Businesses, employees and apprentices came together this week to celebrate the first year of Croydon Works.

The jobs brokerage service was set up by Croydon Council and partners to ensure residents benefit from the employment opportunities created through the borough’s regeneration, in particular those with barriers to employment.

The free to use professional recruitment service is designed to provide Croydon employers with pre-screened, job ready, qualified employees, and residents with the support and training they need to find sustainable, quality jobs locally.

In its first year the jobs brokerage service successfully helped 147 people into work, assisted 70 residents on to training courses to develop new or existing skills, engaged with more than 1,000 local people and over 120 local employers.

Chris Adams, who was helped to secure a job as a trainee at Ikea said “I’d had various job interviews but I hadn’t got a job so I was starting to get frustrated."

"But then getting [the job at Ikea] so quickly, was brilliant. Croydon Works guaranteed an interview if you lived in the borough so I took my CV in, got a phone call that afternoon, had a proper interview on the Monday and then had a two day induction and started the job straight away. It’s great, not just for giving me money, but I also feel useful again.”

Nick Price, associate director at construction company Mulalley also praised Croydon Works after using the service to recruit for their apprenticeship scheme and to find people to benefit from their work experience opportunities.

“The added value of working with Croydon Works is they have easy access to a large area of the community. They provide a one stop shop, they’re a very good use of resources for us and they have enabled and helped us to fulfil our social value commitment to Croydon,” he said.