At present, the average childcare worker is young, white and female, a profile that is perpetuated by settings' recruitment procedures. But providers are going to have to reach out to a far broader range of people if they hope to avoid even greater recruitment problems as the sector continues to expand.
Single white females
At present, 98 per cent of nursery staff are female, with about 11 per cent aged between 16 and 19 and a further 30 per cent aged between 20 and 24 (2002/2003 Childcare and Early Years Workforce Survey - Day Nurseries and other Full-day Care Provision). But there are various problems associated with providers pinning their hopes on this group remaining the mainstay of the childcare workforce.
Demographically, this age group is shrinking. Acccording to population estimates by the Office for National Statistics (ONS), the number of women aged 20 to 24 has fallen from 2.16 million in 1992 to 1.75 million in 2000.
They are also becoming better educated. The ONS notes a 'marked'
increase in the number of girls achieving more qualifications at schools, with 58 per cent of them achieving five or more GCSEs grades A to C in 2001-02, compared to just 38 per cent in 1992-93. With higher qualifications and more job opportunities, they may be drawn into other sectors in ever greater numbers.
And there is the problem of their future plans. The 2001 DfES study Entry, Retention and Loss: A study of childcare students and workers found that only half of the existing workforce expected to be working in day nurseries in five years' time, and of those remaining, many expected to be working elsewhere in early childcare or education.
2002/2003 Childcare and Early Years Workforce Survey found that of nursery staff who have left their jobs in the past year, 50 per cent had obtained other posts in childcare and early years education, 21 per cent had gone to other jobs in other sectors and 11 per cent hadn't taken any other employment.
Potential groups
There are many groups whom childcare providers now need to target as potential recruits to the sector.
Part-time workers
Many people, not just lone parents, see part-time work as a way by which to balance employment with family life. Have you considered all the types of people who might favour working part time, such as people who have recently retired and people returning to work after a career break?
Lone parents
There are 1.75 million lone parents, of whom 90 per cent are women, and the lack of good, flexible, accessible and affordable childcare is a particular barrier for them. This is even more of an issue among minority ethnic lone parents.
According to The London Childcare Strategy, published by the Greater London Authority, 42 per cent of lone parents in London were working, but with the Government's plan to increase the employment rate of lone parents to 70 per cent by 2010, future entrants to the workforce could either want to access childcare, thereby increasing demand, or could be targeted as potential childcare workers.
Trainees/students
Inadequate, inflexible and expensive childcare provision also limits parents' options to study and progress to further studies. This is again a particular problem for black and ethnic minority parents.
For many years now, Westminster Children's Society has had a project to recruit local parents as childcare trainees and given them a part-time childcare place as part of their employment package and trained them to NVQ level 2 within our workplace.
You could also link with other settings and form a consortium to train staff. Your EYDCP may be able to help and you could access funding through the Learning Skills Council.
Black and ethnic communities
People from different ethnic groups want different childcare. According to The London Childcare Strategy, white and black parents are more likely to voice a need for childcare than Asian parents and are likely to want both full daycare and after-school provision. Refugee and asylum-seeking parents are more likely to have children under five years old than the general population. They are also more likely to be in full-time education and to have lost their social networks.
Providers, therefore, need to offer the kind of childcare that parents want, to recruit staff who are responsive to parents' expectations, and to appreciate fully the benefits of having a diverse staff team. At present 8 per cent of nursery staff are from an ethnic minority group (2002/2003 Childcare and Early Years Workforce Survey).
Disabled people
Disabled parents face major problems accessing childcare, education and employment. Careful thought needs to be given to enabling disabled people to work in childcare. Employers often focus solely on problems of mobility, excluding people with unseen disabilities that do not restrict their capacity to work with children. Employers also often fail to recognise the extent to which a disabled person can enhance the services offered, though some nurseries have collaborated with organisations such as Rathbone Training (tel: 08707 461045), which trains and employs people with disabilities.
At present 1 per cent of staff have a disability (2002/2003 Childcare and Early Years Workforce Survey).
Older people
In a young persons' industry, 35 is old. Yet, interestingly, people now tend to ask at interview the average age of our staff. They are no longer happy to work in nurseries full of very young people. We have staff aged 19 to 60 with a fantastic range of life experience and interests between them.
This has come about in part because someone takes up a job in a nursery where the average age is over 35 and encourages their friends to apply.
Men
Low pay and low status deter men from entering the sector - twin problems that must be addressed locally and nationally. In the meantime, target schools and encourage young people to review their attitude to childcare.
Show them a 'day in the life' video of one of your staff team. Send any male members of staff on Making Choices courses to share their experiences (visit www.connexions-direct.com for more details). This approach has been quite successful at Westminster. At present, 10 per cent of our staff are male and we are continually trying to improve this.
Recruitment procedures
Despite the wide range of people who could potentially work in the sector, research has shown that single white females are still the main group that providers target to fill vacancies.
The Recruitment and Retention of Childcare, Early Years and Play Workers: Research Study, commissioned by the DfES and carried out by the National Institute of Economics and Social Research, was critical of providers'
recruitment procedures. The study described employers as 'fire-fighting' by recruiting when they had a vacancy and accepting a high turnover as inevitable.
It found that they were still tapping into the diminishing workforce of white young women and were stereotypical in their recruitment, for example, looking for mothers with children at school while ignoring potential new groups.
And it accused employers of lacking imagination and relying too heavily on word of mouth when filling vacancies.
This is certainly not the way to attract people currently under-represented in the early years. Ways to improve your recruitment procedures include:
* Target your audience by giving them a clear message that you are interested in recruiting them. What are you doing to recruit staff from local communities? Have you made important connections? Do you drop leaflets at some of the community meeting points? Do you have parents from those communities who can point you in the right direction?
* Find out where and how best to advertise. Have you used the local Children's Information Service? Do you represent your service at the Making Choices courses where the EYDCP introduce local people to the early years? Are you linked to local community groups, such as the Migrants Resource Centre, who may help the candidates complete application forms ? Have you contacted Job Centre Plus? Have you helped them understand what an applicant may need to include in an application form to get an interview? Have you approached the local Sure Start and Connexions groups? They often have very positive links with the community and may already be training staff to prepare for the world of work.
* Consider your attitude to equal opportunities and expanding the diversity of the workforce. Your EYDCP may also help you here.
* Monitor applicants who apply for jobs to help judge how effective your attempts are at reaching potential new candidates.
Interviews
It surprises me how many people interview without having any previous training in it and how many childcarers comment that their interview amounted to a chat or quick visit to a nursery before being offered a job.
More worryingly, some people report being offered a job on the basis of a CV. Interviewing is an essential task that needs to be done properly if you are to choose the best candidate. A bad decision could have serious implications for both the candidate and your service.
* Do not discriminate against any candidates. Attitudes are often formed early in life, and affect our behaviour both consciously and unconsciously.
Although there is a legislative requirement that we do not discriminate on the basis of race, gender or sexual orientation, we still let our attitudes and stereotypical thinking influence our decisions when interviewing candidates.
* Be absolutely clear about what the job entails and the skills needed to carry it out. Have a clear picture of who applied for the job and why they were rejected.
* Appoint people on the basis that they can do the job. Don't consider people just because you want to improve the mix in the organisation.
Laudable as this is, we need to make sure we do not set people up to fail by giving them posts they cannot do. Nor should we reject people for spurious reasons, which may be hard to prove.
* Have nursery managers attend equal opportunities recruitment and selection training so that they can see the power of the interview panel.
* Involve other staff on the interview panel as well. It's a good way for them to understand the issues at first hand and it is very effective training.