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Chamber Chief Executive, Clive Memmott

Chamber Chief Executive, Clive Memmott, was a guest speaker at three major business events last week.

On Thursday evening (7 November) he was at the Lloyds Bank Big Picture event at the Imperial War Museum in Trafford Park.

The event, which was hosted by BBC Newsnight’s Gavin Esler, focused on what matters most to business and the steps businesses need to take to reach their next level of growth.

Clive’s fellow panellists were Matt Riley, Chief Executive of Daisy Communications, Professor Martin Hall, Vice Chancellor of Salford University and Chris Barrie, Editor of The Business Desk.

The topics selected by the audience for discussion were:

• Do UK companies have the confidence to support their plans?

• Are the right people coming through to support business growth?

• What funding is out there and how can businesses access it?

During the event audience members were surveyed for their views on the economic outlook. Click here to find out what they said.

The Big Picture event was one of 15 being held across the UK by Lloyds Bank as part of a national campaign.

On Friday morning (8 November) Clive was one of the guest speakers at the launch of the Winning Sales Academy in Manchester.

Later in the day he was a keynote speaker at the Career Development Institute’s first Annual Conference in Stratford-upon-Avon. Clive was asked to give a business perspective on the key issues facing the UK labour market today and the role the Career Development Sector has to play, with particular reference to the state of the careers education and guidance in Schools.

In his speech, Clive emphasised that the solution was not the sole responsibility of a single organisation and that it was down to the key players in the public and private sectors to work out a solution.

He explained that the recent Ofsted Report on careers guidance in school had found that only 12 out of the 60 schools inspected were providing students with enough information to consider a wide breadth of career possibilities. He added that amongst the recommendations of the report was a proposal that Local Enterprise Partnerships and Chambers of Commerce, work with schools and the National Careers Service to facilitate links with employers.

While welcoming improved links between employers and schools, he warned that this alone would not solve the problem.

He said: “Until we accept that schools cannot realistically be expected to deliver credible careers advice that reflects the breadth of what’s available, and we then provide a national or regional service in schools that integrally involves careers advice professionals and employers in a structured and quality assured manner, we won’t make the radical change that is required.”

“There is no doubt that some employers, not all, believe that many young people coming out of schools, colleges and universities are not adequately prepared for the world of work and lack the right attitude, personality, motivation and work life experience.

"How we can credibly criticise young people for a lack of employability skills and experience if we don’t provide them with any in the first place is beyond me.

“Recognising that the employer’s voice must become more influential in developing and delivering the skills that are required in the workplace is a pretty good starting point in trying to address some of these problems.”

Clive ended his speech by talking about the need to involve employers in the design and delivery of careers advice and training and the importance of providing relevant work experience.

“Employers must be willing to play an increasingly active role in the design and delivery of this work if it is to equip our young people with the insight, knowledge and motivation they need to make an informed career choice.

“However, we must be absolutely clear about what it is that we want our employers to do; make it easy for them to make this contribution; provide the training and development that will underpin this and make sure the whole process is quality assured. Ambitious, yes - risky, yes – but overwhelmingly necessary.”