1. SUPPORTING EMPLOYABILITY: A CO-ORDINATED APPROACH TO EMPLOYER ENGAGEMENT THE BROADER LANDSCAPE Alan McGregor, 16 June 2010

2. DEVELOPING SCOTLAND’S ECONOMY 1.The Government Economic Strategy calls for acceleration of Scotland’s growth rate relative to other economies and regions within UK 2.2 key drivers are: Employment Productivity 3.In simple terms: We need more jobs We need more people, able to fill jobs We need to increase effectiveness of people in workplace

3. WHERE WE NEED TO DO BETTER 1.Relative to our population, we do not have sufficient businesses, and our business birth rate is low 2.We have relatively high employment rate but Too many young people not in education, employment or training Too many working age adults on IB or ESA 3.We have relatively high numbers with good qualification levels, but our productivity levels do not reflect this

4. WE ARE ON THE CASE 1.Work in schools through Determined to Succeed Enterprising young people with core skills for 21 st Century labour market 2.Work to support and progress young people in MCMC group Tackling issues and raising employability 3.Work through local employability partnerships to help adult jobless into sustainable employment Tackling issues and raising employability

5. EMPLOYER ENGAGEMENT IS A KEY PROCESS 1.In all of these policy areas, effective employer engagement is central to our efforts 2.We need employers to engage with our schools: To pass on intelligence about today’s labour market To provide varied and good quality work experience opportunities 3.We need employers to engage with young people in the MCMC group and jobless adults: To provide training opportunities To provide jobs and support for sustainability and progression in these jobs 4.We need employers to act as ambassadors and champions to help get other employers on board

6. IMPROVING EMPLOYER EXPERIENCE 1.We badly need support of employers in our work – and so we need to treat them as key customers or partners 2.We need to give them a good experience when they engage with us – but employer feedback on their experience is mixed at best: Too many agencies knocking on our door wanting apparently the same thing Lack of clarity around exactly how they want us to help Lack of consistency in what we are told about the support on offer 3.We need to do better in all of these areas

7. MAKING MOST OF OUR RESOURCES 1.Agendas we are all working to are key to Scotland’s economic future 2. Making progress against these agendas is difficult at this time Economy and labour market depressed with low growth for some time as most likely scenario Major cuts in public spending certain over a number of years 3. Current economic situation means that: Employers will find it harder to offer jobs, work experience and training opportunities our clients need Our resources for engaging with employers will almost certainly be reduced 4.We can do better on employer engagement, by identifying and exploiting win-win situations Simplify things for employers Secure maximum levels of employer engagement from our resources Generate as many varied and good quality employer-based opportunities for our clients as we can

8. MAKING MOST OF OUR RESOURCES (CONT) 5.One way to do this is through a more co-ordinated and integrated approach to employer engagement across the policy areas represented here today 6.We have talked a lot about employer engagement over a number of years Now is the time to implement a more effective and coordinated approach across Scotland We must do this We can do this – and today we will up the momentum