent plant visit was recently realized.
Young people need many more skills after graduating from school to get a good job. For example, they should know how to set priorities, make good decisions or work in a team. To train these skills, in March 2022 Siegwerk offered a workshop and possibilities for exchange to fourty young people from SOS programmes in Ben Tre in Vietnam.
The young people learned a lot about goal setting and planning, were able to build their management skills, and developed strategies for decision making and problem solving.
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During the plant tour, the young people were able to gain an insight into Siegwerk's production. Photo: SOS Children's Villages Vietnam
About three weeks after the workshop, the group of youth also visited Siegwerk's site in Vietnam and learned about the working environment there. They were accompanied by two young Siegwerk employees. The mentors reported on their experiences and conveyed a realistic picture of working life by providing information about working hours, tasks and workload. This helps the young people to better assess their abilities and to subject their ideas about working life to a reality check. In addition, Siegwerk provided the young people with training and gave them tips on how to apply for a job and how to prepare for a job interview, for example.
Impressions of the training
Workshops with impact
Son is currently attending 12th grade at Hermann Gmeiner School and lives at an SOS Youth House in Ben Tre. "The workshop has encouraged me, I see my career prospects much more positively now," he said after the event.
Yen from the eleventh grade has also benefited from the courses: "I've learned a lot about myself. For example, how to manage my time better. And I can now imagine more what my everyday working life could look like."
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