While your degree sets you up with the knowledge for a career in social work, the skills you gain are also highly relevant for a range of related social care roles

Job options

Jobs directly related to your degree include:

• Family support worker
• High intensity therapist
• Social worker

Jobs where your degree would be useful include:

• Adult guidance worker
• Advice worker
• Arbitrator
• Careers adviser
• Chaplain
• Community development worker
• Counsellor
• Detective
• Education consultant
• Equality, diversity and inclusion officer
• Life coach
• Mediator
• Play therapist
• Special educational needs coordinator (SENCO)
• Volunteer coordinator
• Youth worker

Work experience

Previous experience in an area relating to social work is extremely important if you want to become a social worker. You could look for paid positions or voluntary work in places such as community care centres, charities that work with vulnerable adults or children, counselling settings or youth centres.

Any roles that show you can demonstrate empathy, along with a genuine desire to improve the quality of the lives of others, are helpful.

Typical employers

Most social workers are employed by local authority children's or adult social services. Increasingly, however, opportunities are available within other settings such as:

• children's homes
• primary care trusts
• prisons
• private fostering agencies or nursing homes
• voluntary organisations or charities.

It's possible to do freelance work for social work staffing agencies or to work as an independent practitioner within social enterprises.

Skills for your CV

A social work degree provides you with practical skills through placements carried out alongside professionals in, for example, the NHS, schools, police and housing.

Ethics, including respecting diversity and promoting social justice, is covered and you develop skills of judgement and become more accountable, reflective, critical and evaluative.

Transferable skills gained include:

• communication skills
• analysing a situation and problem solving
• managing conflict
• advocacy
• negotiating plans and goals
• effective time management.