Words: Kelsey Hargreaves

Getting young people into the cleaning industry has only become harder after the COVID-19 pandemic. Finding a way forward requires all of us, globally, to work together to boost the industry’s profile.

In April 2021, the British Institute of Cleaning Science (BICSc) launched ‘One Industry: Infinite Opportunity’, an initiative aimed at making the cleaning sector more appealing to those outside it. As the UK’s first youth ambassador for the cleaning industry, I’ve worked hard to help young people see cleaning as an exciting career option, full of opportunities.

To do that, we needed to understand better what young people wanted from a career and how the cleaning industry could showcase itself to the next generation. One key lesson has been making sure we are ready to meet with young people where they are, rather than waiting for them to come to us.

School outreach 

Over the past three years, BICSc has represented the cleaning industry at many careers fairs and teaching days throughout the country, across all ages of education. We have spoken to children aged four through to young adults.  In doing so, we’ve helped embed the idea that cleaning isn’t merely something people fall into, but it can be a real and exciting career choice.

Cleaning industry careers hub

Last year, we created and launched the cleaning industry careers hub on the Youth Employment UK (YEUK) website. This comprehensive hub covers more than 35 careers in the cleaning industry, including training options, case studies both in written and video format, work experience opportunities, youth-friendly employers and vacancies within the industry. There’s also media of young cleaning industry professionals speaking directly to the user about their careers and the love they have for them. 

Results day webinars 

For the past three years, BICSc has supplied key speakers for YEUK on results day webinars for students and their guardians. We have offered advice to students and parents on paths forward and painted the cleaning industry as a fantastic career option for students with all different types of backgrounds and qualifications.

Youth associations

Having been recognised as the industry’s first “youth-friendly employer”, BICSs has also had the first two recognised youth ambassadors for YEUK. The roles of these ambassadors and the recognition of BICSc as a youth-friendly employer means that the team has led and collaborated in dozens of webinars, presentations and workshops relating to young professionals and the onboarding of the next generation. 

These talks have seen the industry discussed in the House of Commons on multiple occasions, where our youth ambassadors have also spoken about the industry. We have led employer webinars around education pathways, neurodiversity and mental health and written articles for magazines throughout the world. We’ve also been in the media, getting ourselves featured on national TV and radio.

It’s been amazing seeing the difference these initiatives have made in terms of youth engagement in the cleaning industry. It shows what a difference it can make by increasing the visibility of the sector — in a very positive light — to a new generation of workers.

Thinking back over the past three years, five key lessons come to mind.

1. Celebrate our young workers. If we want to retain them and introduce more, we need to celebrate the people we have. When you recruit a great young worker, make sure to shout about them. We need to make the young generation feel not only visible but highly valued.
2. Listen to young people. We need to work as an industry to ensure we understand the needs of young people and their experiences. This means listening. It means being open to new ways of doing things. Otherwise, our messaging can become irrelevant or inaccessible.
3. Sell the industry. We need to learn how to talk about the broader industry positively. We have some amazing stories of our time in the industry. Let’s find ways to share them with younger generations.
4. Be honest about the industry. Questions are not a bad thing, even if it comes from a five-year-old asking how much a cleaning operative earns! (This happened to me!) The more transparent and honest we are, the more accessible we become. 
5. Get out there, even if we’re not wanted. We need to forget about the fear of rejection. Sometimes there will be moments when the people we are pitching to just aren’t interested in the industry. Even if our message isn’t heard every single time, just being present and ‘out there’ matters. How can we expect to be seen when we have no presence? 

We’ve come so far in recent years. I hope we can continue to build on this momentum and find more ways to reach the younger crowd — the cleaning professionals of the future.

About the author:

Kelsey Hargreaves is a technical specialist and youth ambassador for BICSc. She has written and spoken extensively about the best ways to make the cleaning industry more appealing to younger people.