Ayden Sims (Corr) is aiming for a high-flying career with Remploy after having to abandon life as a trainee fighter pilot with the RAF.
Remploy is the countryís leading provider of employment services for disabled people and 24-year-old Ayden has landed a job as an employment advisor at the companyís branch in Newhall Street, Birmingham.
Ayden, from Birmingham, the son of former Aston Villa star, captain and one-time Player of the Season Steve ìSimmoî Sims, is revelling in his new job which is a world away from his past life in the air force.
He used to be based at RAF Leuchars, near the famous St Andrews golf course in Scotland, and in 2005 had just finished his basic flying training and been streamed to go on to learn to fly jets, such as the Tornado.
While waiting to start his new training, however, he blacked out and after extensive medical tests it was decided that he had epilepsy and so, with the prospect of him ever flying again being remote, he left the air force on medical grounds in March this year.
Ayden found temporary work in civvy street before joining a logistics company in Lichfield, Staffordshire, but then the Career Transition Partnership advised him that, as someone who had been discharged on a medical pension, he was eligible for help from Remploy in finding work.
That help came more directly than he ever imagined as when he went along to the Birmingham branch he discovered there was a vacancy for an employment advisor actually with the company itself. He subsequently applied, passed an interview and landed the job.
Ayden said: ìAlthough I am still doing my initial training I am handling quite a range of work already and it is excellent.
ìI really enjoy working with people, dealing with job-seekers face-to-face and seeing the effect that getting an interview, let alone a job, can have on them.î
Career Transition Partnership employment consultant Brian Alexander said: ìAydenís story is a good example of the support which is available to people coming out of the armed forces with disabilities.î
High flying Ayden
Former trainee top gun re-sets his career sights on Remploy in Birmingham
