- Project brief
Not in Education, Employment, or Training (NEET) in United Kingdom refers to a group of people who are unemployed, not in any vocational training or in school (Bradley, Migali, and Navarro Paniagua, 2019: p.244). These group mainly comprises of youths aged between 16 to 24 years. According to the research done in December 2015, NEET group increase every year. For instance, they rose from 853,000 youths from 2014 to 110,000 people in September 2015. However, Maguire, (2018:p.650) argued that these people have unique characteristics that need project managers to be keen while addressing. For instance, they are energetic and unemployed. It means that if they stay long without getting any economic activity to engage in, they can involve in criminal activities which is a threat to the economy of the United Kingdom. Secondly, these youths makes a bigger percentage of the UK population, about 41%, which the leadership of the country cannot ignore while coming up with their economic policies. George, and Zakkariya, (2015: p.67) argues that there are many journals which have proposed better ways of involving NEET group in a project. When the project managers make use of the recommendations, they prove to be the effective ways of managing the NEET group. In this research, it will look into several authors’ suggestions on how managers can effectively manage the NEET group.
Keywords: effectively, manage, project, project managers
- Journal overview
Mawn, L., Oliver, E.J., Akhter, N., Bambra, C.L., Torgerson, C., Bridle, C. and Stain, H.J., 2017. Are we failing young people not in employment, education or training (NEETs)? A systematic review and meta-analysis of re-engagement interventions. Systematic reviews, 6(1), p.16.
The population of persons not in education, employment or training (NEET) is continuously increasing for the past three decades in the United Kingdom. However, from the report done in the year 2015 and interviews, the outcome of the report stands that there are several new improvement in the involvement of these people in projects through the project managers. The challenges facing the NEET as outlined in the report assist the project managers to focus on the characteristics of the NEET. Consequently when the country brand young people as NEETs, the youths officially become a challenge that the United Kingdom leadership need to address (Maguire, 2015:p.124). However, when finding the effective ways in which project managers can manage these people, the policy makers need to go beyond the idea of NEETs. The cause of the disengagement of these people might have come from the poor way in which the state is managing the method of transition from education to work environment. The project managers have a great chance in transforming these people.
On the other hand, Kerzner, (2018:pp.89) argued that the need of addressing the effectivity of the project managers in managing the NEETs is increasingly becoming ever more urgent as the project managers need energetic people to assist them in their work. The project managers find out that if they do not address the issue at the moment, it may result to a serious issue in the future not only on their performance but also to the general economy of the country. The report from the research look into the way the project managers guide the NEETs during the project management career. Apart from that, the issue that is coming out is the idea of the quality of the curriculum and career guidance that the project managers can recommend to the NEETs. The issue such as flexibility of both the manager and the NEETs also pop outs on the report. Many of the managers and the youths tend to be inflexible when it comes to career and project management. It leads to problems that delay the work output. Lastly, the managers need to research from other countries and the way they address the issue of the NEET groups. The country need to accept that NEET is a challenge to project managers. The project managers should also listen to the growth of the youths to understand their recommendations on how to effectively improve the involvement in project management. Other issues including the work experience and the career guidance are also important and the manager should not ignore.
- Purpose
The goal of this research is to find out the effective methods that the project managers can deploy in their career to assist them in managing the NEETs. In many cases these group of people (NEETs) seem to be a burden to the economy. The experience the have may not match what the project manager need. Some of them even take long time to learn and adapt to what the project manager needs. All the above mentioned challenges may hinder the success of the project. However, what the managers need is to find out the best approach for the success of the project. Various studies related that to project management note that, poor management of the NEETs often lead to poor project management. However, there is also success in the project when there is proper management. The management can identify what everybody can offer to the project to make it a success. No one can entertain late deliveries and low quality work output in any project. Consequently, when an individual is deployed to where he or she delivers the best, there is no doubt that the project will go as planned. However, the challenge may arise in identification of the field of every NEETs. The project proposal will open ways for project managers to effectively manage the team. It also extends the ideas of other people based on the challenges of both project managers and the NEET group.
- Research question
What makes a project manager effective at managing a NEET group?
One cannot fulfill the needs of any project without involving other stakeholders such as laborers. However, many of these youths that deliver their services to the project managers may be experiencing a disorganized life. For example, it is on the records that many of these young people have gone through a long term period of unemployment. Consequently, the main question is how the project manager can can improve the way the work with these group of people. Some of these NEET members lac even the training that the managers need in the specific project. There is the danger of creating more problems within the project when the managers ignore the issue of education and training among these people. In this research, it will include a survey questions for the project managers and the youths belonging to the NEET group. The variable include education and skills level. The research will analyze how these variable affect the effectivity of a project. Apart from, it will quantitatively analyze how the project managers can improve on the issues to make the outcome effective.
- Hypothesis
H0: The project manager’s effectivity do not have a great impact to NEET group in UK.
H1: The effectivity of the project manager does have impact to NEET groups in United Kingdom.
H2: NEET members led by competent project managers still perform poor in various projects.
- Research methodology
Research method involves the procedure of gathering the data and information with the aim of making decision from the results of the gathered information. The process of the research methodology will respond to the hypotheses questions raised in the hypothesis section. In this research, the methodology would include interviews, public research and surveys. The outcome will provide response on factors that makes project manager effective in managing the NEET group.
The move of the research is the best for this case since the NEET group forms a larger population in United Kingdom. However, the main idea behind the research is the notion that incapacity of the project manager has a negative impact to the NEET group in a project management. Nobody can accommodate ineffective manager because incapacity is mainly related to the failure of the project. However most of the project managers do not want to agree that they are ineffective to some extent. Failure to admit means that no one is ready to take any advice meant for improving of the situation. Such a condition lead to more troubles instead of success of a project.
On the other hand, using a case study as a strategy is also another best alternative in this situation. The case can reveal the real strategies that a manager need to make him or her to be effective to the NEET group in a project management setting. Kerzner, (2017: p.24) says that the case study can have a dependent and independent variable. For instance, having a country that have effective managers that impact the NEET group positively. The independent variable can always influence the dependent variable.
Effectivity of a project manager is crucial to a country having high population of the NEET group. These youths influence the economy of every country not only in UK but all over the world. The assurance in this study is that it will maintain the ethical standards needed in a study despise using multiple methods of research and data collection.
- Research procedure
- Primary data collection
It is important to choose a method that will specifically reach to the project and the youths in the NEET group. Online survey is one of the suitable method as it ensure targeted audience only.
- The procedure
There are main issues that influence the manager’s effectivity when dealing with NEET groups include the following:
- Flexibility
- Stakeholder engagement
- Level of knowledge
The source of information for this research project will five other European countries that also faces the challenge of the NEET group. The strategy of collecting data from these five countries would include sending questionnaires to the youths belonging to the NEET group in these countries. They would be given time to fill and return the papers. However, the research will also involve online survey to cover most of the stakeholders. Besides that, Harrison, and Lock, (2017: p.90) says that the project managers are also main participants in the research, the research would create google forms on the same to allow the managers give out their views. The appendix would provide the milestone of the project activities. The countries that would take art in the study should have gone through the problem of the effectivity of the project managers in dealing with the NEET group.
On the other hand, after collecting the information, they would be analyzed using various methods to get the true picture of the situation. Other methods of analysis include the use of SPSS.
- The research tool
The basis of this survey will be on factors that influence success of the project. For example involving the stakeholders. The main stakeholders in this situation are the youths belonging to the NEET group. Some of the acts that will revolve n the survey include the following:
Skills
Level of education
Flexibility
On the other part the participants in this research will be questioned on the projects they have seen to be successful and involved the NEETs. The way the manger organized himself to prove his or her effectivity. The main argument is about the effectivity of the project managers and how the managers can improve the way they operate with the NEETs.
- Limitations
The research is complex. It involves questioning several stakeholders before deliver of a report. One of the evident limitation is time. The research would take long time before finding a solution. The procedure of collecting data, analyzing and delivering of a report. However, Hornstein, (2015: p.260) argues that the time may depend on the stakeholders taking part in the project.
Apart from the above challenge, the second issue is reluctant of the project in providing the real challenge they face while dealing with the NEETs. They may feel guilty of elaborating the reason that also make them ineffective. However, involving many participants increase the chances of getting true picture of the situation.
- References
Bradley, S., Migali, G. and Navarro Paniagua, M., 2019. Spatial variations and clustering in the rates of youth unemployment and NEET: A comparative analysis of Italy, Spain and the UK.
George, J. and Zakkariya, K.A., 2015. Operational Flexibility: A Model for Effective Project Management (Doctoral dissertation, Cochin University Of Science And Technology).
Harrison, F. and Lock, D., 2017. Advanced project management: a structured approach. Routledge.
Hornstein, H.A., 2015. The integration of project management and organizational change management is now a necessity. International Journal of Project Management, 33(2), pp.291-298.
Kerzner, H., 2017. Project management: a systems approach to planning, scheduling, and controlling. John Wiley & Sons.
Kerzner, H., 2018. Project management best practices: Achieving global excellence. John Wiley & Sons.
Maguire, S., 2015. NEET, unemployed, inactive or unknown–why does it matter?. Educational research, 57(2), pp.121-132.
Maguire, S., 2018. Who cares? Exploring economic inactivity among young women in the NEET group across England. Journal of Education and Work, 31(7-8), pp.660-675.
Schwalbe, K., 2015. Information technology project management. Cengage Learning.
Zwikael, O., Chih, Y.Y. and Meredith, J.R., 2018. Project benefit management: Setting effective target benefits. International Journal of Project Management, 36(4), pp.650-658.
