Calling all Wandsworth women. Do you believe that challenge is the soul of motivation?

Have you been out of work for two years or more and want to do something about it? What's more, would you like to be able to travel to Germany, Italy, Sweden or Tenerife and have it all paid for? Then read on.

Wandsworth women who would like to return to work, but who may need training or advice on how to get back into the workplace, can get all the help they need from the Skilltrain organisation under the banner of Wandsworth NOW, an initiative to help women get back to work, either for a company or for themselves.

Wandsworth NOW is a joint project along with four other countries: Germany, Italy, Sweden and Tenerife. The contract to deliver the programme was won by Wandsworth-based Skilltrain.

The project is aimed at encouraging women to identify their skills and to help them get back to work or to start their own business and the accent is on fun.

Skilltrain acts as mentors, they listen, help and put women on the right road to jobs. These jobs can be anything from dressmaking to engineering and the help is free to all those taking part.

Not only that, some of the women will have the opportunity to visit one of the other four countries, again all paid for by Skilltrain, to see how other people in these countries are working their projects.

Those women who go on to start their own business will also be offered free marketing and have their business included in the Internet plus one year's free membership of the Wandsworth Chamber of Commerce. Free training in marketing, sales, presenting ideas, and customer care is available and there is limited childcare provision available.

Skilltrain's managing director, Lucy Gardiner, said: "There are many women in the borough who are eager to get back to work or those who have always harboured a dream to start their own business, no matter what that business is, it can be anything from flower arranging to arts and crafts to domestic cleaning.

"We can offer them the chance to grow those roots. We want to be the wind beneath their wings and help them on their way."

The help and support offered to the women seeking to get back to work is friendly with no formal training sessions but in workshops where the women support each other.

If you would like to know more about the opportunities to get back to work and the chance to spend some time in another country looking at the way they work please call Lucy Gardiner at Gardiner House, The Business Village, Broomhill Road, London SW18 4JQ. Telephone 0181 871 5104, Fax 0181 871 5244 or e-mail skilltrain@cybonet.co.uk.

The only thing to remember is that you must live in Wandsworth and have been out of full- or part-time work for two years or more.

You have nothing to lose. All it requires is a willingness to take the time to dream about the future and then to act to realise that dream.

So go on, take a chance and risk winning. Where is the risk in losing?

Converted for the new archive on 30 June 2000. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.