In 2015, McKinsey Social Initiative committed to expand Generation USA from a single pilot to program impacting 200,000 un- or under-employed young people over five years. With an effective training methodology, Generation USA will launch young people into successful careers and lives. By tracking impact on young people and employers, Generation USA will demonstrate the value of training investment. By 2020, Generation USA will increase operations from one to 25 cities and expand from healthcare to other professions.
The approach has six components:
1. Jobs and direct employer engagement: Generation USA works with employers to secure positions for graduates and develop programs that teach the most important technical, behavioral, and mindset-related skills.
2. Recruiting: Students recruited based on intrinsics, effort, and employment standards for the profession.
3. 8-12 week work-readiness training: Generation USA students complete an intensive skills training bootcamp. Adults, including our target age range, learn best in an immersive environment and disconnected youth can struggle to complete longer programs.
4. Social-support services: So students can focus on learning, the program provides support like stipends, transportation, and child care; and couples services with mentorship to help graduates be successful in jobs.
5. Community: Generation USA aims to develop a supportive community that stays with young people from bootcamp into the workplace, keeping negative influences at bay and reinforcing the learnings from training.
6. Return on investment: Generation will USA rigorously track its short- and long-run impact on the well-being of participants, return on investment for employers, and program efficacy.
Generation USA will have global impact by informing Generation programs in India, Kenya, Mexico, and Spain. Programs in Spain launched last year, and the others will launch in 2015. Learnings from all countries will be aggregated to develop a methodology and business case that applies to any country and profession.
Expand Us Healthcare Program:
1. Identify and prioritize next wave of cities for US healthcare program
- Cities selected based on employer demand, availability of local funding, and presence of local education providers and nonprofits to join implementation coalition
- Expansion into three to five new cities by end of 2015
2) Prepare cities for launch
- Build local implementation coalitions, refine the existing curriculum based on local context
- Preparation takes six weeks
3) Launch in new cities
- Recruit students, deliver training, place students in jobs with partner employers
- Programs are ongoing, and will launch in succession throughout the year
Expand To Additional Sectors:
1) Identify professions in three additional verticals; Generation is currently exploring retail, information technology, and skilled trades.
- Select specific professions based on job and youth demand, and presence of an anchor employer to lead pilot development
- Research began in Q1 2015; intend to expand into retail sector in Q2 of 2015 and professions within IT and/or skilled trades in Q3 and Q4 of 2015
2) Develop curricula
- Work with anchor employer and local partners to co-create curricula for new professions
- Development takes four to six weeks
3) Launch in pilot cities
- Pilot each new sector in two to three cities (selected with anchor employer)
- Eight to 12 week pilots will be staggered beginning with retail in Q2
Additional Implementation Steps:
1) Metrics and Evaluation: Rigorously track outcomes for employers and students, with the goal of demonstrating early ROI by Q2 and a Year One Report by the end of the year
2) Defining Delivery Model at Scale: Refine delivery model and develop implementation plan for scale.
3) Cross-country Learning: Facilitate ongoing communications and working sessions between the country team.
Deliverables:
1) Expansion to 10 to 15 cities by end of 2015, and 25-30 by 2020
2) Expansion to two to three new professions by end of 2015, likely within three identified verticals described above, including creation of replicable curricula for further expansion
3) Early ROI measures available: Q2
4) Year-end ROI report: Q4
5) Implementation plan for 2016-2019: Q3
Globally, more than 300 million young people are un- or under-employed. At the same time, employers cannot find people with the needed skills for even entry-level positions. This skills gap represents a massive pool of untapped talent, and is a source of economic underperformance, social unrest, and individual despair. A new approach is needed to help young people, employers, and educators work together to make the journey from education to employment seamless.
Generation USA is part of a global effort focused on preparing young people for middle-skill jobs, helping them achieve personal and professional success, and thus fundamentally changing their life trajectories. In doing this, Generation seeks to address two critical areas of need:
1. Develop a replicable, scalable, and rapidly deployable approach. A far-reaching problem requires a far-reaching solution; one that serves hundreds of thousands, and eventually millions, of young people. Few programs today operate on anything like that scale. In addition, we need to better understand which interventions are most cost effective and how they can be implemented in different contexts: high and low GDP/capita countries, various industries, and in cooperation with employers, training institutions, and other stakeholders.
2. Prove a measurable return on investment to both employers and young people. More than half of employers say that lack of evidence of a positive return on investment is a major obstacle to investing in training, so proving the business case to them is critical. Generation's aim is to show that by training young people in a different way, employers can earn a positive, significant return on investment with reduced recruiting and turnover costs and higher-quality work outcomes. Young people, too, are looking for evidence of a return on their investment of time and effort, with improved personal and professional well-being both today and in the long run.
