Involving the users of guidance services in policy development

1
Involving the users of guidance services in
policy development

• Vivienne Brown
• Head of Policy and Strategy
• Careers Scotland
• Cedefop,Thessaloniki
• 19-20 November 2007

2
Careers Scotland is an all-age career guidance
and development service
Our role is to enable our key clients to be fully
motivated, informed and empowered to succeed and
progress in todays dynamic labour market

• over 1150 staff, 35 centres, website, telephone
  call-centre
• work from 450 schools, 40 further education
  colleges, countless partners premises
• 200,000 callers annually to our centres
• over 80,000 new registrants annually to our
  website
• 120,000 school pupils annually of whom 50,000 are
  leavers

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Focus on

• schoolleavers
• 16-19 unemployed
• adults in transition
• universal career guidance and development
  services for all clients
• targeted services for those who need help most
  for example
• Key Worker support and case management
• range of employability programmes
• career education and enterprise activities
• labour market information
• exam results helpline
• jobs fairs

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Policy and Strategy terms

• strengthen strategic alliances and partnership
  working between key national organisations and
  with local agencies
• drive to shape policy development for career
  guidance services with Scottish Government in a
  cross-cabinet style
• articulate the unique contribution of career
  guidance within social, economic and educational
  policy goals
• achieve step change and higher profile through
  infrastructural developments and making
  connections in key policies and resultant projects

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Involving clients in policy development and
service delivery

• Embracing the personalisation agenda need to
  acknowledge

• the client voice is key to shaping a new
  vision and key to future organisational success
• that with something so personal as career
  decisions, clients should not be asked to fit
  into frameworks of service provision, but be
  empowered to ask for services to meet their needs
  
• that personalisation is a powerful solution to
  organisational dilemmas, large and small

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How can we establish a customer voice using
research?

• Careers Scotland needs more money? Impact
  measurement research
• give consumers the right to buy services
  directly? Individual Learning Accounts
• establish a Citizens Committee? care words
  research on website
• more tailored, personalised services where we are
  organised to deliver better solutions for those
  who use our services?
• professional efficacy
• using social networks to improve confidence and a
  positive self-image

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How can we establish a customer voice through
increased personalisation and participation?
Actions from research

• more customer friendly interfaces and language
  website, call centre, physical layout in centres
  and staff development to ascertain and respond to
  client career guidance needs
• a differentiated service to enable clients to
  have more opportunity to say how much they want
  to do for themselves in terms of career
  planning and job-search
• an approach to career guidance which places the
  individual at the heart and is in control of the
  career consultation pace and outcomes

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• a Key Worker service to empower those who need
  advocacy and support to articulate their on-going
  needs and re-negotiate their progress from our
  interventions
• a case management service for all young
  unemployed to ensure their needs are jointly
  monitored at a key transition into work, learning
  or training opportunities
• development of clients networks to ensure third
  party interventions are sound and jointly
  consistently delivered no one organisation can
  achieve this working independently
• providing choices to voice aspirations and be
  encouraged in self-confidence and self-image
• increased participation of the client releases
  the solution through a personalised approach

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Effects on policy and higher organisational
issues bringing the personal and societal
policy agendas together
Research Outcomes-

• improving outcomes measured in personal terms
  and in terms of social economic and policy goal
  terms
• balancing client needs and equity of provision
  within resources management how would the
  organisation self-manage if we started with the
  needs of thousands of users?
• more joined up services education, training,
  access to opportunities new Skills Agency in
  Scotland, placing the individual career guidance
  needs at the heart

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Bringing our approach to personalisation to the
next stage

• analysing different customer journeys
• innovation through new approaches so joinedup
  activity takes place differently for clients
• providing different opportunities for clients not
  to fulfil their given roles through our
  existing frameworks
• changes in new Curriculum for Excellence in
  Scotland also provides an important innovation,
  accessing vocational as well as academic learning
  and a new focus on pupil competencies, pace of
  learning and learning style
• BUT still a joint production of policy
  producers and consumers

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Careers Scotland approach to personalisation

• incremental more than radical but with a vision
• focus on unlocking potential both of the
  individual and of our own organisation
• seeking more adaptive solutions, better provision
  of the basics, reliable and timely services in
  short doing what we are supposed to do - better

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And the future?

• giving clients more choice, more informed about
  what they could get and ample opportunities to
  choose between service support options
• empowering clients to be able to choose their
  service level and support
• further research to establish an on-going
  methodology
• creating a more articulate client group will
  change the supply to a more demandled model of
  participation in learning and training, will
  change culture and stimulate communities and the
  economy