The NEET Challenge & the Construction Sector

The NEET Challenge We Can’t Ignore

Youth unemployment in the UK is a national emergency with almost 1 million young people classed as NEET – not in education, employment, or training. This figure was powerfully highlighted at the Social Value Portal’s 2025 conference bringing renewed urgency to a challenge the construction industry has been grappling with for years. 

From Insight to Action

As a result, this year, the TOM System™ (widely known as TOMs and the UK standard for Social Value measurement) has now introduced new youth-focused measurables; placing social value on insight days, paid work experience & exposure to real careers, in recognition that long-term career pathways start early. 

This shift reflects a growing understanding across the construction sector that you just can’t fix youth unemployment at the point of recruitment alone. Youth engagement starts in school with inspiration and paid work opportunities must come first.

The key question is now how to reach a generation of young people and change the perception of careers in the construction industry?

Engaging young people with early careers in construction

What is your business already doing that you want to shine a light on? Here are some ways to engage future talent and young talent with fantastic construction careers from school onwards:

School outreach: Embed summer programmes and insight days to capture the imagination and inspire. Support your staff to engage in school outreach. Think outside the box and consider what young people already enjoy: Can you create a Dragon’s Den or Traitors experience for students with a construction focus? Can you create lesson plans in line with Gatsby benchmarks for busy and budget-conscious teachers to use as part of their careers education?

Events: Ensure your brand presence for national awareness events such as Open Doors: Get into Construction, National Apprenticeship Week, and Careers Week. Have a presence on your careers website, and connect with local schools and colleges. Promote your brand at local and relevant events such as graduate fairs and local jobs fairs. Think about how your brand can stand out from the crowd at these events. If you bring a laptop featuring eye-catching video, it can draw the eye of event attendees and the video’s content can help them connect with your offer.

Early careers web presence: You are likely to have a careers and opportunities hub on your website. Consider how you are promoting your work culture and rewarding offer to young people who have been severely impacted by the pandemic and need to feel like they can thrive and belong. They’re not interested in remote working – they want to be in the room, even though they have financial constraints that could impact travel, and they want to make friends at work and connect with peers whilst being mentored to build skills and confidence. Consider focusing on perks and what you offer, not solely job requirements, in your early career job descriptions. This helps to increase the confidence of young people documented to have increased levels of  anxiety, and helpw them convert to successful applicants. Ensure you have FAQs, as there is no such thing as a silly question – and young people will be full of questions. Explore a tone that conveys professionalism imbued with warmth and plain, simple language.

Marketing: In a world saturated with social media and AI, young people crave authenticity. They also connect strongly with video. Ensure your video marketing helps them trust your brand and see you as a progressive employer. Help them believe that you have strong values and place young people at the heart of what you do. They are not an afterthought – they are the future.

Visibility changes perception

Over the past few years, Mediorite has worked closely with the sector, helping to tell the real stories behind the headlines through videos that attract and engage target audiences, including hard-to-reach young people.

Through video storytelling, case studies, and youth-led content, we’ve seen first-hand how visibility changes perception. When young people see people like them thriving in the sector, the conversation shifts from “I didn’t know this was for me” to “How do I get in?”

 Gen Z have told us what they want from employers, and our diverse young production teams have been helping construction businesses showcase opportunities and work culture in a way that feels inspiring and authentic. In the world of skills building and early careers, our video marketing for the Restart Stronger campaign with Regent College London – which turned student stories into social impact – generated over 4.5 million impressions.

We have partnered with organisations including The Housing Forum, Wates and Willmott Dixon to tell stories about Skills gaps, Future careers and Social value in action helping to amplify their message that construction is not a last resort! It is a future-facing, skilled, and rewarding career choice for young people.

Seize the opportunity

In early 2026, that opportunity to change perceptions scales up even further. Build UK has its  Open Doors initiative, taking place in March 2026. Open Doors | Get into Construction is a national effort to open up construction sites, offices, and projects to young people and career changers.

“Open Doors delivered by Build UK is a unique way of showing what a career in construction looks like, particularly at a time when over one million young people find themselves not in employment, education or training. By opening the doors to live sites and workplaces, we can challenge perceptions and inspire young talent to pursue any one of over 180 different roles available in the industry, which might otherwise feel out of reach.” Tamsin Parkes, Open Doors Project Manager at Build UK

Combined with National Apprenticeship Week in February, the industry has a unique, concentrated window to show young people that the construction sector opens doors to a huge array of possibilities that defy outdated stereotypes. We need to seize the opportunity to;

– Reach thousands of young people  

– Share consistent, inspiring messages  

– Showcase real pathways into work  

Youth unemployment at this scale is a national emergency, but it is also a call to action. Construction has the reach, purpose and long-term opportunity to change lives at scale, while helping to deliver a more sustainable and more resilient future. The challenge is not a lack of roles, but a lack of visibility. Saul Humphrey, Senior Vice President Chartered Institute of Building & Professor of Sustainable Construction Anglia Ruskin University

The opportunity is there, but only if the message cuts through.

How Mediorite can help

We are specialists in engaging young people through video, not just talking about them, but working with them. This includes:

– 🎥 Paid work experience placements on every shoot

– 🤝 Crews trained to make young people feel comfortable and confident  

– ✂️ A young, diverse editing team who understand what content actually resonates  

– 📱 Storytelling designed for the platforms young people use every day  

We don’t just amplify industry voices. We bring young people into the process itself.