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Welcoming young people with open arms
David Garcia, Chair of the British Cleaning Council (BCC), implores young job hunters to pick the cleaning sector for a great future.
With both A-Level and GCSE results due to be published in August, this is a time of year when many young people will be considering their next steps into education,
training or work. Many of those who have left school, college and university this summer will still be trying to get their foot onto the first rung of the career ladder.
All around the UK, young people are writing to prospective employers, sending in their CVs and applying for jobs, with their eyes set on embarking on a chosen career. Unfortunately, it is tougher than it has been for many years for young people to get their first start.
There are more than one million young people currently not in education, employment or training (NEET) and the situation has been labelled as a nationwide crisis, and with good reason. The jobs young people would once have relied upon to get a foot on the ladder are disappearing.
For young people struggling to find that first job, my message is simple: come to work in the cleaning and hygiene industry. We need you.
The cleaning sector still struggles with recruitment and that’s set to get worse as the workforce ages, so we welcome young applicants with open arms. We have a lot to offer ambitious young people.
The cleaning, hygiene and waste industry is one of the largest industries in the UK, worth £72bn and employing 1.51m people, and there are endless career opportunities.
You don’t always need formal qualifications to get started. Many roles can be entered at frontline level, with training available while working, so no experience is needed, only a positive attitude, reliability, willingness to learn and pride in doing a job well.
The industry can offer rapid career progression – for example, from frontline roles to supervisory and management – and there are job opportunities in varied roles and across many sectors. Someone starting as a cleaning operative could move into team leadership, supervision, contract management, health and safety, training, specialist cleaning, pest management, facilities management, sales, marketing, customer service,
24 | TOMORROW'S CLEANING operations or business ownership.
Young people can create a flexible career that fits around their lifestyle – such as working part-time during college or while caring for family. You can even start and grow your own cleaning business. The industry offers recruits the scope to develop the skills, qualifications and industry credentials to increase their earning potential.
Helping attract young people to the sector was always part of the thinking behind the UK Cleaning Career Development Zone. Now we have developed that further by launching two new UK CCDZ social media channels, on Instagram and Facebook, specifically to tell young people what cleaning sector careers could offer them.
Of course, the announcement that the Level 2 Cleaning Hygiene Operative apprenticeship is being defunded at the end of the month hampers our drive to recruit more new staff, but nevertheless the cleaning and hygiene sector is doing a huge amount to engage with young people.
Both the Cleaning & Hygiene Suppliers Association (CHSA) and the Worshipful Company of Environmental Cleaners (WCEC) offer bursaries to support young people going to university, while the Cleaning & Support Services Association (CSSA) actively engages young people through its Clean Start initiative, which tours UK schools to showcase modern career paths in sector.
Our colleagues at the British Institute of Cleaning Science (BICSc) have also focused on this area, through initiatives such as the Cleaning Industry Careers Guide, which it launched on the Youth Employment UK website.
We hope young people heed our message that the cleaning industry is a fantastic place to launch your career.
www.britishcleaningcouncil.org x.com/TomoCleaning
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