FLIPCHART NOTES FROM TSEF 8TH MAY 2012

HOW ACHIEVE MAXIMUM IMPACT

Pilot projects?

Tried, tested as to what delivered. Innovation around how? Involve smaller orgs

Programme (bid) that adds to or extends work already being done.

How is challenge fund going to target most disadvantaged

Look at length of time to implement + achieve + deadline for bid.

Maybe more small projects specifically targeting, groups/areas

Wage subsidy. Incentives to employers. Transport costs basic adaptations not covered by access to work

Cpp

Involvement early

Target some of fund to specific age group that are excluded from other progs (18-24)

Not to push young people into outcomes they can’t sustain

Geographical parity. Urban . Some areas have a lot of funding already

Employability pipelines

Ccp involvement early

Mentoring

Managing transitions

More employer contact

Minimum, maximum bid

£150,000 min?¼mil tops

Existing interventions

Major piece of work to identify existing interventions, in some areas

Q + a

1 how do we achieve maximum impact?

  • Recognising early part of intervention
  • Understanding is needed of world of work
  • What happens with those who may not move into work
  • Working with 15½ yr olds – pre school leavers – in school staged process
  • In school
  • Sharing of info
  • Support for drop outs from apprenticeships
  • More links with sds
  • 6 months job exp/work placements to develop skills linked with curriculum excellence provided by this group
  • Not prescriptive/flexible
  • Smart – targets achievable
  • Payment – wages ?
  • Upskilling employers of needs of support
  • Joined up approach/shaking of employer opportunities
  • Job brokerage + split other parts of funds – fjf model – include mainstream employers

2 ensure best fit?

  • Partnership working – supply chain, functionally split
  • Can’t ignore any other welfare 2 work programmes linked + not duplicated (staged/transition)
  • Fit with skills & exp of org bidding taking into acct
  • Pilot projects for those orgs without delivery exp. With innovative idea – already pilots transition over

*{broader range of outcomes

{at end of 8 months another service picks up – positive destination

3 how can mgt of fund support ambitions

  • Guidance of financial parameters
  • Simplified admin/bid process & compliance
  • Monitoring/measure of 3rd sector included – fairness
  • Rural vs. urban viability of bid – smaller 3rd sector employers
  • Matching services – online process of eventsurban/rural
  • Measure of quality, diversity & variety of funders – how engage with consortia – (support to do so)
  • Recognising transition to being a good citizen us a positive outcome
  • Tie in with all orgs who will provide service to 16-24 yr olds to ensure sustainment into positive outcome – captive before going back into unemployment
  • Evaluation

How can the management of the fund support these ambitions

  • Make it easy for employers to get support
  • Use as a pilot project – a chance to try out innovative ideas?
  • Pilot would allow lessons to be learned from different geography
  • Interest-based service?
  • Split the post? Employed/3rd sector support/training for yp
  • Consortium – use existing ones set up too time consuming
  • Make it happen quicker. Give us longer than 6 months. Applications in end of june? Fast turn over
  • An element of sustainable funding

How do we endure we fit with employability pipelines + existing interventions

  • Identifying gaps in existing pipelines

Edin- employer engagement

-convictions (yp)

  • Greater recognition of progression through the pipeline
  • Don’t duplicate pipeline add value to it through 3rd sector fund

How do we achieve maximum impact

  • Timescale - issue handling through sds – enough time for contracting?

-6 months = SUSTAINABLE?

Incentives?Employer grant?

  • Where are the jobs coming from business dev structure?

Build capacity?Work with EMPLOYERS

  • Do we need to support the private sector

Funds to support young people entering the private sector?

More cohesive structure modern apprenticeships

  • Barrier free …… 1 point of contact
  • Eu young people
  • Are we including the most vulnerable or targeting the most vulnerable. Costs in relation to stages in the employability pipeline
  • Additionally for marketing?

1how do we achieve maximum impact?

Should funding go directly to employers as wage subsidy?

Agerange open up to 16-30

What differentiates this fund from others? – supported employment through social enterprises rather than private sector

Issues around accessibility – use electronic/social media services – addresses some issues around rural locations

Time scales – will employers be put off if they need to find funding when subsidy stops?

What have previous programmes delivered? – look at lessons learned

Should fund go to cpp’s to add to pipeline – issue would be around involvement of third sector organisations

2

Amount of funding – is it better to add money to other port rather than creating new funds

Can’t ignore private sector

By local authority area

Splitof fundsectors with skills gaps

Urban v rural

Growth sectors – green agenda

Consulting young people

Stage one application

Procurement process

Consortia approach

Depends on client group

Maximum no of people supported-jobs ready

-close to labour market

-disadvantaged

Need to have wraparound services – ongoing employability support

Targets need to be set around achieving sustainable jobs after “fund” jobs

How do we overcome entrenched worklessness?

Potential impact of work programme

Should focus be on earlier intervention rather than job stage?

Keep numbers smaller to maximise impacts

Allocation based on identified need – evidence base?

Consider targeting specific client groups to MAXIMISE impact eg care leavers, non-mainstream education leavers, disability

Use fund to support clients moving from community jobs, but not into “sustainable” employment?

3 fit with employability pipeline & existing INTERVENTIONS

Consortia approach

Client group

Targeted

Green agenda/growth sectors

Strategic bids – encourage specialist organisations

Keep things simple

  • Ignore employability pipelines!!

4 managing the fund to support ambitions

Make it simple

Quick turnaround for decision-making

Concerns about sds procurement process

“steering group” to work with sds to assess bid

Short term nature of fund – after decision making only left with a few months activity

Social enterprise focus

Streamlined application process

Target sml organisations – already working consortia – not feasible in timescale.

Proven track record for achieving outcomes.

Overall targets – outcomes

Pipeline

Timescales

All different

Strategic issue

Project based approach informs future.

“action research”

Using interface – vol action

Change the way sg engage with vol sector.

Recognise expertise in vol sector

Go direct to on the ground org’s

Impact

  • Inventive for employers
  • Employment grant
  • Links with employers – (key) – (commercial employer gap) – long process
  • Invest time – tailor to needs
  • Where does it sit? – speak to one another
  • Local partners working together. Payment benefit young person
  • Support continue in employment
  • Target specific – to meet timescales (6 mts) (min+max) ties in £50k? £100k?
  • Different strands
  • Fund that’s accessible to existing programmes sg/sds role

Why is it always the case that spend & delivery in tight timescales?

What is the ask?

Extend past 31/3

Partnership – informal

Sustainability to smlr org’s

Management/central costs allowed

Deliver grant funded or contract?

Understand differences in org’s costs

Higher investment

High targets

No qualifying period

Is there a ‘danger’ of targeted geographics s.i.m.d.??

2.5m = £25.00 per head – what is the min & mas if this is the case??

Has to be organisations that are ready to deliver without logistic problems

Scoring of bids should be previous impact

Has to fit with what is already there but adding value

Smaller performing organisations can be given the opportunity to add value through this fund

Scoring has to demonstrate local knowledge in relation to working with local employers

Question 2

Is there a crossover with the work programme?

After care should be written to bid (if a carry forward is allowed)

Local focus should be a strength

Consortia bid is not possible unless existing delivery partners are awarded which may exclude rural & smaller urban unemployment hot spots

Maximum bid £250k (for consortia?) - £60k (small org). Minimum/maximum

Must complement or fit with eg esf does not duplicate but adds value

Should this fund be used for wage subsidies? Would this cause displacement?

It is important to define soft outcomes (eg people can be job ready but not ready for work)

What proportion of the allocation will be focused on the most disadvantaged?

Pipeline is important for progression (demonstrate)

– or anything that can be matched (inc volunteering) to the pipeline should be included 

- do we only consider (the most disadvantaged)

Sds need to consider best example case studies for future

Short turn around and minimum intervention for successful contracts

Is the payment on outcome – no!!

It must support small business cash flow including social enterprise

Question 3

Light touch management

Proportional to timescales & funding

Application process needs to be short, quick – not bogged down for short time scales & small amounts

Scoring panel should include other organisations (real) local knowledge present in panel.

Set parameters in bid documentation, to ensure manageable number of bids

Key points

Local projects, local access, local knowledge

B of t outcomes p5 esp hardest to reach

Demonstrate

Existing performance

Eligibility of organisations to participate in c. Fund

Use cf to EMPLOY the young person lts/se create value & impact – transferrable skills

Extend cjs to 19-24 – innovative ideas

Research

Create sustainable project

Outcome payments – who gets?

Work programme?

Third sector/social enterprise?

Look at existing programmes and layer on

6 months not a long time

Impact difficult

Flexibility in year 2013/2014 for funding

Min & max timescales

Engage with cpp’s – mechanisms in place

Rural areas might not have cpp difficult for small orgs

Strategic bid

Fit in with youth employment strategy

Encourage consortium

No scope for innovation

Challenge fund poorly thought out

Eligibility of client group

Link in and support young disadvantaged people on work prog who may not be getting a good service

Link into grfw, cjs , etc

*maximum impact (outcomes) v most vulnerable

Varied outcomes? What are the impacts?

Interventions are already varied in extent

Better/greater connectivity ~ use as a measure

Set weightings for outcomes ~ establish at outset

  • Need to know benchmark/criteria we are aiming for

How to define “impact” or political, preventative, spend, economic impact

Need that definition please ~ and WEIGHTED appropriately

Potential to broker relationships with primes ie tpw

Links to employers ~ relevant to outcomes?

Picture is currently very complex

Formula for cf needs to be fit for purpose

  • Assessment panel? Need for representation from 3rd sector
  • Will help with initial screening for likely over-subscription
  • March funding ?(not as criteria) – seed corn funding?
  • No of bids from each organisation should be clear

Management of the fund

Minimum bid more effective? Esp if smaller orgs willing to partner up ~ although time frame will make this difficult

Would work best where there is an existing partnership

Size of fund adds to difficulty

Maximum bid

Local ~ £50k, national(ish) ~ 4 x £50k

Need to allow bids which can demonstrate “national” scale

Proper definition of “social enterprise” & “specialist third sector”

Community interest co’s

Co-operatives

Measurement of “sustaining” ~ another opportunity to link into pipeline

Payments ~ likely to be in arrears, outcomes based

Employability pipeline

National bid will fit with some pipelines & not others look at local bids specific to la pipelines? Bids to require la support? Avoid right of veto for cpp’s

  • Should be able to demonstrate dialogue with la

Incentives to get young people (care leavers/ex-offenders) lead to high wage subsidies ie the short-term & less focus on long-term outcomes

Can this wrap-around activity agreements?

  • Differences ie development in la’s could be problematic
  • Another opportunity for connectivity ~ fund used to fill these gaps
  • 7 month window too short? Less likely to produce job outcomes?

3rd sector needs to be careful not to set themselves up for a fall ~ ie doing too much for too little, ending up under resourced.

Be careful what you wish for

Cpps work differently all over scotland

If relationship with cpp breaks down?

Inconsistency of audits by cpp & esf

False sense of security or the opposite

Dependant on quality of interface

Benefit of cash flow by being part of cpp ~ as dictated by scottish gov

Clarification on what a cpp is for purpose of bids

Esf may be used to substitute core funding or shore up core funding gaps causing issues ie funding march cunding. Co-commissioning?

Target the funding ie a move focussed way ~ winners & losers

Clie is in the name “partnership” ~ can translate as just a group of bide in isolation

How hard can it be (ie a scotland-sized country) to have a generic, definitively uniform system

Path of least resistance leads to willingness to take a financial hit rather than suffer administrative doom

Driven by process ~ no consideration to customer compliance issues run counter to objectives of many projects

How do we spent the money

What good can we do with the money

Separate 3rd s. Pot??

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