Empowering Future Leaders

Our partnership with Skills Builder to recognise essential skill development through leadership.

At the start of April, we were excited to announce our new Skills Model, which underpins all our awards, qualifications and learning programmes, providing a visual explanation of the way our leadership programmes help young people to develop essential skills for life.

Alongside the launch of our new Skills Model, we were also extremely pleased to announce that we have joined the Skills Builder Partnership, aligning our programmes more closely with the Universal Framework for essential skill development.

Working with Skills Builder in this way is a huge development for us and our programmes as it recognises the essential skills developed by our learners in a wider, more relevant context for employers and educationalists. The Universal Framework, which all members of the Skills Builder Partnership align to, is globally recognised across a wide spectrum of industries, including sport, arts and technologies.

This ensures that young people completing our programmes receive the maximum recognition for their essential skill development, giving the universal understanding of the essential skills being developed and their level of attainment.

Preparing young people for the world of the future

As an organisation, one of our founding aims is to help more young people feel confident and prepared for the challenges that face them in the future through the development of essential skills through leadership opportunities.

But in a world where change seems to be happening at an increasingly rapid rate, it is more challenging than ever to ensure that today’s learners have the confidence to recognise and apply the essential skills they need to be successful in tomorrow’s workplace.  We wanted to use our Skills Model to enable learners to communicate their essential skill development with confidence to help them progress.

But in a world where change seems to be happening at an increasingly rapid rate, it is more challenging than ever to ensure that today’s learners have the confidence to recognise and apply the essential skills they need to be successful in tomorrow’s workplace.  We wanted to use our Skills Model to enable learners to communicate their essential skill development with confidence to help them progress.

According to the 2025 future of jobs report from the World Economic Forum (WEF), technological changes, geoeconomic fragmentation and climate-change mitigation are among the most significant factors affecting young people in the future, so we need to work collaboratively across the education sector to ensure our learners build the essential skills required to be prepared for the challenges ahead.

In particular, the rise of artificial intelligence (AI) looks set to shake up the workplace, with 86 per cent of employers expecting it to transform their business by 2030 (which, shockingly, is only five years away!). This will have a transformative effect on the fastest-growing and fastest-declining job roles, making essential skills, such as teamwork and communication, more important than ever to differentiate job seekers in a competitive job market.

Rapid change on the horizon means a need for greater adaptability

Looking more closely to home, since coming to power last year, the government here in the UK has been working on a full curriculum and assessment review, leading to an interim report published in March. Among the review’s four areas, one is focused on ensuring the curriculum is fit for the future.

The interim report supports the WEF report: “rapid social, environmental and technological change necessitates that the curriculum keep pace; including a renewed focus on digital and media literacy, and a greater focus on sustainability and climate science”. In addition, the government indicate that their polling suggests young people want a greater focus on the essential skills that will equip them for later life and work.

So, while the curriculum will likely continue to be ‘knowledge-rich’ in its overall make-up, we can expect to see a greater focus on the development of essential skills and their application through real-life work experience and volunteering, something the government committed to during the election campaign.

By partnering with Skills Builder and aligning with the Universal Framework, we’re adding extra credibility and relatability to the essential skills our learners develop, making it even easier for them to demonstrate their abilities to future employers or within higher education applications.

The skills outlined in our Skills Model – leadership, speaking, problem solving, creativity, adapting, planning, listening and teamwork – are all highly transferrable and are needed for just about any job or workplace. We believe they play a fundamental role in helping young people to be confident, curious and brave, behaviours that in turn help them acquire more technical or discreet skills and abilities as they progress through education and employment.

Aligning our programmes to the Universal Framework for skill development

From 2025-26 onwards, learners completing our qualifications will be able to see which skills are being developed through their learning programmes with us and the level to which they are being developed. We will be achieving this by including a visual guide within their Learner Evidence Record (LER), providing an easy-to-digest demonstration of their progress.

LERs have long been a valuable tool for young people to demonstrate their progress when reflecting on their work or applying for jobs and higher education. The ability to align this progress with the Universal Framework adds clarity and depth, making it an even more powerful resource as they begin their journey into further education or employment.

As with all our partnerships, we’re incredibly excited to be working closely with Skills Builder. Working collaboratively with organisations in our sector allows us all to have a stronger, more unified voice, which serves to amplify our message of the importance of skill development.

Perhaps more importantly though, it provides us with the platform to elevate the way our learners are perceived and the way their skill development is recognised. We know that young people work incredibly hard to build the essential skills they need to shape the world around them, so it makes us extremely proud to be able to reward them accordingly and keep helping them on their way to feeling empowered and ready for the future.