Essential skills training needed to close youth jobs gap

But despite such progress, the future for many young people is uncertain. Under 25s make up around 60 per cent of the drop in employment, they are disproportionately likely to have been furloughed, and more than one in eight young men are neither earning or learning - the most in almost a decade.

Youth unemployment is a big challenge, but last week’s budget invested in machinery, rather than people. Essential skills that young people need to succeed in the workplace are overlooked. Whether you call them soft skills, people skills, behaviours - they matter.

We know that even before the Covid crisis, hundreds of thousands of young people were neither earning nor learning. At Impetus, our Youth Jobs Gap research shed some light on this group.

It found qualifications matter. Getting five GCSE passes roughly halves your chances of being NEET. Getting A levels or equivalent halves it again. The unprecedented disruption to education over the past year may well show up in the labour market.

Young people from disadvantaged backgrounds were much less likely to get crucial qualifications even before the pandemic. Having been less able to engage with remote learning, these young people are understandably a priority for schemes like the National Tutoring Programme to help them catch up.

But qualifications alone are not enough. Our research also found that young people from disadvantaged backgrounds were 50 per cent more likely to be NEET than their similarly qualified but better-off peers. What is driving the other 50 per cent?

Everyone has their pet theories about this. Local labour markets. Soft skills. Confidence. Character. Grit. Resilience. Determination. Careers advice. Caring responsibilities. Almost all of these things probably play a part. Indeed, some of these words are probably interchangeable – what’s the difference between grit and resilience, and aren’t they both part of character?

That’s where the skillsbuilder framework for essential skills comes in. A partnership of over 700 employers, schools, and others have developed shared language and outcomes. The framework consists of eight skills, like problem solving and teamwork, and a clear 16-point rating to measure them.

And recent research shows that these skills are linked to job outcomes. Young people progressing to average skill levels on the framework is associated with a 15 per cent pay rise - £3,400 per year. This is an extraordinary finding, and the pay premium for similarly qualified people with average skills is still £2,900. Very clearly, the skillsbuilder framework is a meaningful way to think about the skills young people need to succeed.

So we need to factor in essential skills as we think about what “build back better” means in practice. The appointment of Sir Kevan Collins as education recovery commissioner is a welcome sign of intent in education, much as kickstart is for the labour market. Essential skills are the necessary third leg of the stool. Let’s make sure we get that right before we all head off to the pub.

Ben Gadsby is head of policy and research at Impetus, a charity that supports young people from disadvantaged backgrounds to succeed in education and employment; and an Associate Fellow of the think tank Bright Blue.