SleepWalking To A Skills Disaster

It is usual, when views and opinions you have held and expressed for several years are validated by official reports and data, to feel a rather smug sense of satisfaction. However, nothing could have been further from my mind when I read the joint report from The Princes Trust and HSBC issued last week and confirming that UK employers believe a skills crisis is imminent. My underlying reaction was rather one of intense frustration that the symptoms of this crisis have been evident for the last decade and that as a nation, we have simply chosen to ignore them and hope that like a heavy cold, we could sniff and sneeze our way through it and eventually we would be fine again. Instead we now have a major epidemic on our hands which is seriously threatening the long-term prosperity of the country.

The Clock Is Ticking

My only disagreement with the 616 directors whose views were canvassed in the report, is on timing. The majority of respondents felt that the crisis would hit us within the next 2-5 years. I believe that it is with us now but leaving that aside, we clearly urgently need solutions and it is not, as some people would have us believe, a question of simply fine-tuning a well-oiled machine. If we are serious about upskilling our nation, then we have to take radical action. That is never easy but unless we can build a consensus around the need for such action, we will in my opinion, be simply sleepwalking towards a disaster.

Defining a problem is the relatively easy part, agreeing and implementing a strategy to tackle it, is a lot more difficult. So I will spend the rest of this article proposing solutions rather than restating the blindingly obvious.

An Eight Point Plan For Action

1. We need to take the politics out of this and gain a broad spectrum of support. If the TUC and the CBI can agree a strategy on Traineeships (see below), then that should not prove to be an insurmountable challenge.
   
   
2. We should make a full commitment to a world-class Apprenticeship programme. That means:
   
   # Implementing the proposed reforms as a matter of urgency and putting committed employers at the heart of the programme
   
   # Eliminating “dead-end” Apprenticeships and making Level 3 the standard qualification. We cannot address the skills crisis simply by training young people to the equivalent of GCSEs
   
   # Scrapping the demeaning Apprenticeship minimum wage. How can you expect commitment from a learner who is earning £2.68 per hour? No doubt this will be met with howls of protest from employers who like the idea of cheap labour and free training but if you can’t afford to pay your people a living wage, you shouldn’t be in business in the first place
   
   
3. Accept that this is an issue which impacts on people of all ages. Whilst there is a case to be made for limiting Apprenticeships to young people under the age of 25 who are seeking to develop new skills, we should recognise that the lives and job prospects of many older workers are blighted by a lack of basic numeracy, digital and communication skills. Perhaps we need to develop a new framework of qualifications designed specifically to meet the needs of older learners. We cannot focus all our resources on trying to solve the youth unemployment problem whilst millions of other workers are left out in the cold. We have “Traineeships” and “Apprenticeships”. Do we need another “ship” for mature workers?
   
   
4. Embrace new technologies and new thinking which can make learning fun. For whatever reason, many people whom we need to support, have had a difficult experience at school. We need to challenge their negative perceptions through the use of eLearning, social learning, gamification, badging and mobile learning platforms to prove that learning can not just be valuable, it can be cool.
   
   
5. Recognise and reward those companies who make a genuine commitment to the development of their people and who understand that training is an investment not a cost. Arguably, Investors in People has had its day. We need to develop a new Gold Standard, a marque which identifies those companies who have exceeded all expectations in this area.
   
   
6. Develop the Traineeship programme in the way in which it was originally intended - a first rung on the employment and career ladder. The CBI/TUC agreement is a great step forward. We now need to ensure that successful Trainees are offered an Apprenticeship and that work experience is meaningful and specific.
   
   
7. Fix the broken careers advice system. We cannot expect young people to develop the appropriate skills, if they are being left directionless by a lack of appropriate guidance.
   
   
8. Open up the funding system to new providers. Currently there are many excellent smaller private training providers who cannot directly access government funding and whose income is dependent on the whims of prime contractors or brokers, both of whom tend to charge ridiculous fees. The government should create a level playing field so that provision is driven by quality rather than the size of a funding pot.

Just as we have seen with Apprenticeship Reform, I would expect that all of these proposals will be met with an array of the usual objections – too expensive, too radical, won’t work here, not necessary etc etc. I don’t have a problem with that and a robust debate as long as those who object have alternative proposals. What we cannot do is simply maintain the status quo in the naïve belief that eventually, everything will be rosy again in the garden. The time for woolly compromises has long past. The system is broken and we need to fix it.

Roger Francis is a Director with Creative Learning Partners Ltd, a new vocational training company formed by the senior managers and staff of MindLeaders Learning Services following the acquisition of the company by Skillsoft in 2012 and focusing on the delivery of Functional Skills

Standalone Functional Skills programmes are fully funded by the UK Government and can therefore be delivered to employers without charge.

Please email roger.francis@clpartners.co.uk for further information.