About us
We are a charity committed to supporting young people and adults to realise their potential. We deliver our mission through high quality and professional career management, employment and training services delivered in schools, in the community and in prisons.
We commission high quality research to help shape our services, contribute to policy debates and share best practice. We are passionate about social mobility and helping the most disadvantaged to create a better future.
Our History
We were established in 2001 as part of the Connexions network, becoming a charity in 2014. During 2023/4 we worked with 97,719 people across a whole range of contracts including 8 Local Authorities, 214 schools and 18 prisons. Since becoming a charity we continue to diversify our services, delivering programmes to a range of young people and adults and in new settings including criminal justice.
The charity has always been focused on innovation and has delivered ground-breaking programmes including two Social Impact Bond programmes, New Horizons and Unlocking Potential. New Horizons focused on NEET and at risk of NEET supporting 4,222 young people delivering £10.56m worth of outcomes with an outlay of £4.5m. This was followed by our second programme, Unlocking Potential (UP), with an additional focus on young people facing mental health and well-being barriers that increased their risk of becoming NEET. UP supported 4,040 young people delivering £9.9m worth of outcomes against an outlay of £4.2m. These programmes delivered an above target return for our social investors alongside a strong evidence of impact in independent evaluations.
We have also utilised our leading expertise in Careers guidance to provide consultancy internationally in Sri Lanka, UAE and more recently Bahrain delivering training and supporting them to design an all age Career service.
In 2023/4 we delivered an additional social value of £8m.
Equity, Diversity and Inclusion Statement
Career Connect is fully committed to making equality and diversity a reality for the participants we serve. We do everything possible to involve participants to ensure that they have access to services, and that these services are effective irrespective of age, disability, gender reassignment, race, religion or belief, sex, sexual orientation, marriage and civil partnership, pregnancy and maternity, or any other individual characteristic that may limit a person’s opportunities in life. We value the diversity of the local area and want services to be fully accessible, relevant and meaningful to all our service users.
We will continue to challenge stereotyping and support individuals considering opportunities in non-traditional areas. Our modes of delivery will be accessible so that all services can be understood and used by those with learning difficulties and disabilities, as well as those less familiar with or able to access web-based technology. Equality and diversity is integral to the development of the service and we will always monitor the take-up of services – and the outcomes achieved – by these groups. In 2023/24we were ranked as no 10. In the top 100 most inclusive employers by Investors in Diversity.
Finances
Our turnover last year was £14.7m and we have reserves in excess of £7.0m, putting us in a strong position finically. Our funding currently comes from the following sources;
Local Authorities – Across Liverpool City Region and Greater Manchester
Schools and Colleges across the UK
Careers and Enterprise Company
Her Majesty’s Prison and Probation Service
UKSPF
