Rocket Science held an event on how to build finanical resilience in young people in May, find out more about the discussions, learning and access event notes and presentations.

 

Building financial resilience in people of all ages is critical to help them manage their working lives now and in the future.  Traditionally much of the support provided to help people manage their money and debt has been as a one off intervention, usually at a point of crisis.  However if people are to survive the challenges of managing their income when they are in insecure or low paid employment they are really going to need to have good financial education.

Last year Rocket Science was commissioned by four charities; Centrepoint, National Skills Academy for Financial Services, Quaker Social Action and Shelter Scotland to conduct an evaluation of their financial capability projects funded through the Money Advice Service What Works Fund.

The projects were testing new ideas and approaches to building financial capability, two of which focused on building the skills and offer for vulnerable young people and those facing transition.  One is working with families through coaching and training to develop a family approach to money management and the other has supported health care professionals in their work with people facing a combination of health and money challenges.

The event brought the learning from the evaluations, published this month, to a non-financial capability audience, including funders, commissioners and organisations working with people to improve their employment, education and life chances.

Discussions revealed that people still find talking about money or thinking ahead really hard to do.  Some of this is down to a lack of education, learnt behaviours (from parents) and in many cases being in a place where considerations about money management are just not a priority.

 

This means that people will only ask for help when they are in crisis.  Many services are designed and funded to provide one-off support, rather than as part of an on-going offer.  Often services also tend to resolve issues for people rather than giving them the skills and confidence to do it themselves.

These projects have looked at ways in which you can build better attitudes towards money management and in turn create behavioural change.

A key learning point has been the need to have an on-going trusted relationship with an advisor and recognition that people often face multiple transitions, meaning that good intentions can be derailed by life events and impact on mental health.

The main take away point for me, was that financial education needs to be recognised as a key life skill.  Importantly, we need to ensure that this becomes integral to the support we provide people of all ages to manage their personal and working lives.

The notes from the event can be found here Financing and planning for an uncertain future event note May 2018, alongside the  Presentation slides and details of the organisations who presented Information and contact details.

If you would like to find out more about our work in this area, please get in touch.

Caroline

caroline.masundire@rocketsciencelab.co.uk

 

Caroline is an Associate Director at Rocket Science based in our London office.  You can check out her profile here.