Jobs news click onto a career revolution - www.iwant2b.org.uk

A new online careers web service is set to help people plan their working lives in the UK.

Combining millions of permutations, the new free online service, www.iwant2b.org.uk, can map out individual pathways for people looking to embark on a particular career or to change jobs completely.

It is intended to help people fast-track their career plan and tap into some of the best job opportunities of the future as for the first time it links together universities and colleges to clearly show how to get the right qualifications for the right job and where.

The new system, which has been developed by the North East Higher Skills Network, is being trialled in the North East region, where all 28 universities and colleges have come together. It is hoped the system can soon be rolled out across the UK enabling users countrywide to search every course in the country from one website.

Iwant2b is aimed at everyone from teenagers to middle-agers and enables users to create a profile of their own work history and qualifications on-line, using this information to map out the right courses needed to arrive at a particular career.

Dr Mark Lythgoe, one of the few scientists in the world to have held Albert Einsteinís brain, launched the innovative online careers mapping tool ñ adding that such a system may have helped him fast-track his ambitions at an earlier age.

Now the director of the Centre for Advanced Biomedical Imaging at University College London, 43-year-old Dr Lythgoe explained how he left school with just one poor ëAí level pass and spent years working across the world doing a variety of jobs ñ from a dog-trainerís dummy in Israel to a researcher on board the ëflying doctorí flights in the Australian outback ñ before deciding on what he wanted to do.

After returning to England, Mark took the first tentative steps on to an academic career, studying diplomas, enrolling on a part-time MSc course, before finally getting a PhD at the age of 38 ñ ìone of the happiest days of my lifeî.

He said: ìI had to overcome a lot of negativity, because I did not adopt the traditional approach into an academic career and as a result I always felt very driven ñ as if I needed to prove myself and that I was capable of doing the work.

ìWhen I left school I had no idea what I wanted to do really and how to even start going about getting where I needed to be. I had no idea how useful and relevant the educational system could be for me and what doors it could open and opportunities it could provide.

ìBut I think a system like iwant2b may have helped me and made a massive difference as I would have had clear advice and help from an early age.î

The innovative virtual expert helper is the brainchild of IT and careers experts at the North East Higher Skills Network. Backed by all 28 of the universities and colleges in the North East, the network is tasked with improving the take up of higher education and skills across the region.

Professor Graham Henderson, Chairman of the Network and Vice Chancellor at the University of Teesside, said: ìBy providing a clear career pathway, people can see at a glance where they need to go for help and training without having to trawl through dozens of individual websites.

ìIt has been a huge technical task to develop the first stages of iwant2b.org.uk, which we believe will be an excellent tool for anyone looking to map out a career or change direction at any stage in their lives.

ìWhen you look at what Dr Lythgoe achieved through having a goal and sticking to a clear path of education it makes you realise the enormous potential we all have. Quite often we just need to unlock that potential and the iwant2b tool will help people do that quickly and simply by setting out a pathway at the touch of a button.î