Follow our 10-step guide to guarantee a confident and successful return to work.

By Diana Wolfin, Course leader, Women Into Management (for women returners), University of Westminster.

"I've lost my confidence". No matter what field a woman has been in before and at what level, this is the most commonly used phrase by women going back to work after a break.

There are a whole litany of confidence-ebbing reasons which may make your return to the workforce an uncertain or frightening one:

• you've been at home in the constant company of small children and feel you've lost that edge,
• you may feel that you no longer know what's going on "out there" in the workplace,
• you no longer want to work in the same field as before but have no future direction,
• information technology has progressed so quickly that you feel a dinosaur when faced with the prospect of keeping up.

Ten steps to getting back on track:

1. Start buying newspapers and reading the appointments pages, looking at what employers are looking for in terms of skills or IT packages, and what salaries are like.

"75% of all jobs are gained through word of mouth, so networking is paramount, especially for the woman who has been out of the workplace for a while."

2. Contact your previous employer - this is a useful networking exercise in case there are job openings.

3. Talk to someone who has successfully returned, with similar family commitments to yours. Finding a role model can get you thinking that you can do it too.

4. If you belong to a professional association, subscribe to its magazine, contact it to see if it runs any updating courses (the Law Society is one which does). It may also publish some sort of noticeboard with jobs available. Did you know that 75% of all jobs are gained through word of mouth? So networking is paramount, especially for the woman who has been out of the workplace for a while.

5. Most local authorities run IT courses which are not expensive. Learn to use a word processor if you don't already know how. Familiarise yourself with email and get used to the jargon. You'll seem out of touch to a prospective employer if you look blank at words like "download" or "outsource".

6. There are good updating courses for professional women, many which are funded from the European Union and are free. These courses include skills updating in their area and field placements. Find out more from the Department of Adult and Continuing Education at your local university and ask for women returners' courses.

7. Career development consultants can be a great help, but one with sympathy for women returners is helpful as there are issues specific to them which don't apply to other unemployed people. There are also many women's organisations which can talk to you about the industry if you're thinking of staying in the same area. They'll be able to tell you what skills are required for various jobs within that industry. Some include:

Women in Banking and Finance (tel: 020 8777 6902)
Women into Science, Engineering and Construction (tel: 020 7227 8421)
Women in Management (tel: 01536 207307)

8. Get a book on CV writing as this is your major selling document. It needs to reflect who you are and what you're looking for in a job. Get a friend who's knowledgeable about how a CV should look these days to go through it with you carefully - for spelling mistakes, verbosity and absences in work history.

9. Remember that finding out you don't want to go into a certain field is as positive a step in the right direction as finding out where you do want to go. It may be a case of trial and error before landing on the right job.