Madelene Rönnberg, Study- and Career Counsellor at Uppsala University
You are working with guiding university graduates navigating the job market after graduation. It is a highly competitive market and you have been involved in a project developing ‘SkillMill’.
Can you in short tell us what your job is at Uppsala University?
As a career counsellor, my main task is to empower students on their way towards their future careers. I love my job where I meet people of all ages, from diversified backgrounds, interested in a big variety of subjects, and the one thing they have in common is to find their future career path.
The core of my job is to teach Career Management Skills, either in a one-to-one coaching context or in a workshop context with university students. Career Management Skills are all about learning self-leadership, how to manage your career planning based on tools for reflection, mapping competencies and developing job-hunting strategies
What is the SkillMill and why was it developed?
SkillMill helps us: identify, understand & verbalize the Soft Skill training stories that transform our professional experiences into merits. A key factor for employability is not only the awareness of one’s skills but also the ability to verbalise and express them
SkillMill is an app designed to support soft skills reflection, it is useful as soon as you step outside your comfort zone and challenge yourself. It can be occasions such as moving to a new place, doing internships, study abroad experience, internationalization at home and promotion of lifelong learning.
It can be used individually, in groups and in workshop settings.
It was developed in cooperation with various, international partners. Would you say that ‘finding your skills’, is universal? What was the benefit of having an international project team creating the SkillMill?
The importance of mapping and expressing your soft skills is universal.
The app is developed in the fields of career counselling, psychology and game design. Project Partners:
- Uppsala University (Sweden, Coordinator)
- University of Helsinki (Finland)
- University of Stavanger (Norway)
- University of Tartu (Estonia)
Co-founded by the Erasmus+ Programme of the European Union.
Who can benefit from using the SkillMill:
The SkillMill app can be used at any time. The app encourages a lifelong learning mindset, in which one’s personal skill set is under constant and continuous development.
Can SkillMill be used in a recruitment process as well?
It is made to prepare students for recruitment processes, so they will come prepared with storytelling technics and knowledge of the employer language. The goal is to support our students so they can stand out in the pile of applicants, be attractive job candidates and land their dream job.
How does the SkillMill help your students today?
SkillMill is a digital, pedagogical resource in the format of a mobile app that makes complex learning resources accessible to students. This is done by adapting resources such as established skills taxonomies (e.g. WEF, UNESCO, OECD, ESCO) and career counselling methods into a game design framework, available in student’s phones learning experiences. This way, SkillMill aims to provide users with a safe and personal step-by-step reflection process, which helps them connect personal experiences with labour market skills and employer perspectives.
How does it work in practice? Where is it available?
You can download the app here:
And read more about how to use it on our webpage: https://www.erasmus-skillmill.com/
