Creating Your Future Job - Youth Self-Employment Program

Creating Your Future Job is a comprehensive youth self-employment program. During the program, participants identify a local problem or market need & brainstorm a micro-business solution to make an income.

Creating Your Future Job aims to address the global youth unemployment crisis by providing a unique approach to self-employment and micro-business development. With an expected youth unemployment rate of nearly 15% this year, traditional solutions, such as quickly placing young people in low-paying jobs that do not align with their passions or interests, have proven to be ineffective. Our program, instead, focuses on empowering young individuals to identify and address local problems and market needs through the development and growth of their own micro-businesses.

Furthermore, the current youth labor market is heavily impacted by the effects of COVID-19, with many roles in industries such as hospitality, entertainment, and tourism being casualized or on short-term contract. Our program provides an alternative solution for young people in such situations, equipping them with the skills and resources necessary to create sustainable and fulfilling careers for themselves.

Creating Your Future Job is an innovative, hands-on self-employment program for young people aged 15 to 24 years. The program, which runs for 7 to 20 weeks, empowers participants to identify a local community problem and develop practical, realistic micro-business solutions to address it. Throughout the program, participants work towards making an income through self-employment and gain the skills and resources necessary to succeed as entrepreneurs.

The program is particularly well-suited for disengaged and disadvantaged youth, including those with experience in the criminal justice system and those living in regional or rural communities. Self-employment offers a viable, flexible career path for these young people, putting them in control of their own futures and allowing them to create jobs based on their areas of interest or passion.

We believe that entrepreneurship and self-employment can truly solve youth unemployment among the most disadvantaged youth.

A report from Nobel Prize nominated economist William Baumol highlights the similarities between the personality traits of successful entrepreneurs and business leaders and those of individuals who commit crimes. Baumol argues that many would-be entrepreneurs end up criminals due to educational and economic inequalities. By offering our program at a young age, we aim to redirect the entrepreneurial talents of these young people towards legal and productive ends, helping them to break free from the unemployment trap and create real wealth for themselves and their communities through micro-businesses.

Creating Your Future Job is a targeted program that aims to provide a solution for young people aged 15 to 24 years who are unemployed, underemployed, live with a disability, are disengaged or disadvantaged. The program is designed to empower participants to create their own future job based on their personal interests, passions, and local market needs.

The 7 to 20 week program provides a comprehensive learning experience, including interactive real-world self-employment training. Upon completion of the program, participants are given access to 'The Young Leaders Space' (www.space.edu.au), a free online education community filled with young leaders, short courses, live lessons and micro-credential certificates. This provides continued support to participants to grow their micro-business and ensure the momentum of their new venture is sustained even after the program concludes. Additionally, weekly live lessons with guest mentors and presenters are hosted to provide further support and guidance to participants.

The ASE Group is led by a team of passionate, accomplished young leaders who embody the values of energy, adaptability, and creativity. Our team includes Young Australians of the Year, TEDx speakers, and award-winning social entrepreneurs. As a community-led and purpose-driven business for good, we involve all stakeholders in decisions relating to youth, including students, parents, teachers, small businesses, large businesses, and educational institutions. Our newly formed advisory councils, including the Youth Advisory Council, Educators Advisory Council, and Industry Advisory Council, ensure that we truly represent all aspects of the community.

Our executive team is made up of young leaders who are dedicated to teaching life skills to other young people.

We're led by our 2 x CEO's - Taj Pabari (22 years old) was a disengaged school student but luckily recognised the role small business could play in his career and therefore started multiple micro-businesses from a really young age. Small business re-engaged Taj in mainstream support services. Taj was named The Australian Young Innovator of the Year for 2014, an award given to Australia’s most exciting innovator and emerging talent. In 2017, Taj was awarded Young Australian of the Year for Queensland. He is the youngest recipient of the award since its formation in 1979. Taj has presented to the Former US Vice President, Al Gore in Brisbane, joked with Hollywood Tycoon, Will Smith in Hong Kong and sipped tea with the Prime Minister of Australia in Canberra. His story has been featured by Sunrise, 60 Minutes, The Today Show, National Geographic, ABC, Nickelodeon and CNBC. Taj's work in education and background in youth entrepreneurship have led him to speak at schools, conferences, festivals and corporate functions around the world. He has appeared as an education commentator on Channel 9 and Channel 10. He has given three TEDx talks and has been a keynote speaker at the World Science Festival alongside Nobel Laureate, Brian Schmidt. 

Jahin Tanvir (22 years old) is an award-winning advocate for young people, and diversity and inclusion, Jahin was named the 2022 Young Australian of the Year finalist whilst also receiving the 2021 Young Canberra Citizen of the Year in Individual Community Service. Jahin is a Board Director at the Adolescent Health Association of Australia, a UNICEF Young Ambassador and Movember Ambassador. As a first-generation migrant, Jahin’s vision is to empower people from diverse backgrounds in decision-making and conversations in Australia, representing the multiculturalism of Australia.

Other members who are heavily involved in the design, delivery and impact reporting of the Creating Your Future Job program include: 

Tionne Young (24 years old)

Tionne is passionate about social impact and events that connect young people with endless future possibilities. In her day-to-day role, Tionne looks after our custom youth engagement partnerships with Local, State and Federal Government and leads the curriculum development of our self-employment programs around Australia. Prior to joining The ASE Group, Tionne helped deliver youth engagement programs for the Australian Government, Westpac, MYOB and Red Frogs Australia. She was directly responsible for the delivery of the Minister’s Climate Challenge which featured the Former US Vice President, Al Gore as well as the design and delivery of a youth engagement tour with MYOB New Zealand. Tionne has facilitated 5,000+ hours of workshops including workshops with disengaged/ disadvantaged youth including specialist programs for indigenous youth.

Andy St Baker-Radice (36 years old)

Andy has over 10 years of banking experience internationally as a Senior Portfolio Manager and as the Chair of the Steering Committee for Microfinance for Credit Suisse Switzerland. He has extensive expertise in business strategy and partnerships management with not-for-profit and social enterprise organisations, building strategic partnerships and approaching business growth and problem-solving from a new perspective. Andy is an integral member of ensuring our program is of course directly relevant for self-employment but equally as useful for upskilling youth should they wish to enter an employment pathway in the future. 

Our organisation has undergone a thorough co-design process involving young people, educators, parents, and industry to ensure that the program meets the specific needs of our target market. The process involved confirming that the target market we identified is indeed the cohort that needs the program the most, followed by an agile build phase where we developed content and curriculum and tested it with a small group of youth. Each phase of the program was evaluated independently to ensure its effectiveness.

In 2020, we conducted our first pilot program in North Queensland, Australia, which can be seen in the video link provided. We have continued to deliver the program on a small scale, refining elements of the program over the course of 2021 and 2022 to ensure it is as effective as possible. The program has been met with extremely positive results and feedback and we are now looking forward to scaling up and making it available to more young people in need.

https://youtu.be/ejBJ5hnF8sM

The use of self-employment as a means to support disengaged citizens is an innovative concept that has not been fully explored internationally. Our extensive pilot programs in Australia have already shown the effectiveness of an entrepreneurial education in not only providing skills development but also clear employment outcomes.

To further support our new entrepreneurs, we have developed an online platform called Space (https://space.edu.au/), which is an innovative tool that provides on-demand e-learning specifically designed for Gen Z and Alpha, who are known to have low attention spans. The e-learning videos are short and engaging, designed to combat low engagement rates seen on larger online course hubs. Additionally, we offer cohort-based live lessons to provide a community for participants to connect with other young people at the same stage of their entrepreneurial journey, while also learning from successful entrepreneurs and leaders.

Item A: Program Delivery - 1,000 young people from disadvantaged backgrounds

• Outcome A: 85% of participants graduate from the program.
• Measurement Plan A: Participant attendance will be noted each lesson. 

• Outcome B: 70% of participants launch a micro-business and generate revenue or income during the face-to-face program period.
• Measurement Plan B: Participant revenue and income will be tracked on a weekly basis with individual mentoring to be provided to participants that are struggling to turn their ideas into action. 

Item B: Program Outcomes - Education + Employment Metrics

• Outcome A: 70% of participants complete 3 x micro-credential certificates during the program based on in-demand, transferrable skills such as: financial literacy, people management and communication. 
• Measurement Plan A: Progress on micro-credentials will be tracked to ensure we meet this educational outcome. Should participants take an employment pathway, they can use these micro-credential certificates on their resume. We track participants competence for these certificates based on practical delivery, not quizzes or exams. For example, during the program, we invite students to learn about people management and communication through a 'group business'. Participants will work together to deliver a group business - popular past group businesses include a community car wash or marketplace at a local park. They will all work together on a particular business idea and deliver it to the general public where they will demonstrate their competence when it comes to managing a group of people, showcasing customer excellence skills, counting and giving change, etc. 

• Outcome B: 60% of participants will still be self-employed via their micro-business and have generated a minimum of $1,000 of income or revenue after 3 months post-graduation.
• Measurement Plan B: Participant revenue and income will be tracked on a fortnightly basis post-graduation with individual mentoring to be provided to participants that are committed to self-employment but are struggling to make an income.

• Outcome C: 51% of participants will still be self-employed via their micro-business.
• Measurement Plan C: Participant revenue and income will be tracked on a fortnightly basis post-graduation with individual mentoring to be provided to participants that are committed to self-employment but are struggling to make an income.

During the face-to-face program, participants are challenged to identify a local problem and develop a micro-business solution to address it. Most participants choose to implement a tech-based solution, such as setting up an e-commerce system to find customers outside of their local region, using social media to attract interest, or utilising other digital platforms to expand product or service reach. This is in line with the trend of businesses going online and adapting to the digital era.

To support the continued growth and success of these businesses, our organisation provides access to an alumni engagement platform called Space. This platform is specifically designed to engage young people and uses technology to provide on-demand e-learning, cohort-based live lessons, and micro-credential certificates. The platform includes built-in feedback mechanisms to ensure participants are actively engaged and not just skipping through the content, allowing us to accurately report on engagement levels.

Over the last 24 months, we've piloted the Creating Your Future Job with 322 Australian students.

Our goal is to service an additional 1,000 students over the coming 12 months. 

Specifically, the Australian School of Employment experiences the following barriers:

• Sustainability: The organisation aims to move to a funding model based on outcomes, but tracking revenue and income can be difficult, especially after participants complete the program. If the organization moves to a zero upfront fee funding model, there needs to be a way to enforce payment from participants who are self-employed. This can be particularly challenging in some regions due to legal and regulatory issues.
• Staff Training: Facilitating the program requires a unique set of skills, and the cost of training new staff members is significant due to the various elements of the program. As the program scales, the organisation needs to find a more efficient way to train new staff members to deliver the program.
• Startup funding: The organisation requires funding to support the first 6 months of operations until program alumni start paying back their course fees. While the program is designed to be self-sustaining through course fees, the organisation needs initial funding to cover expenses and operations until these fees start to be generated. This funding is crucial for the organisation to stay afloat and continue delivering the program to those in need.

While we don't have any formal partnerships, we do receive participant referrals from various organisations. These include schools referring their most disengaged students, youth justice centres, flexible learning schools, and employment service providers. These organisations see the potential impact of our program and refer young people who can benefit from the opportunities it provides. 

Our business model has traditionally relied on government and corporate funding to pilot the program across various regions and groups. We have been successful in securing pilot funding from various government departments and private sector partners and have been able to showcase clear educational and or employment based outcomes that have only been improving as we grow.

Going forward, our business model aims to become sustainable by implementing the following approach:

• No upfront cost for the face-to-face training
• A program fee of AUD$4000+gst for the 20-week program
• Participants only pay back the program fee when they start generating revenue of at least $1,000 per month for 3 consecutive months

This business model aligns our organisation's incentives with the success of the participants, as we only get paid when they achieve positive outcomes. It also ensures that participants accepted into the program are committed to finding an economically viable path.

Funding from Government and Private Sector partners will be required until we have a number of consecutive cohorts participating in the program under the no upfront fee structure, to ensure our organisation can stay sustainable and active. We believe that this fee structure is beneficial for all parties involved - participants only need to pay back the program fee when they generate income or revenue, and for our staff, their goals and objectives are aligned with the organisation's.

The organisation becomes highly sustainable when multiple cohorts are running and program fees are being paid back by participants around the world, at different times. This allows us to reach more young people and have a greater impact on youth unemployment and self-employment.