Your situation
Returning to work after long-term sickness
Returning to work after long-term sickness can seem daunting, but with a positive attitude you'll be able to turn it into a fresh start. Remember, many people have time off work with sickness. Take a look at the steps below you can take to get back into work.
Consider your situation
Ask yourself the following questions:
- does my illness or injury mean I need to think about a new line of work?
- do I want to do a different job when I return to work?
- will I need to update my skills to get back into my previous line of work?
- does my confidence need a boost?
You can use your answers to develop an action plan that can help you get to where you want to be.
Identify new career opportunities if you can't return to your old job
If you had an active or physical job, your illness or injury might mean you can't return to your previous line of work. However, you can use your skills and experience in many other ways.
Think about your experience – for example, if you've worked in the building trade think about hardware retail, costing building projects or working in support roles such as human resources or training. Other options include general management and driving jobs. With these jobs you can use your experience without doing much physical work. If you have worked in heavy industry you could think about quality management or health and safety. Get some ideas from our job profiles.
Make a fresh start in a new line of work
During your time off you might have decided you want a change of job. You might just want to change, or opportunities in your previous line of work might have decreased.
You could kick-start your career change by identifying which skills you have, which skills you want to develop and what type of work would interest you. Try out our skills and interests tool to get a picture of your current skills and which jobs you might like to move into next.
Our advisers can help you to interpret the results of the skills and interests assessment and generate career ideas.
Update your skills and knowledge
If you want to get back into the same line of work that you were in before, check your skills and knowledge are up to date. You might need to update yourself on developments, and new working practices may have come in. You can get up to date by reading a trade website or magazine or by calling your professional body. You could contact previous colleagues to ask them what has been going on.
As technology changes quickly, your computer skills are the most likely skills you will need to update. You could do this by joining a college course or doing an online course from home.
You can use the course search to find the right course to update your skills. If you're not sure which course is best, simply go to the Contact us page to get in touch and our advisers will help you find the most suitable one. They can also put you in touch with the professional body for your line of work.
Give your confidence a boost
Whilst you're out of the workplace you may have lost some confidence. You build confidence from doing things and achieving things, and work can play a big part in this. You'll start to gain confidence again if you take a positive step and do something new and challenging, such as starting a course or doing some volunteering.
There are many ways to boost your confidence – read our article to find out more.
Be positive about your time off
Employers will understand why you've been off if you're honest about the nature of your illness or injury. It will also help them to build up a positive image of you if you mention any personal development activities you have done whilst you've been off. Activities like these will impress employers:
- completing courses
- joining societies
- volunteering
- being active in your community.
Get some experience
Employers appreciate experience because it gives them recent evidence of what you can do. If you're aiming for permanent full-time work but want to ease yourself back in, you could think about temporary work, part-time work and volunteering work. You'll also get a reference and it could lead to a full-time job.
Find out which training schemes you can access
You should also be eligible for other schemes for unemployed people, such as Work Trials, where you get a work placement that allows you to show an employer what you can do.
If you need extra employment support because of a disability, you can see a Disability Employment Adviser, who will usually be based at your local Jobcentre Plus office.
Get advice on benefits and other legal matters
If you're off work due to injury, you can get advice on benefits from your local Jobcentre Plus. They can advise you on whether to move from Incapacity Benefit to Jobseekers' Allowance or Employment Support Allowance.
You can also get impartial advice on legal matters such as compensation from your local Citizens Advice Bureau.
