Dominic Cain, a porter at NTH Solutions, the subsidiary company of North Tees and Hartlepool NHS Foundation Trust, took his first step into working life with a placement as a project choice student and now after securing a full time role in the department has become a mentor for the newest group of students.
The latest cohort of new recruits from the Project Choice programme have joined us to work in a variety of departments across our organisation and Dom has took a leading role in making sure they feel welcome.
Project choice, a programme funded by Health Education England, aims to help young people with learning disabilities, difficulties and autism by setting up placements to get them the work experience they need to get into paid employment within a year.
Dom, who works in our mail room, has autism and was one of our first project choice students in 2018 and after discovering what an asset to the team he was secured himself a full time role within the portering department. Dom expressed an interest in becoming a mentor for the new students and has taken them under his wing to introduce them to the workplace and be a central contact should they have any issues or concerns.
Dom has been taking the group around the departments they will be working in from medical equipment library to the kitchens and introducing them to members of the team and giving them an oversight of the function of each area.
Personal assistant in the emergency department Debbie Heward said: “Dom is always polite, friendly and willing to go the extra mile by calling back after his mail round if we have post later on in the day.
“We recently witnessed him doing a fantastic job supporting the students from project choice. Before he came into our office we heard him explaining what part of the hospital they were in and who was based in our area. Once he was in the office he explained who the students were and introduced them all to us.”
Senior operations manager at NTH Solutions Natalie Wintersgill added: “We are always receiving wonderful feedback and compliments about Dom, he really is a fantastic person. He is so caring and hardworking we are lucky to have him as part of our team.”
