It’s no secret that young people are having a tough time finding a job these days.  Employers receive hundreds of applications for every role they advertise, and they are in a position where they can afford to be selective.  Unfortunately for the 1.04 million unemployed people between the ages of 16 and 24 (as of December 2011, according to the UK Office for National Statistics), selective can often mean choosing someone with experience doing the precise role that is being advertised.

Many of these unemployed young people have either never held a job, or have held a part time job throughout school or university.  Whole they may have gained many transferable skills through their studies, life experiences and part time jobs, they are still getting passed over in favour of people with more experience.

But hiring one of these young people could bring with it some unexpected benefits.

Here are 5: Flexibility: Young people are often more flexible in terms of the hours they can work due to less commitments such as childcare.  They are generally also more willing to relocate as they are not tied to one place by a mortgage or spouse as often.

Transferable Skills: They may not have the job title on their CV, but many of these young people have all the skills necessary to perform these roles.

The Future: With a significant portion of the population reaching retirement age in the next few years, hiring some younger people now will make for a smooth transition.

A New Point of View: Young people bring in a new perspective and can add a lot of valuable insight especially when it comes to trend-oriented markets like technology, social media or music.

The Company Culture:  If someone is being hired for their first or second job, they don’t have a set idea of how things “should” be done, and will likely bend to fit in with your ways of working and company culture.

Dana G.

Tags: Apprenticeship Scheme Programme, Candidate Screening Process, Candidate Video Interview Service, David Alan Consultants News, Employee Screening Process, Government Subsidised Apprenticeship Scheme Programmes, Human Resources, Recruitment, Video Recruitment, Youth Unemployment

This entry was posted on Thursday, March 29th, 2012 at 8:47 am and is filed under Employee Screening Process, Recruitment, Recruitment Industry, Video Recruitment. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.