A 59-year-old man from Albania, without education and certifications; with a wife and a child both with a disability of more than 50%.

Or to put it another way: a middle-aged man, with family burdens, no formal qualifications and of foreign origin. How many vulnerabilities can one man have? How many obstacles to remove in order to survive?

Mr. D. visited the Employability Service of the Athens Solidarity Center by SolidarityNow requesting help in filling in forms for public sector notices. At least now he has got the Greek citizenship. In Albania he was a graduate of compulsory education and has experience in manual work.

Analysing the vulnerabilities, things look difficult. On the one hand, his age, although not objectively advanced, is an obstacle to finding work in the private sector, particularly in manual work. In addition, his lack of formal qualifications prevents him from applying for higher-paid positions. His compulsory school certificate by his country has not been recognized, and his main vulnerability is the exclusive care of his wife and child, and their total dependence on him.

However, at the same time, the certified disability of his family members, combined with his own unemployment, enables him to apply for public sector jobs involving people with disabilities and their guardians.

Thus, the plan, designed and developed with Mr. D. and the employability counselors of the Service, was in the first phase to create a profile and post documents on the ASEP website (Supreme Council for Civil Personnel Selection) with which the non-tech savvy beneficiaries need support. The second step was to search for advertisements that included compulsory education positions without a baccalaureate degree, while also applying for fixed-term jobs.

The search was intensive, and Mr. D. himself was particularly consistent and reliable in the meetings. However, the efforts of himself and of the Service’s counselors soon bore fruit, as he was accepted for a position as a cleaner in the Municipality of Egaleo!

We thank him for his trust and wish him a great new start in his new job!

*Since August 1st, 2023, the operation of the Athens Solidarity Center by SolidarityNow is supported by the Swiss-Greek Cooperation Programme/Embassy of Switzerland in Greece to reducing economic and social disparities in the EU and by the Ministry of Migration and Asylum.

 **The Center is also supported by the Municipality of Athens.