At times like this I am compelled to write to the papers, phone into radio stations and engage in intensive debate with whoever will listen about the key points relating to ‘the rising unemployment’

Firstly, the real reason we now hear about the rising unemployment is that politicians recognise that it is becoming an issue once again, alongside the recession, party politics and the usual media stories about scrounging by the state benefits fraudsters i.e. the unemployed!

Unemployment is never usually a major issue for the public at large because it affects at most, 1 in 10 of the working population. It may be that in areas like the east end of Glasgow the general unemployment figure is 30%, but the general population do not really care because- ‘Hey Ho –we don’t live there’

I have worked with employment programmes for more than 30 years; created new programmes, written European funded programmes, taught on them, delivered training for trainers and the burning issue as far as I can determine after all this is Employability for everyone in our communities and not just unemployment statistics.

My definition of Employability (detailed later) is possession of ‘the skills required to Access, Achieve, Progress and Sustain in employment’. These have very little currency in our schools, colleges and universities today –if they did then our young people would clearly be moving on into their chosen careers or working in areas they trained in or not accounting for 26% youth unemployment!

In a 2010 survey of 7000 businesses by the British Chambers of Commerce, members were asked how confident they were in hiring from our universities.

Only 45% expressed high confidence in the graduates they met.

Members felt that funding in our Higher and Further Education sectors followed the interests of the learner and not the needs of the economy.

There is a simple reason for this –it is how these institutions draw down their government funding. Providing courses for students who are ill advised and who have little or no input for a career – College & University courses are funded by starts, attendance, achievement and completion and nothing about employment.

Employers want new employees with literacy/numeric skills, present well, communicate, are willing to learn, problem solve, have good timekeeping etc and say if they are provided with these ‘employability’ skills then they can provide the rest, with a little assistance from SDS and the government for training.

Secondly, the old chestnut regarding the common misapprehension that ‘there are no jobs out there’ has got to be cleared up once and for all.

There are jobs out there and we find them and get our clients into them every day of the year. In fact we recently celebrated 500 jobs in 500 days at our facility in East Kilbride –EK Works.

The truth with this approach to employability is that we are preparing people in all the areas of employability and so they are able to sell themselves and get to the top of the queue for the jobs.

Job opportunities which are displayed in the Job Centre account for around 10% of those available – or 30% of the total jobs available are advertised. Like the iceberg –the largest number of job opportunities lies beneath the surface. They are to be found on cards in shop windows, newspaper articles, agency listings, gossip from the workplace, neighbours leaving jobs to take up new ones, word of mouth, recruitment agencies, new company start ups, etc

Employability skills training teaches people how to find these “hidden jobs” and how to progress up the ladder once they achieve their new job.

Thirdly, there is Job Creation.

Of all the 2000 clients we have helped into employment in the past 3 years, the number who progress into and towards employment, 80 % approximately go into existing jobs but 20% move into new jobs or job which has been created for them.

We promote this by setting up a variety of placement opportunities which allow us to ‘job match’ the client with an employer. We do this currently for almost 500 young people who move onto a subsidised job for 6 months –with results of 91% sustained at 3 months and 81% sustained at 12 months

Youth Unemployment is at critical levels in the 3rd quarter of 2011 with the number of 16-24 year olds looking for work now passed the 1million mark. At 1.02 million the figure is the worst since I remember in the 1980’s and now includes 286,000 students in fulltime education seeking work to supplement their incomes
Even worse is the UK figure for those Not in Employment Education or Training (NEET) which is at 1.16 million or 1/5th of their age group

The Scottish figure is currently 36000, or 13.7% of 16-19 year olds

Why does the Government in Westminster always look for new programmes, new techniques and ideas when the tried and tested ones have worked so well in the past?

Isn’t it time we concentrated on a ‘back to basics’ approach and set employment and enterprise at the heart of all our education strategies?

How we learn, basic skills and employability coupled with respect for all technical training can lead to a society where ‘I’m just a….’ no longer prevails.

Colleges are now all academic institutions and promote Higher National Certificates and Diplomas with an emphasis on articulation with Universities instead of the valuable Technical Colleges of the past.

Joblessness among the young is rising dramatically across the European Union and the UK rate is close to the average of the 27 member states at 21.4%. The situation in some other countries is more serious; Spain 48%, Greece 43.5%, Italy 29.3%. But in Germany the youth unemployment is 9%

Europe’s greatest economic power, Germany has led the way in youth training with its dual education system model, which combines highly regulated apprenticeships in the private sector with vocational training in colleges.

Employers are locked into training contracts and cannot exploit apprentices by paying low wages for minimal instruction. German qualifications and employees are highly regarded and mush sought after across Europe.

2 years ago the Scottish Government announced 7,800 new Modern Apprenticeship places for Scotland. This sounds good for employers and trainees alike but there are huge gaps in the reality of the situation, which are obviously not apparent to the Scottish Government, Labour politicians who have put great emphasis on increased numbers of MA’s and the media observers who are all to happy to print the party line that this is having a dramatic impact on our young people, it is not.

Nowadays, Modern Apprenticeships are for young people (and now Adult apprenticeships) who are EMPLOYED!!

In addition to the Modern Apprenticeship madness, the Leader of Glasgow City Council has pledged an offer of a MA place to all school leavers who fail to secure progression to education or employment – again, where is he going to find the companies which will employ the 1,000’s of young people on the MA’s? There is little or no incentive for employers to employ these 1000’s of young people, certainly not the training funding, which is managed by large training companies, the employer rarely gets to see it.

Some of the bigger MA programmes are targeted at 3 main areas, which account for 35% of all young people on an MA in Scotland.

SDS Report 2010 - 2011(In Training at 21/03/2011)
Industry Starts In Trng Achieved £ per MA
Construction 2,046 5799 65% £7,500**
Engineering 943 3,541 80% £9,000**
Vehicle Maint. & Repair 907 2,089 65% £7,500**
(only 66 were female clients)

I would be a bigger fan of MA’s if we could find a way to ensure 100% achievement, but the sad reality is that at least 30% won’t achieve their qualification, for whatever reason – this is a tremendous waste of public money.

Are there jobs available for 11,429 young people in these industries? What happens to the 30% who do not complete their MA? Is it cost effective to pay £7,500 - £9,000 per person for this training?

The conclusion I have to reach is that we are funding policies which were fine in decades past when employers wanted financial support in training young apprentices but today I find that they want trainees who are employable first and who can be trained on the job secondly – not the other way around.

Would we not be better assigning funding on this scale to securing basic employability skills for all our young people in order that they can enter employment, sustain the job and then progress onto Modern Apprenticeships, further education and industry specific training courses?

I’m speaking about Incentivising Small, Medium Sized Enterprises, who would like to recruit a young person but need actual monetary support to do so. Do this on a large scale, such as in South Lanarkshire (Youth Jobs Fund) and you begin to make a sizeable dent in the increasing problem of youth unemployment.

Employability is all about the 4 stages – the skills required to Access, Achieve, Sustain and Progress in employment – and, in addition to these, I believe that we need to add Respect.
• It is respect for one’s own aspirations and success.
• It is a respect won from application, motivation and dedication.
• It is respect from the management, staff and customers with whom we work.

Scotland has a greater number of young people who are not in employment, education and training which was referred to as the Not in Employment Education or Training.

This has changed now with the drive for ‘political correctness’ to become defined as the More Choices More Chances group.

But by changing the name it has not been enough to stop the drift of increasing numbers of young people languishing in Scottish communities with no opportunities of finding work and little chance of this improving over the next 10 years.

This figure has risen from 16% of the numbers not securing any progression from schools into employment, education or training and, in some areas, can reach almost 50% of school leavers.

In one area where we worked recently, the resulting action from the local authority was to close the school and move the children to other schools.
The costs calculated to taxpayers for supporting these young people, including benefits and their failure to contribute taxes is £3.5 billion pounds

Of the 60,000 young people leaving school, around 30% went on to University and 25% on to Further Education Colleges – 25% found work.

This is perhaps hardly surprising when you consider that only 25% of young people leave school to go into jobs when they are 16. They are likely to be among the lowest achievers. More than half of 18-year-olds go on to higher education these days, so even those who leave school to enter the workforce at 18 are likely to be among the lower achievers.

Priority has to be given to the 50% of all young people leaving school to help improve basic skills, achieve qualifications and progress into technical careers with respect for these as fundamental roles within our communities.

In addition to the Smith Group Report, which again highlighted the politicians fixation on Apprenticeships, I would make a couple of recommendations, which I believe will begin to turn the tide against youth unemployment and towards supporting Employability Development for all of Scotland’s people;

1. A move to employer led courses at universities and colleges
2. Develop a 2 stream path at our high schools, universities and colleges i.e. academic and vocational
3. fund higher and further education on performance indicators which include employability, sustained employment, employment in the areas where students secure qualifications, progression within employment, enterprise & self employment
4. Embed realistic employability training throughout secondary education
5. Strip funding from failing training providers, who are being funded to achieve failure by the government and disassociate from employers who have only a financial interest at the heart of Apprenticeship delivery
6. Move funding towards SME companies who want to employ but do not need high level training or who can provide “on the job training”
7. Ensure that Local Authorities have assigned budgets to ensure employability development programmes for their residents
8. Promote the use of employer subsidy, direct financial assistance and generate interest in youth employment as a positive solution to company need
9. Bad news sells – we need a media that promotes the ideals of good citizenship and the real desire of young people to find employment and to highlight the good news this will generate.
10. Deliver on the promises of growth and envision a Scotland where young people are not left to rot on the shelf, but become the driving force behind the countries economic recovery
11. Attach Incentive Funding to Young people as they leave school, so that agencies that work with them to help them towards employment can use this incentive to attract employers and ensure the young person has the best possible chance of employment.

The future does not look bright for our young people if we do not act now and act decisively.
Projections for the next 10 years include converting part time workers into full time posts; fewer private sector jobs created, fewer public sector jobs, more people staying in work past their retirement date and more senior citizens remaining in employment for much longer periods.
All this makes the efforts being undertaken for youth employment appear superficial and short term.

I have not blogged now for quite a few months not because I couldn’t be bothered or because I had nothing to write home about, but rather, because I got fed up of thousands of replies which mostly have to do with penis enlargement or viagra sales
Now, I do not hold an opinion for or against either of these subjects which many correspondents wish to engage with me in debate but I have to point out to them the futility of pursuing me with these subject areas.
Fortunately I do not need to search out the benefits of the blue pill ( at present anyway) and as I have been involved in the Scottish business community for many years where I have encountered business colleagues who, far from needing enlargement in the penis department perhaps require more of a reduction!! Well— it is always about who has got the biggest isn’t it? And even if these are not on display one would think at conferences and seminars that all were endowed with enormous willies as in the Best Hung Horse stakes especially when it comes to comparison with size of egos.
So, back to the blog and the requirement to have a brief look at the thousands of replies about the above subjects and the one or two relating to my blogging
I found myself searching the other day for my role models, my heroes and those who I look up to in life and was struck badly that all I could enumerate were dead.
I also was aghast to discover that not one of those identified was Scottish!
Now before you go rushing to the blogosphere and name the thousands which you know, I have to say they will have to be in refined company when I mention who is on my list so far
My English hero who is well above all the rest is Winston Churchill and of course he was half American. A man who knew from an early age that he would lead his country in the most important of times
Then there are Ernest Shackelton, Horatio Nelson and Andy Ripley –of these three Andy has to be the ‘boys own’ hero capped for his country, successful in business, sport and academia plus fighting the greatest battle of his life against the cancer which finally defeated him but with such enormous bravery
The Duke of Wellington, Field Marshall Viscount Montgomery and Michael Collins are all from the Irish nominees; while Lloyd George is my Welsh representative hero; Gandhi for India and Nelson Mandela for South Africa
All, as you will note are ‘world class’ examples and no doubt if I try harder I could add a few more –but, where are the Scots?
The only person who comes into the arena with the outstanding names above is Alex Salmond and he is my sole nominee for the My Heroes listing.
Why?
He is a man of great determination, focus and purpose and stands far above any other politician of his day in any parliament or House of Representatives. Who could you quote as of his equal anywhere in the world today? Obama? David Cameron? Nicolas Sarkozy? Putin?
I knew Alex 20 years ago when I stood for election for the SNP in the European elections. Even as a Member of Parliament and campaigning throughout Scotland he found time to help me and brief me for my campaign. His debating skills are outstanding, his grasp of financial matters unequalled and his dedication to the task in front of him is always exemplary
He is a great Scot as First Minister and I hope an outstanding addition to the admirable heroes on my list

Scotland is getting older and the UK, like the rest of the world, is getting older. In most countries, the population is ageing. That has dramatic consequences for pensions and other government policies for supporting older people.

There are two factors behind this decline. The first is the good news which is that people are living longer. A child born in 1960 could expect to live for 52 years. Today, the figure is 69 years. By the middle of the century, it is likely to be higher still, well over 70.

At the same time, people are having fewer children. In 1960, there were 33 births for every 1,000 people. The number has fallen to 20, and it is expected to decline further as people in the developing world have fewer children.

But the general pattern is one of longer lives and fewer children.

Desirable though both trends are in themselves, they create a new problem. There are fewer people of working age for every older person.

In 1926, when the first contributory pension was introduced, only 34 per cent of men and 40 per cent of women were expected to reach 65. Today, one in four baby boys should reach the age of 100. Experts say today’s workers should accept that their retirements will be dramatically different from those enjoyed by their own parents.

Today’s children will be working into their 70’s as the state pension adjusts to rises in life expectancy. They will barely believe that their parents and grandparents retired at such a young age. Retiring in your 60’s could become a thing of the past unless you build up a big enough pot of private savings while you are working. And the size of the pensions we currently enjoy today??? A senior civil servant with 40 years of service can look forward today to retiring on a pension of £50,000 per annum if they were on a modest salary e.g. they will receive almost 40% of their final salary package and a 25% tax free lump sum. The pension pot required to generate such a pension in the private sector would have to exceed £1 million.

There can be no doubt that the richer you are, the longer you live, therefore raising the retirement age is a direct attack on the very poorest in our society.

The Coalition Government’s policy isn’t about choice. It is about cutting costs. It is estimated that the taxpayer will save around £13billion for each year that the state pension age is raised.

Decreasing birth rates mean there will be fewer workers to pay for old age pensions

In 1950, 8% of the population were over 60. Now it is 11% and by the middle of the century it will be 22%, according to United Nations projections.

Many state pensions, like our own, come from contributions made by current taxpayers - it’s an arrangement called Pay as You Go. So on current policies, there will be fewer taxpayers to pay more pensions.

Private pensions are different, but some economists think a smaller working population will tend to depress the value of financial assets and that will in turn affect pensions.

Then there is the financial crisis. It has hit many people retiring in its aftermath, by reducing the value of the financial assets they use to buy a pension.

And because interest rates are so low, the pension you can get for any given amount of savings has also fallen.

In the long term, it might be that developed economies are going to grow more slowly as a result of the crisis. If so, that would undermine the value of pension funds’ assets.

As for public provision, lower incomes and higher unemployment have affected contributions to state pensions.

Britain is being pushed back to ‘the days of Dickens’ by plans to force workers to retire as late as 70, it was claimed recently. Ministers warned that millions of workers face the prospect of a retirement date which slips farther from their grasp every year. In a major shake-up of state pensions, the Government said the age at which people can get their pension could jump in line with rising life expectancy.

The Coalition Government revealed a fast-track, six-week review into the state pension age, currently 60 for women and 65 for men. Under its current proposals, the state pension age will rise to 66 ‘no sooner than’ 2016 for men and 2020 for women - nearly a decade earlier than Labour’s original proposals.

In Sweden pension size is linked to life expectancy. Since the 1960s the state pension age, which used to be 67, has been 65 for both men and women. But changes were made in 1995 to a radical model which may be copied in Britain.

The average life expectancy for a Swede is around 80 for both men and women.

The age at which Swedes retire dictates the size of the pension that they will receive, the Swedish Pensions Agency said yesterday.

For example, if they retire at 61 - which means they are expected to live for another 19 years - Swedes will typically get a pension which is 25 per cent lower than retiring at 65.

And if they delay their retirement beyond the age of 65, they receive an even bigger pension.

But the real shock is that life expectancy can also affect the size of the pensions.

If life expectancy increases, the size of the monthly pension falls.

Unemployment levels are also taken into account.

This year, for example, pension levels were cut by an average of 3 per cent and they are expected to fall again next year.

Each year Swedish workers are sent an ‘orange envelope’ which explains how much their pension will be worth with figures clearly stating how they will collect if they retire at 61, 65 or 67.

The Labour Government had also proposed a rise to 67 between 2034 and 2036 and 68 between 2044 and 2046.

So, I have proposed that we attack this now and use the regulations which will allow us in the Private Sector to get into pensions now for all our staff.

Our staff will have the option now to receive a wage increase as well as contributions into a Personal Pension if they work to agreed targets and bonus.

This has a number of benefits for all.

Example:

Staff member warrants a 5% rise in salary which qualifies as a bonus at £1200 for the year

Option 1 – pay rise and they pay tax on this at 22% which means they retain £960 and the company pays 13% NI contributions circa £150

Option 2 – pay rise of 5% of £600 and pension contribution of £600

Staff member gets £470 after tax and £600 into pension –total of retained cash £1070 (staff member will collect 25% of the £600 as part of the tax free lump sum when they retire - £150)

Company pays 13% as NI contribution of £600 which is approx £70 and nothing on £600 pension contribution

20,000 Scottish young people out of work for more than 1 year

8,000 Scottish young people out of work for more than 2 years

In figures published this month the International Labour Organisation shows the global youth employment rate at a record high reaching 13%.

Younger workers in Scotland are being shut out of the labour market and this will lead to lost generations who will have never been in full time employment.

The results of allowing such a catastrophe to happen will remain a stain on the Scottish economy and Scottish communities for decades.

Young people are pouring out of our schools and colleges and have no jobs to go to or opportunities to secure jobs

Glasgow City Council, Edinburgh City Council and North Lanarkshire councils have the highest young jobless levels in the Scotland – at 25,170, 11,533 and 12,403 respectively.

One bright story in Scotland however, is the action taken by South Lanarkshire Council with its Young Peoples Future Jobs Fund. SLC has decided that positive action must be taken now in order to secure a future for their young people and they have provided a programme which links employers needs to local young peoples’ skills and talents

Key workers ‘place’ young people with employers with a view to them building relationships and therefore creating jobs and long term posts with training

Of course the Labour market has changed in its composition many times over the centuries.

250 years ago the majority of Scottish workers were located in the weaving trade –it had risen from 25,000 to 70% of all workers a hundred years later

150 years ago industry in Scotland evolved quickly to be dominated by heavy industrial occupations including coal mining and shipbuilding. This continued right up to about 60 years ago and there are still the remnants of the Clyde Shipbuilders to be seen even today

But for the last 50-year period the changes have been dramatic in our communities and the moves have been towards service industries, finance and transport. It is estimated today that 1 in 4 jobs in Scotland is in the Public Sector

Where will the jobs be in the next 50 years? Creative industries, service industries, hospitality, catering, social care, the environment sector?

In the UK a total of 72,000 18-24 year olds had been unemployed for 24 or more months in the 3 months to June this year. This figure is up 41.9% year on year and up 11% on the previous quarter.

A further 184,000 young people were out of work for a year or more in the 3 months to June

Total unemployment in the 3 months to June 2010 fell by 49,000 to 2.46m but the numbers claiming Jobseekers Allowance in July decreased by just 3,800 –which was far lower than the experts predicted of 17,000.

Long-term unemployment across all age groups also rose by 33,000 to 796,000 –the highest since 1997

The report singled out the UK as having one of the highest youth inactivity rates in Europe with the numbers of young people who would like to find work but who have ‘given up hope’ reaching 23.7% compared with 12.3% in Spain and 8.8% in Germany

‘Dare we hope? We dare.

Can we hope? We can.

Should we hope? We must.

We must, because to do otherwise is to waste the most precious of gifts, given so freely by God to all of us. So when we do die, it will be with hope and it will be easy and our hearts will not be broken.’

Andy Ripley, 10 June 2007, Athlone Friary

I attended a wonderful Mozart’s Requiem concert in the ancient church of St Leger in Cognac in early May this year. I was enthralled and uplifted by the wonderful music, as were the 400 in the audience and the 200 performers. We were all amazed at the intricacy of the Requiem and the beauty of the composition.

Later I discovered that Mozart did not complete the Requiem – in one of life’s supreme ironies, death took the unfinished work from his hand. There are a variety of versions, which claim to be authentic to Mozart’s style and vision of the work, and the chorus music is slightly different in each. Süssmayr did the bulk of the work, but compared to the genius of Mozart he was unfortunately a composer of limited technique.

The movements Mozart did compose have all of the voice parts and the orchestral bass line fully scored.

So once again Death was victorious and the life of the genius proved to be futile in the face of such a power?

At the same time as I was listening to the performance, in the South of England a very brave woman faced Death too –her life coming to its end prematurely like Mozarts. I had visited her the week before and had recognised the futility of all we humans can hope to do with our short lives – we can care, be successful, love, marry, have children, develop ourselves and so on. If we were to pick up a newspaper or watch television or overhear conversations on the train would we know of the struggles with death, which surrounds everyday life for some people? We might never realise the importance of the simple aspiration of dying well.

Instead I suppose it is easier to try and forget –it is the human way. The media knows what is important don’t they? ‘England wins the World Cup in Cricket’. ‘Greatest Tory/Lib/Dem Coalition in 70 years’. ‘Pound slumps to new low’. ‘Crisis on the world Stock Markets’.’ Sue Bo and the latest X Factor stars.’

Ann like Andy Ripley the England International Rugby star had a different approach –they lived well and choose to die well.

Andy Ripley wrote ‘Dying from cancer isn’t losing - it’s just dying from cancer. We all have to die of something at some time’

We can focus on the good things but at a time like this one is compelled to ask ‘what is the point??”

The Earth has been around for more than 4.6 billion years and recognisable humans for a mere 200,000 years –some would say that this is more like 15,000 years! But what is important is, that it isn’t a long time in the great scheme of things in our world.

So what can we do about it? As the man said, who thought about it long before me –there are only 2 things, which are sure in this life ‘death and taxes’

I have learned that it is important for us to Live well –doing what we can to the best of our ability, caring for others, making it easier for others and ourselves, enjoying what we have each day, loving, being happy. And then to be aware that we will inevitably be required to Die well too – planning, making it easier for others who are left behind, preparing ourselves for the journey which no one as yet has returned to tell us what to expect, leaving our little mark on the life we had and..…..

The question put to Andy Ripley is one so many who find themselves facing death are asked ‘What is the meaning of life?’

Paul Kimmage who, in one of the finest interviews ever written on this subject, explains to Andy ‘You asked me who I admired most in the world and I told you. And then you asked me if I had told that person and when I said no you said ‘You should tell him’, and I went home and wrote to him’

‘And what did he say?’ Andy asks

‘He didn’t say anything’. Paul replies ‘He didn’t need to.’

‘Yes, sometimes words are unnecessary. It’s called love, isn’t it?’

There are many like Ann, Amadeus and Andy who know about love and how much they are loved.

The problem with Job Centres in the country today is that they have moved too far away from the people in our communities and from the original concept on which they were founded. This was the concept of ‘labour exchange’ and this name was above the doors of all offices in the UK for decades and signified the real purpose of such centres –the exchange of labour for payment and working conditions between the employees and the employers.

We have sadly lost this ‘exchange’ and the organisation today merely lists Jobs Available and lists Out of Work People available for work.

There is no training available, no matching of employees with employers and a very restrictive 7% only of the workforce who are available for work being referred from Job Centres. Most people move between jobs or move from school, College and University into employment - it is the 7% of those registered that are referred from Job Centres

Employability is for all people looking for purpose, a career or a job and it so happens that 90% and more of us are always in employment and have the same issues with the level of personal employability skills we possess as do those who are not in employment. Those who are in employment have been more lucky or have used their employability skills better or have been in the right place at the right time or have known someone who has helped them into their current job or they have fewer barriers to securing full time work – which are just some of the arguments for the lack of understanding between those in work and those without work.

So what do my centres for jobs currently deliver in 2 major centres in Scotland?

In Edinburgh we operate an ‘employability’ Academy and in East Kilbride an ‘employability’ EK Works centre which are both located in retail premises in busy shopping centres. See our web site www.employmententerprise.co.uk for more details.

These centres are open to all –all ages from 16 years to whatever age. They are open 6 days a week. They have expert staff on hand for advice and support.

We offer

- guidance and support in finding work

- employability modular training

- introductions to employers

- jobs specific training in areas such as retail, care, hospitality, construction

- short courses

- links to College courses

- support from specialist agencies such as Drugs rehab or alcohol advice

- links to local authority economic development programmes

- contacts with local agencies such as the Shaw Trust, YMCA, Healthy Working Lives, Apex etc

The clients who register are entitled to attend up to 3 days or 15 hours each week (this permits those who are registered for Job Seekers Allowance officially to attend without attracting any penalties)

They are assessed using the Bridges to Employability Soft Skills Assessment Framework and divided into 3 categories for an individualised personal development strategy by our experienced staff

A – Job ready or nearly job ready

B – Needing employability upskilling or Practical Skills training such as Retail, Construction, Hospitality, Catering

C – Intensive support, specialist agencies, employability training, community support

None of our clients will go near an employer unless they are ‘job ready’ which ensures that employers are keen to participate in a relationship with the Academy/EK Works

Each year we see over 1500 people going through the Academy in Edinburgh and EK Works will see nearly 2000 clients. In Edinburgh over 400 clients are placed into full time jobs and in East Kilbride the target is 500. We deliver the employability module to over 2500 participants.

And the costs?

To deliver a programme like the Academy described above will cost in the region of £200,000 each year in each location and this funding comes mostly from a partnership between the local Council, the local College, the management of the shopping centre and contributions from other training agencies. The unit cost per job is under £500 and the added value from training progressions to College courses, part time work, voluntary work and full time training is a bonus for the projects.

The client group breaks down very evenly into all age groups, gender, employed/unemployed, skilled/non-skilled, local/national/EU citizens and the outcomes follow the same evenly spread pattern.

Employability is for all and all can use employability training.

In the next few years I see great opportunities for all parties involved

-Savings in Central government spending by ‘outsourcing’ employability to the Private Sector

- Transfer of funding dependency for Employability Centres from local government to private sector employers. Employers spend around £5000-£8000 to recruit 1 new employee –this figure based on advertising, recruitment staffing, interviewing and induction.

What if employers contribute instead of public sector bodies to the running of the Employability Centres?

- Delivery of short upskilling programmes where necessary

- Partnership agreements to enhance the provision (we are now working with YMCA Glasgow who work with Asylum seekers and Refugees)

- Greater employer involvement in recruitment and training from local communities

Employability centres have to be at the heart of our communities with benefits for all – people, employers and community.

Cognitive acceleration or the ability to think or higher order thinking skills is a strategy based on the philosophy of Jean Piaget, a Swiss psychologist, whose methods were first adopted in the UK in the 1960’s. Higher-order thinking skills include the ability to analyse and make connections, to reason, solve problems and think creatively. Now, more than any other time it is the combination of these skills which will promote self-determination, self motivation, self advocacy and lead to Enterprise and Innovation in all that the individual wishes for their future life.

In more recent times these theories have not figured in our Teacher Training curriculum or in Further or Higher Education or in our community programmes.
Maybe these will be used and should be used more?

Piaget identified two periods of rapid brain development that need to be utilised if people are to attain higher-order thinking skills.
The first ‘critical window’ occurs when a child is at the age of 5, when children are able to understand such concepts as ratio and time sequence.
The second, commences around the age of 11 years and continues to be perfected until the age of 15, taking children from the concrete to the abstract.

The bad news is that unless you take advantage of Piaget’s critical windows, your ability to engage in higher-order thinking is irretrievably lost.
After the age of 19, the agility of your intellect goes into inexorable decline.

So, the most important thing to do is to train the mind to process information and tackle concepts while it can. You can continue to acquire knowledge, but unless you have developed higher-order thinking skills, it will not be able to apply it as effectively.

What do we do to enhance our clients and students progress in these areas?

There are number of stages which we can address:
- Introduce the higher-order thinking skills as early as possible in our programmes such as those for School Leavers, Modern Apprentices, those with multi-barriers to employability and Job Seekers
- Learning to Learn must feature prominently in all introductory sessions
- Motivational programmes such as the Pacific Institute programmes, PX2 and Steps enforce the concepts of higher-order thinking
- Use of the Bridges to Employability Soft Skills Assessment Framework can facilitate the embedding of higher-order thinking and promote the use with employers, clients and tutors

Once the client has recognised the importance of higher-order thinking skills we witness accelerated progress in all areas of their life, from career progression to personal development.

For more than 20 years I have heard people discuss the enhancement of communications for their contracts by using new technology, multi-media and film - why has this never really been achieved?
• Because of the price of making and distributing film?
• Because of the lack of expertise in these techniques?
• Because it is too difficult?

We have been using film with all our programmes both for clients and for funders in a variety of ways for a number of years now. Film is a major tool for use with clients in Community and Economic Development and what is important here is the ability to secure a production company who can understand the processes, the clients and the range of what we deliver in employability.

We have developed a relationship with Enterprise Screen Productions, a sister company (www.enterprisescreen.co.uk), which is working very well and is giving us considerable options and benefits for our clients and funders .

Examples of this include:
CVs on film – a short 30 second working life stories for people who find it difficult to tell their work history on paper. This is a tool which can be sent to employers as a file attachment or by as a single line link.
Case Studies - we can follow the progress of our clients and actually see the ‘distance travelled’ in their programmes.
Promotional Films – for our company, on-line clips showing a variety of our courses and projects.
Dissemination - of good practice, current progress, shared experiences and role models.
Presentations – to use at presentations with Powerpoint at conferences or seminars.
On Line – we have examples of all our work with clients, staff, partners and funders on short films on our web site.

Visual examples and case studies are the way forward to record, excite and stimulate the wider audiences for our programmes.

Why do we always look to new techniques and ideas when the tried and tested ones have worked so well in the past?

Isn’t it time we concentrated on a ‘back to basics’ approach and set employment and enterprise at the heart of all our education strategies? How we learn, basic skills and employability coupled with respect for all technical training can lead to a society where ‘I’m just a….’ no longer prevails.
Colleges are now all academic institutions and promote Higher National Certificates and Diplomas with an emphasis on articulation with Universities instead of the valuable Technical Colleges of the past. Why?

The following are quotes from a paper bag, which I received from a bakers shop called La Mie Caline in Cognac when I purchased some bread there recently.
La Mie Caline roughly translates as the Honey Bun in Scotland – we may recognise the same kind of shop here as Greggs the Baker but without many of the assets of its French equivalent!!! I noticed that not only are the staff in all French businesses and shops proud of their position as a worker, but also the management recognise their achievements and role in the company – therefore the statements below about their staff are provided for information for their customers, pride in their staff and testimony to their achievements.

Victoria: I have worked for La Mie Caline in Normandy for 6 years. With my qualifications CAP-BEP in Sales and Customer relations, I am returning to being in Sales. At 26 years old, I am responsible for a team of 3 people in Sales.

Damien: I have always wanted to work in business. I like the action and the contact. I started as a sales person at 18 years old in a Mie Caline in Poitou-Charente. I am 25 years old now and I am responsible for a Mie Caline in a town of 15,000 people.

Florence: I am 35 years old and I am dedicated to the work of bakery products. I have worked for 5 years at the Mie Caline in the Midi-Pyrenees region in the post of preparation. Having succeeded, I am now part of a dedicated and motivated team

Employability is all about the 4 stages – the skills required to Access, Achieve, Sustain and Progress in employment – and, in addition to these, I believe that we need to add Respect.

• It is respect for one’s own aspirations and success.
• It is a respect won from application, motivation and dedication.
• It is respect from the management, staff and customers with whom we work.

Scotland has a greater number of young people who are not in employment, education and training which was referred to as the Not in Employment Education or Training or NEET group. This has changed now with the drive for ‘political correctness’ to become defined as the More Choices More Chances group. But by changing the name it has not been enough to stop the drift of increased numbers of young people languishing in Scottish communities with no opportunities of finding work and little chance of this improving over the next 5 years.

This figure has risen from 12% of the numbers not finding any progression from schools and, in some areas, can reach almost 50% of school leavers.

In one area where we work the resulting action from the local authority was to close the school and move the children to other schools. The costs calculated to taxpayers for supporting these young people, including benefits and their failure to contribute taxes is £3.5 billion pounds

Of the 60,000 young people leaving school, around 30% went on to University and 25% on to Further Education Colleges – 25% found work.

The problem facing our young people today is one which centres on the definition of employability. Education has moved so far away from this central requirement that it no longer considers or plans for the progression from a school environment to a work environment. Work experience and employability skills are given low priority and funding mechanisms do the same by concentrating only on qualification achievement statistics.

What use are league tables when the qualifications gained cannot be utilised with employers and in the community? Academic progressions are of course important but not of general use for a large proportion of those who are leaving school.

CBI surveys have repeatedly found that employers are dissatisfied with the level of skills among young people. In 2008, 40% of those questioned said they were unhappy with the literacy and numeracy skills of school leavers - 17% had been forced to provide remedial help for school leavers.

This is perhaps hardly surprising when you consider that only 25% of young people leave school to go into jobs when they are 16. They are likely to be among the lowest achievers. More than half of 18-year-olds go on to higher education these days, so even those who leave school to enter the workforce at 18 are likely to be among the lower achievers.

In 2008, 40% of 16 year olds failed to pass their maths qualifications and 37% failed to get English. Even by the time they have reached 19, around 25% of young people have still failed to get five good passes of any sort.

Isn’t it time to concentrate on some of the basic ingredients, which will give our young people the chances they deserve, and to strengthen our communities accordingly?
Priority has to be given to the 50% of all young people leaving school to help improve basic skills, achieve qualifications and progress into technical careers with respect for these as fundamental roles within our communities.

As we move deeper into the digital age there may be related issues, which will cause us to be separated from the key factors which keep our mind and body together.

After all it was only 600 years ago that Gutenberg invented the printing press and accessible knowledge to a wider population. (Gutenberg invented the printing press in 1439 – 570 years ago) The native North Americans believed that photographs taken of them captured their souls. And in the last century, the father of nuclear fission, Albert Einstein asked what was the use of remembering his own telephone number when he could look it up in the phone book.

We learn by Memorising, Understanding and Doing – a combination of these key learning styles. But information to be learned has its pitfalls and today around 33% of under 30 year olds don’t need to retain information when they can ‘Google’ it. Information about themselves is readily available on Facebook, on Friends Reunited or Twitter for their friends or whoever gains access.
Are they separating and fragmenting their valuable ‘self’ information and leaving it disintegrated on scores of web sites to be undervalued by others? Are they forgetting how to learn about themselves and why?

The Organisation guru David Allen is known for his insight in proposing that we get stuff out of our heads, which will lead to mental calmness. Everyday stress results from the mind trying to forget everything which is worrying it. So he suggests you keep your to-dos in a ‘trusted system’, which can be a notebook, a computer file, a list, etc. and you will gradually relax.

The dancer Twyla Tharp offers one elegant idea in her book The Creative Habit where she says ‘I start every dance with a box. I write the project name on the box and as the piece progresses I fill it up with every item that went into making the dance…. The box makes me feel organised, that I have my act together even when I don’t know where I’m going yet…Most important though, the box means I never have to worry about that, because I know where to find it. It’s all in the box’

With us at work we try to copy what I learned from Stuart Cosgrove of Channel Four Television and BBC Scotland Sports broadcasting fame – his company always had 3 levels of work-in-progress files on his desk. Now for us there are the Green files, which are ready to go; the Amber files, which are on hold but ready to be progressed to Green; and Red files, which for the moment are at stop.

The Renaissance revived the ‘method of loci’ or Ars memoriae, the art of memory. Its roots lie in ancient Greece, although much of what is known about it comes via the Renaissance from Roman sources. At its simplest, the art of memory was a technique to assist a person to remember long tracts before printing was invented e.g. officials, politicians, messengers. The technique required the individual to visualise a building, particularly the rooms within it, with which they were familiar. In each room they ‘placed’ or pictured mentally, articles that prompted an associated idea or image. The object selected as they entered each room would often be striking in some way, again to strengthen the image – grotesque, crude, rude, brutal, colourful as best suited the subject. To remember the text, the person would mentally enter the building and ‘walk’ through the rooms on a predetermined route.

The success of the technique owes much to the fact that the human mind is not always logical in the way it processes information and, in order to understand how it worked, it may be useful to divide memory into two types; natural and artificial. Natural memory is untrained and almost unconscious whereas artificial memory is trained to have had thoughts, ideas and facts more forcefully ordered within it.

Where is this technique today? Is it used in learning? Does it have an application in the digital age?

We teach the key principles of encouraging ambition and expectation for all our students. We look for progression in self-development towards self-fulfilment and self-actualisation. The search for happiness is based around the individual’s determination for achievement of Self Purpose.

The Philosophers of the Renaissance in their attempts to achieve ‘oneness’ with the divine spirit or self, harnessed the art of memory.

So in the key learning styles it is not enough to do and understand. I think there is a place still for memorising and not just tables and chemical symbols.