Engaging with Young People
Organisation: Bedfordshire Luton and Milton Keynes ICB & Health and Care Partnership
Location: Bedfordshire, Luton & Milton Keynes
Populations served: 1 million residents
Working to reach pockets of our local residents who we may not otherwise engage successfully with we linked in, via Luton Council, with the Reach Society to participate in their Luton Employability Day. The Reach Society is a social enterprise which encourages, motivates and inspires young people, especially Black boys and Black young men to realise their potential and make viable transitions into adult life.
In addition to promoting our Health and Care Academy to the young people present, a stand was also hosted both to promote non-clinical/patient facing roles within the Integrated Care System and to seek the views of the young people about their future careers and their job seeking activities to help plan future engagement activities.
Impact of the programme
BLMK People Plan theme of promoting health and social care careers to local residents.
Links to ‘live well’ aspiration to support growth and prosperity in BLMK via increased employment as a local anchor institution
Supports workforce planning and population health management linked to projected growth in the health and care needs of BLMK residents
Desire to promote careers to young people as they begin to consider their optionsNeed to think differently about how to reach some sectors of our BLMK population who may not engage with our usual communication channels
The intended impact was twofold: to highlight non-clinical roles to local, young residents and their families and to gain local intelligence of the views of those young residents about working in health and social care and their job seeking activities.
Previous virtual careers events delivered to adult residents had highlighted lack of awareness of the wide range of roles available in health and social care and limited knowledge of where to look for live vacancies in BLMK; this activity planned to explore this further with a subset of our younger residents.
How the programme was delivered
A range of non-clinical staff hosted a stand at the Employability Day and talked to the young people present and their families; around 150-200 people attended the event. In addition, they conducted face to face e-questionnaires on iPads with a subset of young people (n=37), to gather information on their understanding of health and social care roles, whether they had considered them, what might stop them and where they looked for careers advice and job vacancies. The high-level themes were:
Interest working in Health and Care (H&C)
Opportunities across increasing capabilities and opportunities and especially motivating young people to consider H&C careers
Explore mentoring/coaching and paid opportunities
Explore further interventions to improve wellbeing and quality of life
Interest in Luton Youth Healthwatch
Considerations where opportunities / jobs are advertised to attract young people
What is the future of this programme?
The data has been shared at an All Staff Briefing for the ICB to highlight the current views of a small subset of young people the area. Staff have expressed interest in supporting future events to promote careers. The data from the questionnaires also revealed some interesting insights into where young people looked for vacancies (not usually NHS jobs!) which can support how vacancies can be promoted in the future. It also revealed that some young people didn’t feel they would get the right grades, this shows the importance of promoting the wide range of entry routes in health and care careers.
Advice for others doing similar work
Don’t assume that things you know are obvious to others (i.e. where NHS jobs are advertised)
Go out and speak to residents/young people and get their ‘take’ on careers and job searching to help tailor your offer to meet their needs
Remember the whole family; by talking to young people, you have the opportunity to also promote health and care careers to their family members.
This piece of work was a joint effort between the BLMK Workforce Development Academy, the Bedfordshire Health and Care Academy, the AD of Sustainability and Growth, one local authority partner (Luton Council), a local Pastor from Luton and The Reach Society; partnership working can help open more doors for organisations to better reach their local residents.
For more information about the programme, contact Catherine Jackson at Catherine.jackson20@nhs.net