Assess developments in public policy which are affecting work, employment: CIPD Level 7 Strategic People Management Assignment, UK

Question 6
AC 2.2 Assess developments in public policy which are affecting work, employment, and people management in organizations.

In recent years governments have raised the ‘education leaving age’ and have brought in incentives to encourage employers to invest more money in training and development. Assess the purpose of these strategies and evaluate how successful they have been. Justify your answer.

Pointers for students:
This question asks you to assess the purpose of these strategies and evaluate government policy in relation to education leaving age and skills development. You could briefly explain the reasoning behind such initiatives in the UK with a discussion of the Leitch Report (2006) ‘Prosperity for all in the Global Economy: World class skills’ and the subsequent government targets to improve skills to remain competitive in the global arena with the rise of the BRICS countries i.e, Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa. You could also talk about the Conservative government ‘Levelling Up’ agenda and /or the Skills for Jobs white paper (2021).

If you live or work outside the UK then please choose government initiatives from your own country to assess and evaluate. You must discuss education leaving age being raised to 18 in the UK and the reasons behind the decision (or school leaving age in a country of your choice). You may want to talk about the policy in relation to reduction of NEETs (young people not in education or training), the need to have a more highly skilled workforce, reduction of young people on benefits etc. Provide evidence from a range of sources to evaluate how successful the purpose of this initiative has been.

Evaluate the effectiveness of one other initiative such as, but not limited to:
1. Apprenticeships- apprenticeship levy.
2. T Levels- government initiative to try and match industry technical job roles with teaching and meaningful work experience.
3. Traineeships- a form of pre- apprenticeships
4. Vocational technical qualifications
5. Lifetime skills guarantee- adults can train for a full Level 3 qualification in a range of sectors.
Choose initiatives that may be applicable to your own organisational context. Find academic opinion, organisational examples and data to analyse how successful the initiative has been.

Possible disadvantages/ challenges:
 Lack of opportunities for meaningful work experience for young people
 Is the quality of education and training as good as it could be in terms of outcomes? Lack of good teaching in some areas: severe teacher shortages and lack of investment in the further education sector in subjects such as Health and Social Care, technology, engineering etc.
 Onerous admin for organisations taking up apprenticeships – e.g., Off the job training time for apprentices. Particularly difficult for SMEs.
 Narrow scope of apprenticeships.
 Apprentices not completing their apprenticeship just their main qualification.
 Only full level 3 qualifications included in the lifetime skills guarantee. Time it takes to gain a full level 3 for adults- average time is 2 years. Fitting this around current employment.
 Different learning methods, formal education delivered in the classroom versus less formal on-the-job
 The impact of the economy crisis on organisations investing in training versus students leaving education with high debts.

What suggestions could you make for improvement? What would help your organisation?