Assessments

Work Assessment Report
This assessment is for people who want a profile of their working and motivational traits. It gives insight into an individual’s “soft skills”. Soft skills refer to the cluster of personality traits, social graces, personal habits, friendliness, and optimism that we each express to varying degrees. People who understand their own “soft skills” can often present themselves more effectively to prospective employers. Soft skills compliment hard skills, which are the technical requirements of a job. However, it is more likely that an employer will train the technical skills if someone has the “soft skills” rather than the other way around.

Employment Training

Jan Miller & Associates offers individual and group vocational training. We serve a diverse group of clients with a variety of abilities and disabilities. We do this by custom designing our programs to meet the unique needs of the individual, where clients can choose one or a combination of programs to meet their vocational needs. Our programs focus on the ‘soft skills’ needed to get the job, stay employed, and advance in the workplace. Soft skills are the non-technical skill abilities and traits that workers need to function in a specific employment setting.

"Current research strongly supports that factors such as self-confidence, self-awareness, self-control, commitment, and integrity not only create more successful employees but also more successful companies."
(Daniel Goleman 1998)

Individual or group programs (ten hours):

Self Esteem and Confidence (Managing Workplace Expectations)
This program is designed for people whose lack of confidence and self esteem is hampering their ability to obtain and maintain employment. They will learn how to communicate self-respect and respect for others on the job, how to present a confident image, how to identify a support system within and outside of their employment environment, and the language of confidence.

Interpersonal Skills for Effective Relationships in the Workplace
This program is designed for people who have had difficulty establishing appropriate social skills in the workplace. They will learn the importance of appropriate boundaries in the workplace, how to differentiate between social skills at work versus at leisure, appropriate behaviors and conversations in the workplace, and how to establish healthy relationships at work.

Coping With Anxiety
(Get a Job, Stay Employed, and Advance in the Workplace)
This program is for people unable to return to the work force, stay employed, or advance in their jobs because of excessive levels of anxiety or shyness. They will learn techniques for reducing anxiety and panic attacks, coping strategies for shyness traits, and skills for handling anxiety and shyness in the workplace.

Coping With Shyness
This program is for people experiencing problems in the workplace because of excessive levels of shyness. They will learn how to understand shyness traits, techniques for managing shyness and skills for handling shyness in the workplace.

Anger in the Workplace
This program is for people re-entering or having difficulties in the workplace because they have problems managing their anger responses. This often makes it difficult for them to maintain employment and have healthy working relationships. They will learn techniques to handle anger in the workplace, awareness of their own triggers, how to handle criticism effectively, how to change their perspective on other people’s behaviour, appropriate expressions of dissatisfaction or anger in the workplace, and effective strategies for changing attitudes, theirs and others.

The Art of Assertiveness and Negotiating
This program is for people who need to learn effective assertiveness strategies because they may be in negotiations for placements and jobs, or having interactions with co-workers and employers. They will learn communication rights and responsibilities, beliefs and attitudes that support assertiveness, assertiveness skills, techniques for Win/Win negotiating, how to express clearly so they can be understood, how to be a team player.

Good Employee / Good Employer
This program is for an employee with no work history or who has a history of negative work relationships. They will learn appropriate behaviours and relationships for the workplace, employees’ rights and responsibilities, employers’ rights and responsibilities, problem solving on the job, how to develop healthy attitudes towards their employer, work standards and how to ask for what they need, how to understand and be understood on the job.

Manage Your Chronic Pain and Keep Your Job
This program is designed for people who are dealing with chronic pain causing difficulties in attaining or maintaining employment. They will learn how to manage their chronic pain conditions on a daily basis, strategies that reduce symptoms so that they can cope with competitive employment, and understand and cope with their symptoms.

Advanced Preparations for Successful Interviews
This course is for exceptional people who are preparing to start a job search and will be looking for work or work placements. They will learn how to identify and present accommodation needs as they prepare for interviews, use techniques for successful interviews, develop skills for influencing people, sell themselves in an interview, and practice effective interview skills.

Personal Hygiene for Successful Employment
This program is designed for people whose level of personal hygiene is not appropriate for competitive employment. They will learn the value of personal hygiene, the consequences of inappropriate personal hygiene, and to be motivated to attain and maintain an appropriate level of personal hygiene in the workplace.

Comprehensive Program
This program is for people who have been diagnosed with multiple disabilities or who are struggling with long-term chronic issues. Our Comprehensive program is custom designed and includes sections from each program. It focuses on overcoming the many barriers that have prevented successful employment for the client.

Components that can be added to these programs (eight hours):

Coping with Depression
This component is for people who are struggling with depression. It helps them to understand depression and to learn effective strategies for coping in the workplace, as well as how to unpack depression and use motivational techniques to break its patterns.

Making Your Disability an Ability
This component is for people who feel their disability is a huge obstacle for employment. It redefines disability, recognizes personal strengths that have emerged from coping with disability that support attaining and maintaining employment, identifies accommodation needs and learning effective methods of requesting

Addictions
This component is for people whose addictions get in the way of attaining or maintaining employment. They will learn how to access community resources that work with addictions and to create personal support networks, as well as about the process of behavioural change, key triggers of addictive behaviours, and new ways to disrupt negative patterns.

Improving Memory
This component is for people who are having difficulties with memory or people who want to enhance their memory skills. It helps to understand memory, be in charge of their own brain, recognize beliefs and attitudes that support remembering, develop strategies for effective memory work, and use language that supports remembering and being effective in the workplace.

Stress Management
This component is for people who are having difficulty managing the stress of preparing for attaining or maintaining employment It helps to understand the difference between good stress and bad stress, identifying personal stressors and find effective strategies for dealing with personal stress.