Enterprise for all…

Enterprise for all…

This morning I have been engrossed in reading Lord Young’s report “Enterprise for all”. This comes off the back of being fortunate enough to be invited to join Julie Holland (Director of the Glendonbrook Centre for Enterprise in Loughborough), Professor Angus Laing (Dean of Loughborough School of Business and Economics) and Stuart Miller (Entrepreneur in residence of Glendonbrook centre for enterprise – although I am not sure if he was their in that capacity or in another of his many roles) for the Small Business Charter awards  in which Loughborough received a Silver award.

Professor Angus Laing At 10 Downing Street collecting a silver accreditation for the Small Business Charter Awards
At Downing Street for the Small Business Charter Awards

So back to Lord Young’s report. The report carries 10 core recommendations that look at how we can create captive, continuous and coherent enterprise education. Here they are:

1) The publication of a Future Employment and Earnings Record after leaving education – Allowing potential university and college students to make more informed decisions about courses they should study. It’s an interesting proposal, I think it is extremely valuable to know more about university degree programmes potential for future earning whilst I also recognise that money is not the only factor that should and/or is considered. Although I do recognise that from my point of view, as someone who didn’t want to come to uni and was nudged by parents, it wouldn’t have been a factor. For me, Universities need to continue to develop outreach programmes using engaging students and recent grads to entice and invigorate college students that university is the right option. Further, I would echo the thoughts of Dave Jarman (Enterprise Educator) in the essence of although in principle it is a great idea it is so important not to rush/ hash the implementation (That only takes a small element of the blog – would recommend a read on some of the other thoughts) without looking at the current market. In summary this whole sector of entrepreneurship and data collection is so busy and to be honest it just feels at times that everyone is falling over everyone else in terms of help, support and surveys which is certainly a better situation than no one talking about it but lets be lean and utilise technology to make it better!

2) Developing an Enterprise passport – Essentially a digital approved record of activities outside of curriculum undertaken by students (Crudely speaking essentially LinkedIn projects with recommendations for young people) This is a concept I really like, although I recognise it would be difficult I would be fascinated to learn more about Young Enterprises thoughts on how they see it being implemented as one of the developers of the idea. I also love the data potential for this, if you could collect meaningful information (i.e. not just someone saying they have been involved in something without really engaging) it would allow potential for employers to decide between candidates but also provide potential businesses a route into understanding customers interests better… (I imagine this will make many squirm around the concept of more data being available, especially for young people, but we need to just get over it … sorry potential rant on not understanding social media … another blog post I feel) I do wonder whether platforms like LinkedIn will move into the younger generations, as a feeder for their main platform and with the opportunity to link to employers (in particular recruiters) already on the platform, with a slightly altered offering that can capture the information and verification in an innovative manner that government cannot compete with.

My challenge as a recent graduate with a genuine interest and passion in the sector is how do I stay involved…

I will tackle the next recommendations and my thoughts in follow on blogs on the particular topic areas of enterprise in school, further education and in higher education… 


Log out of this account

Leave a Reply