Decision time! What needs to be in place to support young people to make good career choices Tristram Hooley

Our research https://www.careersandenterprise.co.uk/research

What we are going to cover Making career decisions Good career guidance

What we are going to cover Making career decisions Good career guidance

cognitive burden cultural framing

Young people talk… (1) "I decided I wanted to [work in childcare] because I’ve always been told how great I am with my little sister and brother… people always tell me I want to be a nursery worker. I’ve just got into it, I want to be it." Ellie, Year 9 What do you think about this decision? What would you say/do?

Young people talk… (2) "This year’s been a lot about options, and what I’m going to take next year. It has had a massive impact because you’ve got to sit there and think, ‘What am I going to take?’ It’s made a massive impact because it makes you think, ‘This is what I want to do when I’m older’." Steve, Year 9 What do you think about this decision? What would you say/do?

Young people talk…(3) "After [school], after college, university, I would like to take on the career of becoming a dentist, it’s something I’ve always wanted to do, it’s the only career choice I’ve ever wanted to do.” Jacob, 15 What do you think about this decision? What would you say/do?

Type 1 and type 2 thinking Which is the right approach for making career decisions?

Rational decision making

Think about when to use this Behavioural models Feed this system 2+2=? 4 System 1 – ‘going with your gut’ Fast, intuitive, powerful decision making 24X14=? 336 System 2 – ‘thinking it through’ Slow, clunky decision making for dealing with unusual problems Think about when to use this

Dealing with ‘choice overload’ Increasing engagement ‘Moments of inspiration’ Provide opportunities for career learning Experience counts Reducing cognitive load Less is more Improve navigation Enhance personalisation Provide support

Information should… Work with young people’s intuition Encourage reflection and challenge assumptions Be trustworthy. Be personalised to the individual Give young people agency Break down big decisions into smaller ones Be ‘just in time’ Helps influencers (teachers, parents or carers, careers advisers) Signpost actions

In summary Young people find career decision making difficult. But there is lots that we can do to help them. Information is important… but it is only part of the picture.

What we are going to cover Making career decisions Good career guidance

History 2014 – The Gatsby Foundation publish the good career guidance report – The 8 Benchmarks are proposed. The benchmarks become popular with policy makers and schools 2016 - CEC in collaboration with Gatsby develop COMPASS the career benchmarking tool 2017 – State of the Nation report uses the first year of Compass data for the most thorough understanding of careers and enterprise provision in schools to date 2017 – A rebooted compass tool is launched (more on this The Gatsby benchmarks became popular and schools were informally auditing their provision. We created the compass tool for them.

Good career guidance Summarises existing evidence and frames them as eight benchmarks. Presents it in a way that can be understood by policy makers and acted on by school leaders. Has achieved wide support amongst policy actors and practitioners alike. The influential 2014 report

The Benchmarks – a quick recap 1. A stable careers programme 2. Learning from career and labour market information 3. Addressing the needs of each pupil 4. Linking curriculum learning and careers 5. Encounters with employers and employees 6. Experiences of workplaces 7. Encounters with further and higher education 8. Personal guidance The important thing to remember is that each of these contains specific things tat schools must do to achieve. They are not abstract. For example; does your school have a careers plan on it’s website, and does it take into consideration feedback from parents, students, employers, teachers in the evaluation of its careers plan. Shout out to benchmarks 5 and 6 – The Careers & Enterprise Company is trying to increase the number of employer interactions as research shows that 4 or more encounters reduces NEETs and is associated with earnings premia.

State of the Nation 2017 Based on responses from 578 secondary schools gathered through the Compass self-assessment tool in 2016/2017. http://compass-careers.org.uk/ IThe scope of the data is broadly comparable with data collected as part of the original Gatsby Good Career Guidance research in 2014 allowing us to see how provision has changed over time. https://www.careersandenterprise.co.uk/

Number of benchmarks met by schools

Achieved and partially achieved

Change since 2014

What matters? No relationship between the characteristics of the school or the labour market in which it is situated and the number of Benchmarks. There is a relationship between the number of Benchmarks achieved and the region in which the school is located. There is a relationship between schools’ performance against the Benchmarks and whether they have a sixth form. There is a relationship between getting a higher Ofsted grade and meeting more indicators that make up the Benchmarks. There is a relationship between schools which hold the Quality in Careers Standard and those which meet more Benchmarks and sub-Benchmarks.

5 ways to get your school moving in the right direction Start early (e.g. year 7). Engage all stakeholders, including parents and employers. Update your website with information about your careers programme. Join the Enterprise Adviser Network. Complete Compass every year.

5 substantial initiatives to improve your programme Develop careers content in all subjects, not just PSHE. Take advantage of labour market resources and make them available to all students and their parents. Provide ALL students with information on ALL routes. Provide experiences of workplaces for all students. Adapt existing systems to track destinations and careers and enterprise activities.

My contacts Email thooley@careersandenterprise.co.uk Twitter @pigironjoe Blog https://adventuresincareerdevelopment.wordpress.com/

References Department for Education. (2016). Graduate outcomes: longitudinal education outcomes (LEO) data. Available from https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/graduate-outcomes-longitudinal-education-outcomes-leo-data [Accessed 8th April 2017]. Gatsby Charitable Foundation. (2014). Good Career Guidance. London: Gatsby Charitable Foundation. Kahneman, D. (2011). Thinking, Fast and Slow. London: Penguin. The Behavioural Insights Team. (2016). Moments of Choice. London: The Behavioural Insights Team. The Careers & Enterprise Company. (2016). Moments of Choice. London: The Careers & Enterprise Company. The Careers & Enterprise Company. (2016). Response to Moments of Choice. London: The Careers & Enterprise Company. The Careers & Enterprise Company. (2017). State of the Nation 2017. London: The Careers & Enterprise Company.