Employability skills research and trends

Impact of Barclays LifeSkills

We believe that everyone deserves the financial independence, security and opportunity that comes with a job. A vibrant, skilled workforce ensures that local communities and businesses can thrive.

With the pace of change in the working world accelerating with automation and AI, there is a growing need to equip everyone with transferable skills to navigate working life, to enable people to adapt.

LifeSkills aims to understand these employability trends by drawing on various sources of research to ground the programme in credible evidence, coupled with the annual evaluation of LifeSkills which has been running since 2013, to assess the impact LifeSkills is having on participants.

Our 2023 impact findings noted teachers highlight the quality of LifeSkills, valuing the flexibility of LifeSkills resources to adapt to the needs of learners, and how easy they are to organise into a learning sequence.  From using the resources teacher knowledge and expertise in teaching employability, careers and money management skills improved (86%).

These were the areas of greatest impact on young people participating:

• Awareness of own strengths and skills (91%)
• Understanding of what makes a good CV and cover letter (89%)
• Feeling more positive about the future (88%)
• More motivated to do well in academic or vocational studies (87%)
• Improved understanding of core transferable skills (85%)
• Improved their personal finance capability (93%)
• Understanding how to keep track of their money (93%)
• Feeling confident about managing money (86%)

Source: Chrysalis Research Evaluation of LifeSkills 2023

To find out more about the landscape to support people with skills, download our latest report Unlocking skills and employment opportunities.

With the evolving jobs landscape there are various pieces of insight to help with your own planning, alongside resources for you to use with your students to support them in developing their core transferable skills.

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