The £1 trillion British tech sector is displaying its wares at London Tech Week. As President of The Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development (CIPD), I’m thrilled we’re gathering in the same week for our flagship Festival of Work. With my rare background having headed both the labour market and technology departments of a G7 nation as a politician, I know the intersection of people, work and technology could not be more important.
I believe we have an unmissable opportunity to examine how AI innovation can help more people into the labour market.
Economic inactivity remains one of the UK’s major strategic challenges.
There are well over 9 million people not participating in the UK economy. This is a tragic waste of potential – many of them are desperate for opportunities. For business, securing the right talent is still a top problem. For Britain, it’s impossible to grow without fixing this issue.
And the task is a thorny one. CIPD’s spring Labour Market Outlook evidences employer confidence in decline. Recruitment & Employment Confederation’s latest Report on Jobs shows a continued fall in hiring. Russell Reynolds Associates’ recent Global Leadership Monitor shows CEOs rate economic uncertainty and the availability of key talent and skills as their biggest threats – while also spinning the plates of technological change, workforce transformation and increased regulation.
Meanwhile, within the 9 million are people with a range of challenges: disabled people, people with long term health conditions, carers, people retiring early and students.
I’m interested in how AI can help. This summer, I’ll be bringing together experts who are applying this technology to explore how we can achieve better, faster, more effective, more personalised matching of people with the opportunities that are right for them.
This project will build on important work like the research led by CIPD and Innovate UK into people and organisational factors that can accelerate responsible AI adoption, shaping frameworks for ethical and responsible use of AI, and employers’ understanding of skills and organisational development needs.
It will learn from the fast-moving frontier of technology in recruitment, or ‘RecTech’, with the Recruitment and Employment Confederation trade body helping its members with AI transformation and the future of recruitment. I’m looking forward to their dynamic conference this week too.
Many have philosophised about what AI will do to the nature of jobs, and the character of the economy. There are also well-developed taxonomies for the specifics of what skills are needed to work with AI, like TechUK and Tech Skills’ strong equipping of people and businesses across the country.
This groundbreaking project is practical, ambitious and different: it will go further by examining how AI can help match people with vacancies. And it will go wider, spanning all dimensions of the labour market, from unemployment and inactivity to recruitment, HR practices and retention.
Our long-term aims are to:
- connect people with opportunities (in particular, jobseekers with jobs)
- connect the dots; reveal opportunities and challenges in the wider UK labour market
- connect innovators and policymakers where needed
- exchange insights and collaborate for good
- enable local, national and international comparisons
- support people professionals to get understanding and practical value from the leading edge.
The ultimate outcomes could be significant. Imagine if we had:
- more innovation and insight into the end-to-end UK labour market
- more understanding and effective adoption of AI throughout the labour market
- more confidence and tools for people professionals
- matching that works for up to 9m more people
- measurable potential contributions to productivity and economic growth.
We believe it’s not been done before, and this is a call to entrepreneurs and innovators to get involved. I’m focused on the private sector where either start-ups or established firms have identified commercially-viable innovation, and keen for insight from those involved in employability.
Who is innovating right now in matching and retention at key touchpoints of the labour market? What are the gaps, and the opportunities? Given the travails of the ONS’ labour market survey, what data can we now pool in other ways? What can cities and regions in the UK demonstrate works? Should we be learning from any other nations?
As Secretary of State for Work and Pensions in the years after the pandemic, I was among the first to articulate the challenge of economic inactivity. My successors are wise to keep up this focus, and I want to work with anyone who shares this passion.
The Government is right to look to increase the use of AI in jobcentres, and they could heed the Tony Blair Institute who grasped this nettle in ‘Governing in the Age of AI: Reimagining the UK Department for Work and Pensions‘.
Yet economic inactivity is not just the state’s problem. Public and private have to come together for results. And at the heart of it all is people who deserve to be connected with the opportunities that are right for them.
I was proud to lead on these issues – locally, regionally, nationally and internationally – over five terms in parliament. And I chose to leave politics with a clear view of the next challenge: help bridge the public and private, help apply technology in the economy and labour market and help people secure jobs at a time of pronounced change, pace and demand.
I’d love to hear from you in this mission of impact for millions of people and employers.
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