Channel 4 Television Corporation case study

Company background

Our unique position as a broadcaster publisher in a new digital age allows us to provide support, guidance and information to enable young people to pursue a career within the media industry. 

Total number of employees

There are approximately 800 employees. We employed 80 work experience students this year.

Operational countries

UK

Challenge

At the end of 2007 Channel 4 reviewed its key purposes in a new digital age through Next on 4. This involves the development of new talent across 4 purposes:

• To nurture new talent and original ideas.
• To champion alternative voices and fresh perspectives.
• To challenge people to see the world differently.
• To inspire change in people's lives.

In order to meet the aims of the revised vision 4Talent decided to take a three pronged approach to developing and nurturing new entrant talent into the creative industries through:

• Work experience.
• Inspiration week.
• Generation Programme (previously summer school entered into the NCWE awards) 

Name of work experience scheme

The summer school is 12 weeks long. This is usually June – September and normally recruits approximately nine students across a range of departments within Channel 4.

Steps to implementation

When I joined, the company we mainly focused on graduate level recruitment and I felt that it was really important to connect with young people through schools, colleges and community organizations so as to inspire them and give them a grounding in the skills, experiences and attitudes you need to work in the media. I came up with a strategy and pitched it to the HR director with a budget. I then worked with departments who would take on placements; and the website team to communicate the message as far and wide as possible and kick the programmes off. The whole process took about two months to implement from planning and design to launch.

Benefits

• Channel 4 has built upon its cache with young people and their ideas have fed into marketing and advertising strategies.
• There is an increased diversity of voices and fresh perspective within the company that adds to the corporate value of the organisation.
• We hope we have had a wider influence on how industries and the creative economy recruit work placement students.

Results

• Two people working for Channel 4 who took part in the summer school. There are also three from the independent sector and a couple that have set up their own independent branding.
• Positive overall halo effect but difficult to measure. They have changed the voices that have come into the channel which adds to the culture of the company.
• Developing people goes to the heart of Channel 4 values and what they do for work related learning. I hope that as we go forward we can build on this programme and have a wider influence.

Lessons learnt

• Treating people as individuals rather than as groups. It is important to make sure that we target particular groups. We have evolved target messages over the last couple of years.
• Provide details early on (from recruitment) about what people should expect to learn and do not make it feel scary.
• Different personality styles suit different positions so the importance of carrying out different styles of assessments such as knowledge based helps to attract a broader diversity of candidates.

Future plans

We want to expand the scheme more year-on-year by recruiting more placement students, making inspirational week bigger, and forming more partnerships, particularly with charities, to further widen the diversity of the people that take part.

Key tips

• It is important to have a good understanding of Generation X and Y. For companies to evolve they need to engage with Generation Y and look for partnerships that will get them access to this group within society.
• Open up doors to young people and give them opportunities. We cannot expect young people to give us what we want in work unless we provide them with the tools.