Research and analysis

Part 4 of 4: Legacy and conclusion

Published 17 March 2022

Next steps for projects

All projects planned to continue delivering returner support beyond the funding from GEO. 6 projects had either secured or were applying for funding to continue supporting returners into work.

This included employer-funded programmes, for example:

• Creative Equals secured funding from participating employers and subsequently launched 2 further Creative Comeback projects, and were planning a third, targeting 100 women across London, New York and Mumbai
• Women Returners were working with 4 employers to run their own returnship programmes – one of whom has since developed their own returner programme and won “The Most Innovative HR” award at the 2021 People in Law Awards

In addition, 3 projects were applying to local authorities, Trusts or charitable funds, and 2 projects were planning to run its smaller scale bootcamp intervention as part of their mainstream National Careers Service contract.

3 projects were launching new training offers based on their experiences of delivering the funded projects. These included training that targeted unemployed people, people who were unemployed due to COVID-19, and career changers. Projects were adapting their delivery model to reach a wider potential client group, in addition to returners.

2 of the projects were adapting their core services to include aspects of practice learned through the Fund. For example, one project hosted cafes to bring returners together informally on a regular basis. They planned to create themed cafe events for all of their clients who were looking to get back into work, including returners. Another project introduced one-to-one guidance sessions for all their clients as part of their mainstream work.

2 projects were using learning about going digital and applying this to their core service delivery to enable them to offer support in a less resource-intensive format to all their clients.

3 projects said that their relationships with employers had improved and that they would like to include them in other parts of their service provision (for example helping with financial advice, or advocating for their work).

Main lessons

4 projects stressed the usefulness of the lessons learned from the Fund and outlined how this would influence their staff more generally. For example, one project said it had raised awareness of the needs of a different client group that was relevant to all their staff. Another was sharing their experiences with similar organisations in their sector.

8 of the 16 projects produced materials to be used beyond the project lifetime. 6 of them produced materials for employers, 3 produced materials for employment service providers and 2 for returners.

Toolkits and guidance materials were made available to participating employers to give them the tools and knowledge to recruit and retain returners. Private sector projects did not publish these guides but the 2 produced by the social sector partners were made available online. One project was maintaining and managing its portal, which was being used as a resource to support both returners and employers.

2 projects provided materials for returners following project delivery. One launched a Support Agency Directory for returners. This contained information on welfare, housing, financial and mental health support, plus other employment service organisations across their city. The other planned to maintain the returner resources developed online and continue the project’s LinkedIn group.

Projects developed training resources for their own organisations during or following the Fund. One national organisation developed a training session about recruiting parents and offering flexible working, and planned to share it with colleagues across other regions.

9 projects produced a range of returner, mentor and employer case studies that described their circumstances and feedback on the project.

Conclusions

Delivery of expected outcomes

The logic model, developed at the inception of the Fund, set out a range of expectations which included the following.

10 to 18 projects would be funded. In practice 16 projects were supported and successfully completed.

These projects would recruit a number of returners and employers. In total, the 16 projects recruited at least 70% of their target number of returners, with 10 projects meeting or exceeding their target. Performance was better on employer engagement and the projects engaged 114% of their target number of employers.

Returners would receive a range of support to make them more employable and more able to apply for jobs. A wide range of support was offered across the projects and participating returners provided positive feedback about their experiences.

Returners would be able to access a range of work experience opportunities, including volunteering and placements, and in time re-enter employment. Both of these happened but at a lower level than expected. 156 returners completed work experience and 179 returners were reported as entering employment (the latter being 38% of the anticipated target number entering employment).

Employers would be engaged to provide insight to returners about how best to present themselves to potential employers. This was met with mixed success with some very good examples in some projects but others struggling to secure practical input from employers.

Employers would be offered business advice about their recruitment practices which would lead to employers altering their recruitment practices to make jobs more accessible to returners. This generally was not completed by projects, as employers that were engaged already had flexible working practices in place.

The projects were either complete or coming to an end when the lockdown restrictions associated with the COVID-19 pandemic were put in place in March 2020. Delivery for 9 projects was affected by COVID-19 and 5 agreed a time extension with GEO to enable them to complete their support for returners. Returner recruitment was mostly unaffected by the pandemic and by March 2020, projects had already engaged employers that were actively supporting their projects (for example, through mentoring or training) and consequently this activity was also largely unaffected. However, 3 projects had to pause or scale back returner recruitment and targets associated with completion of training, work experience, and entry to employment were also harder to achieve following the first lockdown period in 2020.

Research questions

An important objective of the Fund was to identify and develop an understanding of the barriers and enablers for both returners and employers. The Fund aimed to test approaches to supporting returners back into work. The lessons learned about project delivery and outcomes, together with wider evidence gathered, provided an opportunity to revisit the main questions regarding the design and delivery of interventions, and to consider the successes of the Fund.

Returner benefits

Projects were designed to provide personalised support that would give returners the skills, opportunities, and motivation to re-enter the labour market and find meaningful employment. The evidence from the evaluation about returner benefit is mixed.

The returners who participated in the evaluation were enthusiastic about their experiences. They appreciated the efforts and attentions of the project teams, they valued the support they received, they enjoyed meeting others like them and making new friendships, and they wanted to express thanks and gratitude for the opportunities that had been made available to them. There was clearly demand from returners for projects to help them to return to paid employment.

There was consistent evidence across the projects that returners needed skills support. This was most commonly around updating knowledge of the world of work and how to find and apply for jobs in the current day (recognising recruitment practices have changed significantly in the last few years).

Some returners also needed to update their transferable skills (for example, improving general digital skills or English language skills), others needed to develop their vocational skills and knowledge and obtain up-to-date qualifications, new skills, and identify new career opportunities.

Some returners’ circumstances changed within the lifetime of the project due to factors beyond their control, such as personal circumstances (for example, mental health) or family circumstances (for example, breakdown of childcare arrangements).

Future projects should recognise that returners need support for different durations. Returners with higher skills and who were focused on a return to work, benefited from a short intervention. However, longer interventions could be beneficial for those who have been out of work for some time, have qualifications below that of the Level 2 equivalent threshold^{[footnote 1]}, have no formal qualifications, or have not practiced in an employment context. The projects that were most successful in terms of helping returners to move towards and enter employment were those who supported returners with higher skill levels, who could afford childcare and who lived close to employment opportunities. For other returners, longer and more substantive interventions that work at the pace and capabilities of the returner are recommended.

The type of support returners need is also a factor, with returners benefitting most from vocational and employability skills support, as well as job search and application support. The importance of addressing issues such as mental wellbeing and financial capability either alongside, or before, employability support was emphasised by several projects.

While returners shared characteristics within the project cohort (for example, high or low skill), all projects said that individual assessment was desirable. Several projects that supported highly skilled returners found that they also faced barriers that included domestic abuse and poor mental health. Other projects reported cases of people who proved exceptionally resilient and employable despite their personal circumstances. Therefore, while projects can target particular groups, a personalised approach is still necessary to ensure that support is appropriate.

Finally, the nature of returners’ circumstances means that they were seeking jobs which would make the return to work worthwhile. Returners needed sufficient earnings to ensure additional costs such as childcare were covered (and earnings that compensate for a loss of benefits). Therefore, in identifying potential job roles, salary levels and working conditions are important, alongside knowledgeable support on the practical implications of taking on paid work for household budgets.

Employer benefits

Projects were designed to connect with employers and explore creative and cost-effective ways to address their skills needs. Employer engagement was more challenging to address through evaluation because although employers were engaged and promised support, their actual commitments were more limited (for many projects), as was their participation in evaluation.

Consequently, across the projects there was limited evidence of employers changing their practices. In some cases, this was because they had taken previous action, while in others there was little appetite for change. The latter seemed to reflect the range of routine business pressures that employers faced, which intensified due to COVID-19. Employers who did express interest responded positively if they had prompt communication from a project, knew another employer who was involved, were asked to take specific action, and were able to align their involvement with their company’s approach to corporate social responsibility.

One project focused specifically on engaging and supporting employers to create a group of ‘returner champions’. They found that with regular and specialist support via a group of HR recruiters, they were able to make many positive changes to how jobs were designed, advertised and recruited. This project recognised the challenges facing employers and the need for transparency about the time employers need to invest if they are serious about change. They also acknowledged the importance of senior leader involvement, tailoring interventions so that they suit complex organisations with differing needs within different departments, and linking to wider ambitions of culture change over time.

Employers were able to offer fewer job opportunities than projects had anticipated. There was little evidence of changed recruitment practices to create new roles, such as workforce profile reviews or the creation of flexible or part-time roles. Reasons for this include:

• employers’ recruitment needs were time-specific and often out of alignment with project delivery
• many employers recruited in small numbers either because they were small businesses, or because they were recruiting only to replace staff leaving, rather than expanding or restructuring their workforce
• employers were unwilling to offer roles without first understanding the nature of the candidates that might be interested, to ensure they were in control of any recruitment process
• only occasionally would larger employers have multiple vacancies and even then, this might be seasonal and time-dependent

There may be benefits to sectoral or occupation-focused returner programmes, which are carefully targeted. The limited evidence generated would suggest that they would work best where:

• there is a genuine skills shortage driven by a lack of candidates in the labour market (rather than a skills shortage arising from a lack of candidates, unattractive wages, or poor job conditions)
• there is strong buy-in from an influential large employer or employers at the start of the programme

Added value of intermediary

The Fund was promoted by the Employment Related Services Association (ERSA), which secured interest from organisations across a range of different sectors including commercial recruitment agencies, local authorities, and the social and voluntary sectors. A wide range of organisations were funded, suggesting that there is an infrastructure with capacity to undertake this work.

There is a clear rationale for intervention. The evaluation findings suggest that returners need support to find work and overcome barriers. However, 3 things were not clear from the Fund:

• whether projects should be designed to support both returners and to encourage employers to adapt their practices – there is no evidence from this evaluation that both these issues should be addressed by the same project at the same time
• how far the intermediaries need to be specialists in working with returners – it could be that a more generalist programme run by a larger welfare to work provider^{[footnote 2]} could be effective, but this was not tested
• how far the intermediaries needed to be specialists in working with employers – most projects connected with a small number of employers directly, or with a larger number through an employer-facing partner, and projects which are specialists in business support and run ‘by employers for employers’ might have improved outcomes but this was also not tested

Funded projects and their partners need to identify the added value they bring. Returners who participated in the projects welcomed and valued the support they received and were very happy with the project teams that they engaged with. They also said that the personalised and intensive support they received was not available to them anywhere else. However, it is not clear if the support required for returners is sufficiently different to that offered through more general employability programmes for other groups wishing to find employment (such as those who have been made redundant, or people leaving the armed forces).

It was clear that the interventions were resource intensive (by design). While they moved returners closer to the labour market and created opportunities that brought employers into contact with returners, some of the projects were expensive when assessed by the cost per job metric. It is not clear whether job outcomes would have been significantly different if projects had run for longer and had not finished in the middle of a national lockdown. Some projects did report that more returners entered employment beyond the lifetime of the Fund and therefore there would have been more returners reported as in employment had projects been given longer delivery timescales. At the same time, the projects not affected by COVID-19 did not generally perform better in terms of employment outcomes than those which were.

Next steps for supporting returners

The COVID-19 pandemic has affected how and where employees work, how employers manage and support their teams, and what employers need to do to sustain their business^{[footnote 3]}. When delivery of the Fund completed in September 2020, 1 in 6 people in the UK workforce were either furloughed or working fewer hours.^{[footnote 4]} Certain groups, including women and carers, have been disproportionately disadvantaged for a range of reasons. For example, women from ethnic minority groups were more likely to lose their jobs in shrinking sectors and occupations and less likely to gain jobs in growing ones.^{[footnote 5]} Structural disadvantages have been compounded by the effects of school closures and the need for home-based childcare and schooling. Recent research also points to evidence that the crisis has resulted in a dramatic increase of women’s unpaid care work burden.^{[footnote 6]} The immediate future for employers and returners, in a post-COVID-19 labour market, will therefore be challenging. It is important that any recovery efforts do not inadvertently disadvantage returners.

The Fund has generated important learning about returner support. It has shown that returners need and benefit from additional support to participate in the labour market. It has also shown how the needs and benefits vary among different groups of returners and at a personal level. Future labour market policy to support returners should consider the findings of this Fund evaluation, with future interventions designed to build on the learning in this report.

About SQW

Contact:

Jo Hutchinson
0161 475 2116
jhutchinson@sqw.co.uk

Approved by:

Graham Thom
Managing Director
Date: 31 March 2021

Disclaimer This report takes into account the particular instructions and requirements of our client. It is not intended for, and should not be relied upon by, any third party and no responsibility is undertaken to any third party. Whilst SQW has used reasonable care and skill throughout, it is unable to warrant either the accuracy or completeness of information supplied by the client or third parties, and it does not accept responsibility for any legal, commercial or other consequences that arise from its use.

1. GCSE grades less than 5 A* to C (or 9 to 4) would be considered below that of the Level 2 equivalent threshold. ↩

2. This approach may have offered efficiencies in terms of economies of scale but might also have created concerns about additionality. ↩

3. CIPD (2020) Impact of COVID-19 on working lives ↩

4. Institute for Employment Studies (2020) The impacts of the coronavirus crisis on the labour market ↩

5. Institute for Employment Studies (2020) (n 11) ↩

6. Power, K., (2020) The COVID-19 pandemic has increased the care burden of women and families ↩