Young People Are Experiencing Career Anxiety - How Can We Eliminate It?

Careers related stress is rife amongst young people. The Youth Voice Census 2021 has found that young people have little faith in employers, job opportunities, and related education.

There’s a common theme amongst the findings of the most recent Youth Voice Census – increasing mental health issues and decreasing confidence in services and opportunities. Young people are more disconnected from careers than ever, and perhaps most shocking is the lack of faith they seem to have in employers and education. To mark the beginning of Stress Awareness Month, we'll be pointing out the key findings we took from the Youth Voice Census, and discussing what employers and educators need to be doing to eliminate careers anxiety amongst the next generation of workers:

Young people need to believe that good opportunities are available to them.

Despite apprenticeships, traineeships and graduate schemes being made available to them, less than 10% of young people feel confident that they’ll be able to find quality work where they live. On top of this, only 25.9% think that employers are supportive of hiring young people - a figure that will be shocking to those particularly passionate about finding and nurturing young talent.

It's clear that young people have little trust in employers at the moment - with some expressing the desire to learn how to identify when an employer is untrustworthy, or underpaying and taking advantage, and others expressing frustration at employers "ghosting" applicants, and requiring unnecessary experience for entry level roles.

We can improve this though - schools, colleges and universities can work with employers and organisations to showcase different career routes, on-the-job training roles and opportunities. Not only do these employer encounters allow students to build a rapport with professionals, they also allow them to expand their networks.

We need to provide more opportunity for work experience.

One of the reoccurring reasons young people felt insecure in their career prospects was down to a 'lack of experience'. A common frustration was the feeling that there is a constant cycle of needing experience to get a job, but needing a job to get experience.

Early experience of the workplace is invaluable. Over 75% of young people 'agree' or 'strongly agree' that work experience would help them build useful skills - and yet only 37.5% of secondary school students had access to work experience.

This low figure is likely to have been made worse by the effects of the Covid-19 pandemic - something that leaves us room for growth! As we rebuild and adapt to life after lockdown, it's increasingly important for education establishments to work with employers to provide young people with experiences of the workplace and educate them on how to showcase these experiences when applying for a job.

Young people want to learn more about careers and skills.

Young people regularly expressed that they wanted more tailored careers advice from their school, and more learning about the life skills needed following education. Along with parents and guardians, they considered teachers the most responsible for supporting them in this, and one of the most useful sources of careers support - however only 34.7% rated their teachers as 'useful' or 'extremely useful' when it came to careers.

So how can we improve this figure? Firstly, by relating subjects and education to careers and the possible jobs they could lead to. Students wanted to be more aware of the distinct subjects that would benefit them more in specific careers - educating them on the current growth sectors and what qualifications are needed to get into these types of careers would be hugely beneficial.

It's also important that students hear directly from professionals, specifically in the growth sectors, about their own career experiences on both sides of the hiring process. Only 33% of those in school feel that they understand which skills are needed to get a job - meaning the vast majority are admittedly a little clueless. In fact, when asked about what employers could do to help young people develop their skills, the top answer was 'be clear on what skills are needed for jobs'.

There isn't enough access to careers advice.

Over half of those in secondary school or college didn't have access to a careers advisor in the last year - with access to careers support in universities also plummeting during the pandemic. When asked about what support they would've liked to have seen from their school, the top answer young people gave was "more careers advice".

It wasn't just students who missed out due to the impact of Covid-19 that wanted to see better careers education in schools though - with lots who had already left education expressing that they wish they'd received better careers advice and practical support such as CV writing and interview techniques.

Not only is access to a careers advisor important, so is ensuring young people feel that they are benefitting from the advice given - of those who did have access to careers advice in school, less than 30% rated the advice they received as "good" or "excellent".

Elevate EBP want to reconnect young people with their career prospects.

Working in partnership with employers and educators, we hope to reconnect young people with careers education, build their confidence, and ready them for life after education. Working with schools and colleges across the Liverpool City Region, we want to provide all students with the work experience placements and employer encounters they need to expand their network and develop their skills.

These young people are our future workforce - if you'd like to help us prepare them for their future careers, get in touch now. To read the full Youth Voice Census 2021 please click here .