Diversity through skills development

To access training opportunities and succeed in a recruitment process, young people need to demonstrate skills employers look for. Skills like, communication, team working and resilience. Some young people have less opportunity to develop these skills than others, because of where they live, which school they go to and other factors outside of their control. It is important that ICAEW and the profession support these students in developing the skills they need to succeed, not only in their career but also in life.

RISE

A pilot across 12 schools in the UK from lower income areas and social mobility cold spots was run between Jan - March 2020. Face-to-face transferable skills sessions were delivered by RISE volunteers across multiple organisations under a united brand for multiple year groups. The pilot organisations included: ICAEW, EY, PwC, KPMG, BDO, GT and Deloitte. Post pilot, the programme will be opened up to all organisations, as this is fundamental to the future success of the programme. Next steps are to be agreed in light of Coronavirus.

Types of sessions

1.            Commercial awareness
2.            Employability skills
3.            Personal finance/financial capability
4.            Innovation and enterprise
5.            Presentation skills
6.            Readiness for work
7.            Personal brand

LTSB

Leadership Through Sport & Business (LTSB) is a social mobility charity that prepares bright young people from disadvantaged backgrounds for meaningful roles with major firms. ICAEW has worked with LTSB to offer a business game session for students on their programme. We also encourage their centres to register and take part in the BASE competition.