EXHIBITING WITH OR SPONSORING SKILLS LONDON
Welcoming thousands of visitors from across the capital, Skills London is the UK’s largest jobs and careers event for 14 – 24 year-olds. It’s a fantastic chance for organisations to showcase employment opportunities, accessing a diverse audience and developing a stronger talent pipeline.
BY BEING PART OF THE EVENT, YOUR ORGANISATION WILL:
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Meet a truly diverse group of young people at the event, with inclusivity sitting at the core of Skills London.
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Engage teachers, parents, and carers.
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Create interactive learning experiences at your stand.
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Recruit candidates from every corner of London, widening your talent pools.
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Build relationships with schools, colleges, stakeholders, and other exhibitors.
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Support London’s young people in tandem with meeting your CSR objectives.
With 94% of exhibitors agreeing that Skills London is a great opportunity to meet with their target audience in London and 91% of exhibitors saying that the event met their overall expectations, have a conversation with us about getting involved in Skills London 2023.
SPONSORING SKILLS LONDON
Our tailored sponsorship packages will position your organisation alongside the UK’s largest jobs and careers event; with marketing activity resulting in over 90k website visitors, more than 3 million social impressions and 17 million impressions from our advertising campaign.
Skills London is a free event supported by the Mayor of London, helping level the playing field for young people from all backgrounds across the capital. Sponsoring the event gives you the chance to highlight the opportunities your organisation can offer to thousands of young people from across all London boroughs and surrounding counties.
Contact Jen Delderfield to find out more by emailing jen.delderfield@optimus-education.com or calling 01823 219 112.
NEW BUSINESSLDN SURVEY FINDS YOUNG LONDONERS ARE HOPEFUL ABOUT JOB PROSPECTS
Despite a challenging economic outlook and a cost-of-living crisis, young Londoners are relatively upbeat about their future career prospects. That’s according to a new survey published ahead of A‑Level results’ day, by the capital’s leading business campaign group, BusinessLDN.
Fresh polling shows that almost two-thirds (63%) of London’s 16 – 18-year-olds are feeling relatively optimistic about their future career prospects compared to just 8% who feel negative and 29% who feel unsure. Over 500 16 – 18-year-olds who live in London and are in education took part in the survey, carried out between 15 – 19th June 2023. Healthcare and medicine (15%) are the most popular career path for respondents, followed by finance (14%) and law (13%). In contrast, a far smaller proportion want to pursue a career in a trade (1%), hospitality, professional services such as management consultants, or as an influencer (all 3%).
Obtaining in-person placements were difficult post-pandemic but the survey also shows just over half (57%) of London’s 16 – 18-year-olds have undertaken work experience in the last two years, 30% didn’t do any work experience, and 13% were unsuccessful in obtaining any. Of those who secured work experience, 61% agree it has positively affected their ability to choose a future career path compared to 15% who disagree.
BusinessLDN, which runs Skills London, the UK’s biggest jobs and careers fair, is calling for urgent action to ensure young Londoners are equipped with the skills they need to succeed. This includes creating a one stop shop careers advice service, reforming the apprenticeship levy and encouraging more businesses to offer work experience placements. It comes weeks after it set out a slew of recommendations to tackle skills shortages, address inequality and boost labour market inclusion in London as part of its leadership of The London Local Skills Improvement Plan (LSIP), with the capital’s other leading business groups.
Muniya Barua, Deputy Chief Executive at BusinessLDN, said: “It’s good news that young Londoners are feeling upbeat about their prospects but more needs to be done to ensure the skills system supports their ambitions and to equip them for the jobs of tomorrow. The Government should reform the Apprenticeship Levy to boost take up and devolve more powers and funds to the Mayor so he can create a London-wide careers service to provide high quality advice to jobseekers. Young people clearly value the role of work experience when it comes to helping them make choices about their future careers and we encourage firms to ensure they offer placements and jobs fairs like Skills London to give young Londoners a taste of the workplace and help them develop critical skills.”
The survey also found that more than three-fifths (61%) listed strong communication and writing among the top three skills they felt necessary to achieve their dream jobs. Soft skills (39%), such as good interview skills, and digital skills (37%) were both included in their top three career skills by over a third of those surveyed.
Don’t miss your chance to to engage the next generation, build relationships and recruit candidates at Skills London 2023.