Start Up Britain - Big Society with Big Business Benefits?

The Press has been awash with the Government-backed StartUpBritain campaign this week - an initiative involving a handful of the usual 'suspects' offering vouchers and advice to potential 'entrepreneurs'.

It has amazed me just how mis-lead some of our so called business 'leaders' can be; there is only one way to create a sustainable culture of entrepreneurial growth in the UK and that involves a well-funded real connection with the audience from the bottom up, not another example of top-down 'idea a day' approaches to a serious issue.

If you're serious about finding a solution to an existing problem, then you really need to make sure you are affecting the root of the problem with the implemented strategy. In this case, you don't have to be a banker or a qualified economist to realise that there are next to no funds for Government to help anywhere in this problematic equation - hence the whole Big Society approach - passing not just responsibility back to us, but often the cost also.

So, to the root of this problem - you cannot sustain growth in new business start ups without a substantial budget to invest in real money. A small bit of cash and/or a handful of vouchers to be redeemed with participating orgs is not what i'm talking about; this is pass the buck territory again and it should be pointed out that some participating companies may have more than philanthropic thoughts in their heads when they sign up to participate - after all, what great brand awareness and access to potential new customers. I know, too cynical? Well some would say not cynical enough at a time when a stronger Government approach to Banking profits and tax evasion from big business would actually provide the necessary funding from the state to deliver a financially sustainable 'difference' to the vast majority of UK Tax payers. I'd like to see Top Shop, for example, relocate itself away from the profits of our UK High Streets in protest - do you think that would happen?

Without necessary investment from the Banks in the UK, start ups will continue to suffer from high % 1st and 2nd year business failure rates.

It's like trying to solve a famine with a fist full of food vouchers and promises; sometimes you need to get back to basics, this time the basic required ingredient is long term Banking support and assistance. Without this financial support, all the offers of mentoring and free website vouchers just make StartupBritain feel like the old BusinessLinks rebranded and represented with some new mates and freebies.

Things This Week That Will Change Your World

Less of a blog post and more of a list really today; just hit me how significant certain events this week have been, allbeit to my world of CEIAG.

Firstly, picking up on Stella Creasy MP's tweets last night, I became aware of the really disapointing news for careers professionals that, quite frankly, they may as well not be...er, professional. All Tory and LibDem MP's voted in favour of the careers 'profession' not actually needing to be professionally qualified to deliver CEIAG in schools.
I must say that if I was a practicing member of the Institute of Career Guidance or ACEG, I would feel that my organisation had let me down badly; what is your purpose if not to focus on the professional support and protection of your members? Failed.
Talk about grabbing defeat from the jaws of victory - the AACS (All Age Career Service) looks to be confined to a JobCentrePlus where an unqualified careers 'agent' will sort you out some training, an appfrenticeship or, fancy a bit of careers advice?

Secondly, with the axing of Connexions services Nationally (to the point of certain 'death'), the EBP's (Education Business Partnerships) were heralded as the new broker between LA's, schools and employers - well guess what? As of 31st March, for those of you reading today that means..tomorrow, £25m cuts are about to wipe the EBP's out as well. Smart.

Now the third point, and the icing on the rotten cake: with careers in school not coming under the view of Ofsted , careers advisers not having to be relevantly qualified to deliver CEIAG, schools not having Connexions to help with WEX (Work Experience) and schools being made responsible for their own budget spend in CEIAG - there can be only 1 outcome, and that is Generation Zzzzzzz

Apprenticeship - What's In a Term?

As readers of my Blog and Tweets will have no doubt sussed by now, I am a great fan of Apprenticeships as an instrument to improve social mobility in the UK and improve the life chances of young people, particlularly.

However, you will also know that im not a great fan of the current trend to promote Apprenticeships to the point of meaningless; we've seen with the down grading of degrees over time the adverse affect this can have on graduate employment - too many graduates in the labour market may have upskilled the UK but ask the graduates whether they are happy with their current chances of finding employment.

So, I was delighted to see the latest B&Q Tv ads where the emphasis was on the skilled workforce - in terms of City&Guilds qualified teams in store. Did they mention the term 'Apprenticeship'? No. I wonder why?

Because, like most of us who haven't got all loved-up on the hype around Apprenticeship place targets, that business needed to connect with its TV audience, it could have easily cashed in on apprenticeship association but it chose a different route, one that it thought would have greater relevance.

This should be an early warning for the Govt and the National Apprenticeship Service - are you hell-bent on replicating the graduate unemployment model by repeating the exercise in Vocational Training with Apprenticeships?

Graduate? Apprentice? They just don't mean what they used too - better stick to the actual qualification for clarity in future, its the more realisitic barometer of learning quality in my opinion.

WEXperience - Big Society and Social Capital Approach to WEX

WEXperience – An Affordable Alternative to Work Experience in the UK

The background - public sector cuts to frontline youth services such as Connexions are creating a serious squeeze on WRL activity, particularly Work Placement, which will adversely affect the opportunities for Gen Y to escape the rising unemployment and NEET trend.

Employer research proves that '1st Jobbers' are increasingly devoid of the social and 'soft' skills required in the modern workplace. Without real world experience of the work place, this skills gap will continue to increase, and the widening skills shortages for employers will also continue to increase.

WRL delivered within school does not provide students with the real world of work experiential learning they need to make them more 'work ready'.

The budget cuts to Local Authorities’ Youth Services actually mean a patchwork of provision nationally in this arena; some EBP's are managing to fill in some of the gaps in some of the regions - other EBP's have already disbanded before joining the fray.

It could also be argued that the Wolf Report may be interpreted by some schools as an excuse to cease WRL activity in school as it will neither be statutory nor reported on by Ofsted.

One example of the cost to school under the 'new school economy' is £45 per student per school being quoted to organise and deliver work placement services in a particular county - this figure is already being upgraded to a potential £90 per student per school for 2012.

If it is no longer mandatory/statutory for schools to provide this placement service, why wouldn’t they withdraw it if the saving is as much as £15 - £20k per year per year group?

The problem is clear - there is a real possibility of skills shortages increasing among young people unless we can provide them with focused, experiential, world of work opportunities.

The Solution - A scalable solution that encompasses the ethos of Big Society, maximises the breadth of social capital available and draws on some good ideas of the past.

In many schools we see active parents assisting in the process of work placements; infact, it is not so rare now for parents and students to actively seek work placements that they feel would be more beneficial than the current lottery .

This is the foundation for a new, more streamlined and simple solution, which encourages 'society' - ie parents, carers, guardians, friends to take responsibility for their children by helping 1 day a year with WEXperience - Take your Kids to Work Day.

Those students that do not benefit from the social capital that others may benefit from, would be helped by the streamlined WEX service directly to find Employer 'Adoptors' (as is the current system).

This would create a substantial cost saving to Government and LA's, whilst delivering a guaranteed 1 day per student WEXperience as the minimum delivery outcome for all students - quality and quantity. We have been looking at the outreach possibility in terms of assessment of work readiness skills following these WEXperience days, with a London University  looking with us at the possibility of providing a national assessment and a certifcation framework to help students what they will have learned from their 'WEXperience'.

Going forward, this WEXperience solution could be extended to tackle growing youth employment in the UK, by providing the basic world of work insight that many young people currently lack, which is often cited as a barrier to employment entry by the UK’s employers and is a rising and worrying trend.

Systems can be changed from the bottom up - WEXperience could be the start of a small but significant change to Work Placement provision in the UK - we are already working with a number of regions to create a scalable proof of concept pilot - email me for more information on how to help us shape a new solution for our students, you can't change anything if you don't get involved!    

The Apprenticeship Buzz could have a Sting in its Tail

You'd have to be on Mars (or Venus) to not have noticed, since the tale end of the Labour Government, the media hype around apprenticeships; millions of pounds of tax payers money pumped into the National promotion of this most ancient and honourable training system.

It's as though Ministers have competed to pledge the highest numbers of new apprenticeship places - it's as though I keep expecting to see 'Brucey' as Speaker encouraging John Hayes to go 'higher'.

Make no mistake, I am a long, well-documented fan of apprenticeship programmes - I still have the 'I Love Apprenticeships' badge that little Lord Young gave me at an event we were supporting in London once.

But, and it is a big 'but', however excellent the ideal of apprenticeships are, however important they are as an instrument in the skills of the future 'battle' (which we are losing btw), it seems we are on a dangerous course.

Apprenticeships are vital in any economy I believe. Yet, I cannot bring myself to be anything but mystified at the current Apprenticeship strategy being spearheaded by the National Apprenticeship Service (NAS) - although I appreciate they are merely servants carrying out the 'master's' wishes.

The problem I have is that the new strategy is to keep increasing the numbers of apprenticeship places in the UK - an ultimate strategy of 'over training'. Some say this model works well in other countries, often citing the Deutsche Telecom model of releasing their 'over-trained' back into the labour market. But in the UK this could well lead to just a more highly skilled queue at he door of the JobCentre as we wallow in  a recessionary hollow.
Training Providers have benefited from this model of over training in the UK - sometimes at the expense of Further Education colleges. Thousands of students put through the 'programme', with each and every one of them representing a positive entry on the Training Providers' cashflow. Can this be right?

Recently, the Government have been encouraging large employers to increase the number of apprenticeship places they offer, convinced, like some mad alchemist, that this magic ingredient called 'apprenticeships' is going to save the UK economy (or at least help them reduce the number of NEETS and improve the youth unemployment figures temporarily)  .

So, 300,00 apprenticeship places, 350,000...500,000 - I can't even keep up with the latest targets that are coming from Government, such is the intensity of their campaigning.

Big question - would their be so many apprenticeship places if the Government did not provide direct financial incentive to employers?
 If you beleieve the answer to be 'No', then you are probably the most realistic. Having interviewed many HR Directors and CEO's of the UK's top companies, I can assure you that only a few convinced me that the investment in apprenticeship programmes would continue without financial incentives from the Government.

So why is this point important? Because it clearly demonstrates the culture of 'over training' through increased apprenticeship places, which in turn can only result in a reduction in the actual quality of that training and the subsequent quality of the apprentices themselves over time - hardly a solution for the forecasted skills gap that we have looming for most industry sectors.

Government should stop using Apprenticeships as a political football. They represent the best opportunity to learn for thousands in the UK - and I believe they are also one of the best ways to improve social mobility in the UK. They need protecting by organisations such as City & Guilds, organisations that have witnessed the changing view toward apprenticeships over many governments but have renmained rightly focused on the importance of this kind of 'learning'.
 
My biggest fear is that apprenticeships are ultimately going to be devalued, downgraded and then dispensed with for another spell in the box marked 'Not Popular' - until another Government comes along one day and.....history tends to repeat itself.

The Genius of the Great Khan (Salman that is)

In Donald Clark's post about 'Flip the Classroom', he illuminates the theory and practice of Salman Khan - the much commented-on hedgefund manager turned learning guru.

Rather sceptically (I must confess) I started to read Donald's piece about Khan. I then searched for one of Khan's many video posts. I watched 1, 2, 3 and a bit films - then revisited the 'Flip the Classroom' post and read again.

Puzzled, yet surprisingly excited to think it through again. 

Khan's profile is huge, his theory is elegantly simple, yet far-reachingly radical. He speaks of removing technologies from classrooms like some crazy modern Luddite. He argues that the classroom was never created for the use of technology (you can probably see a link here to Sir Ken Robinson's  RSA  knowledge share masterclass, so brilliantly animated). Sir Ken speaks of a radical rethink being required on the modern purpose of education mapped against the current (historic) system that acts more of a trap than a springboard (in Newmanswords!). Salman Khan is questioning many of the same fundamentals that Sir Ken has, and continues to question, but with Khan there is, I feel, a dogged determination to see through this change - and he is, indeed, already 'putting his money where his mouth is' by actually being the instrument of change rather than just the influential orator demonstrating the need for this change.

To me, this is what makes Salman Khan the standout player in the 'purpose of education' discussion as well as being the rarest of beasts - a man that practices exactly what he preaches - because he influences by example not just by the use of infographics or a well delivered blog! ;-)

There is no desire by me to re-write the learned words of Donald Clark's post - so I urge you to read the piece (and all of Donald's other posts for that matter) about Salman Khan - http://bit.ly/fDHUA1 

I'm now convinced that I was wrong.

I was convinced that the problem in many classrooms seemed to be the lack of innovative technology and interactive technology, the lack of ICT expertise etc... I was wrong!

Rather worryingly (worrying because of the instant revelation ),  I'm now convinced that there is something so deeply simple in 'flipping the classroom' and redefining the purpose of education back to its basic principles, that it might just be possible for the disciples of Khan to really make this happen, creating the change and providing the innovation through thought rather than technology. 

  

So, I leave you with Donald Clark's more eloquent appraisal of the man - in his own words:

"..Khan’s trick, is something I’ve believed in for years. Don’t use technology in the classroom, use it before and after, outside of the classroom. Classrooms were never designed for technology, apart, perhaps, for Whiteboards. But the danger with whiteboards is that they reinforce talking at students and ‘lecturing’. Flip the classroom. Assign the short talks for homework, THEN use the classroom for the application of the concepts. The net result is that you humanise the classroom. It becomes a place primarily for learning, not teaching. Simple, but like most great ideas - brilliant."

The Poor Relation in Education

I recently mentioned that CEIAG, as a subject (if it indeed can be classed as a subject!) , is the poor relation within education. It's a subject (note the subtle change of use) that I have returned to discuss because I felt it needed expansion.

Although there are current rumblings that schools may be assessed on the quality of their CEIAG provision by the co-alition Government, I believe we are still awaiting a definitive statement on this particular issue, so as it stands CEIAG still remains outside of the Ofsted remit when it comes to school assessments.

Those that have the responsibility of delivering CEIAG within school have, historically, not always been the most well supported cohort when it comes to the vital tools of their trade; when you are working with students directly in the field of career options, relevant Labour Market Intelligence (Lmi), HE/FE and Training intelligence and an understanding of the person in front of you are all equally vital.

So why have we continually hampered the efforts of careers advisers in school by not recognising that these vital 'tools' need constant upgrading, redefining, assessing and sometimes replacing in favour of more contemporary and relevant alternatives? This community of careers advisers, many of them Connexions employees, many of them now facing redundancies on a scale never seen before, have, quite frankly, been doing the impossible job - trying to provide a service that is so outdated and archaic in its provision that it could be argued it has barely been fit for the young students it is there to help.

Is this the fault of the advisers, the system or even the professional bodies such as the ICG and the ACEG who, it could be argued, are light years away from the progressive work of some other membership organisations to keep up with the pace of a fast changing world?

True, it is often said that, when questioned, many of the public are able to recount a tale of poor career advice when at school - this kind of urban myth has echoed around the profession ever since there was a careers profession. But is it true? And if it is, on what scale? I know many great careers advisers, totally committed, innovative and motivational - they would be the first to agree that the quality of advisers responsible for careers provision in school has not always been a picture of consistent quality and expertise. They laugh when they recount their own version of the urban myth - the crocked P.E. teacher consigned to careers duty.

But, whether the myths are true or not, the issue is : CEIAG, the poor relation in Education?

If you combine the lack of support I mentioned (when it came to the right tools for the job), if you add to that an often non specialist careers advisory team, a lack of innovative leadership from the professional bodies that are 'representing' ,and, for good measure, underpin the whole cocktail with a 'subject' that is neither given the appropriate time within the school curriculum nor a financially-sustainable model for Local Authorities in the current climate to continually support at the same levels as historically witnessed, then, we have a problem Houston !

CEIAG has not only been the poor relation in education, it might actually become bankrupt in the eyes of those it needs to better serve - unless, or until, it is overhauled, enhanced, funded sensibly AND integrated within the curriculum so its not squeezed into 'collapse days' or hidden in PSHE sessions.

I've not even mentioned the lack of innovative technology in CEIAG - I'll save that for another day!

A Really Free Lunch

Over the last year or so there has been a real increase in the number of CEIAG services being offered directly to schools and Local Authorities; companies, social enterprises, charities - all seeking to make their mark and stake their 'claim' in the current Careers wilderness.

Many appear to be little more than re-listers or duplicators of content that already exists in the public domain - especially when it comes to Labour Market Information.

The trouble is some of these organisations not only provide little value-added to a schools' CEIAG offering, but, perhaps more importantly, some appear to be financially gaining from a rather mediocre service.

Why do schools buy in this services at all some ask - can't their ICT team support the needs of the CEIAG function and current CEIAG needs of the students?

It is fair to say that unfortunately not all technical teams, teachers or careers advisers have the personal knowledge or skills to effectively transform their establishments into the modern learning environment that is required in the 21st century. Ignorance and great 'selling' , I suspect, combine to provide schools with little choice - and the excuse to purchase some of these services in order to deliver what they believe to be necessary student CEIAG services.

And that's the problem - as learning innovators such as Prof Steve Wheeler, Shell Terrell and other commentators will confirm, their is a rich abundance of freeware and opensource solutions, that, with a little knowledge and a bit of research, can be fused together to provide an incredibly rich resource . Other free solutions to education don't even need that kind of investment of time - they get frequently shared around the Learning community and can often be as straightforward as plug and play.

The savage cuts to youth services are already impacting negatively on students throughout the UK - when it comes to CEIAG, these are probably the most fragile and hardest to protect - always the poor relation in education. The cuts mean that schools will be directly responsible for their spend in this arena as Connexions services deplete and the Local Authority hands across financial autonomy to many schools.

So, if you are responsible for CEIAG provision, are a Head teacher in secondary school, a governor, parent or guardian - infact,  a UK Tax Payer, you have a duty to question any school spending that seems unnecessary - especially where there are free alternatives in the market.

Viva Free Tools For Schools - it is the future, as long as school teams understand the need to have inhouse knowledge that makes the most of the free offerings out there, infact, it could be argued that it would be negligent in this financial climate not to do so.  

Careers provision is about to get very ugly

It's only been the last 12 months or so that I have been lured into the murky world of social media, as an active 'practitioner' - the guys in the studio hassled me for a long time, so they won in the end which perhaps says more about my stubborn approach rather than their collective persuasive ;-)
This flight today may be bumpy - but its how you land i'm told that makes the difference.

April 2012 signifies an important date for many careers professionals around the UK. As an MICG (member of the Institute of Career Guidance) for the past 5 years, without being a practicing careers adviser, I have lived a charmed existence of interviewing some of our nation's finest careers professionals, politicians, quango execs etc..The careers professionals have long targetted an All Age Careers Service as a kind of holy grail of attainment during this time - and finally April 2012 has finally been selected by the current Government to be the magic date that this dream becomes reality, again.

Whether the AACS works and delivers as per the expectations of the careers professionals or not, is, quite frankly, of no importance to those young students that have started their options as early as last December and are currently in the process of deciding their futures.

I am trying to highlight the danger of the unthinkable - that thousands of young students across the UK may about to become victims of the careers void - whilst Government, academics, lobbyists, consultants, advisors and careers professionals meet and debate the make-up of the new AACS, students, parents, guardians and carers are left to pick up the pieces; take the example of the Hull Careers Service - a service that has recently contacted me to help in their plight to keep HullCS alive and serving young people. Over 600 job cuts to the Youth Services in Hull and Kingston spells absolute disaster for the young people there - they will not have a careers service (nor many other youth services for that matter) left soon if we don't highlight these dangers - we are genuinely sleep walking into the abyss for the next 18 months.

In my own region, Cambridgeshire, as a Board member of the Cambs EBP I have experienced at first hand the damage of the Local Authority cuts on the Connexions Youth Service. The Connexions teams up and down the UK are naturally demoralised and de-motivated - great!!

So, if we're all waiting for a miracle come April 2012 - ie the delivery of a Careers Service that achieves what no other careers service has achieved in the UK to date - such as contempary world of work experience and a service relevance for young people - let us all hope that the thousands of students that are about to go into the 'black hole' from now until April 2012, get a miracle of their own too....they will need it.

Let us not allow another generation of young people to become the disenfranchised, in what is fast becoming, a thoroughly modern UK with thoroughly Victorian thinking and values. But hey, that's what we all voted for, didn't we?