20-year-old Ehsan Izadi is working as part of the Quality Assurance team at Unipres – a global company which has a plant in Sunderland, manufacturing parts for the car industry.
He got his role through the Kickstart Scheme, which offers six-month work placements for people aged 16 to 24, who are currently on Universal Credit.
I’ve been in the UK for four years and I was working in a pizza shop but when COVID came around, the shop was closed.
I was looking for a job and saw the opportunity with Unipres. It was easy to apply through the job centre and it was a big opportunity for me.
I had a conversation about the role using Microsoft Teams so I could get to know more about the company and now I’m working with the other trainees in the quality department, checking the quality of car parts.
We get training on each part – we can work on different things every day and we are always busy, you’re never standing around doing nothing, so by the time you look at the clock, hours have passed. It’s good for me as I’ve had jobs in the past which were boring.
You’re always doing something and you get to know about every car part, so if you want to go to another department you already know what to do.
Before, I couldn’t imagine myself getting up at 6 or 7 in the morning but my routine has changed now and it’s good. I like learning and improving my CV – if you have six months experience at Unipres it’s really important for your CV and can help you get your next job. I’m hoping for an opportunity to get a full time job or an apprenticeship after this.
