In 2021 over 400 young individuals started working in the UK golf industry for the first time with over 250 golf clubs benefiting from the Governments Kickstart initiative, introduced to the industry by Promote Golf and The LSS Group.
The initiative offers 16 to 24 years olds a 6-month work placement with 100% salary, uniform and training costs funded by the Government, and to-date golf clubs have enjoyed access to over £2.8 million in salary funding.
The scheme is no longer open to new applications, however, many Clubs that have already been awarded grants can still make use of them up until 31st March.
The “Kickstart” initiative was introduced as an opportunity for young people to get work experience, with the only qualifying criteria being that they were of the right age and were on Universal Credit.
David Reeves, Managing Director of Promote Golf, comments: “Young people are often caught between a rock and hard place when they first try to venture into the workplace. They often need experience to get a job but need a job to get experience. It’s a very difficult step, securing that first job, and the Kickstart scheme created roles that would allow inexperienced people to make this first move into the workplace.”
The scheme was rolled out by Promote Golf in partnership with the LSS Group, headed by Case Manager, Richard Pilbury, someone familiar with the inner workings of a golf club himself as a previous Golf Club General Manager with some 20+ years’ experience.
Richard says: “My operational background, along with David’s in Promote Golf, was important both in identifying where the opportunities for golf clubs lay, but also in communicating with the industry about the scheme. We must have both spoken to hundreds of Managers and Proprietors, it was very humbling to have so many Clubs willing to be involved in creating opportunities in golf for young people.”
As identified by the two, the most popular role for these Kickstart employees was seen in course maintenance and greenkeeping departments, helping the team prepare and maintain the course over the summer and autumn months.
In addition to greenkeepers, Kickstart employees were also taken on in front-of-house food and beverage roles, as well as kitchen, golf operations and administrative positions.
The first tranche of Kickstart employees reached the end of their 6-month placement in the Autumn, but many have been retained by the clubs and given permanent contracts. It’s something David is rightly proud to highlight: “The correspondence we received from the golf clubs saying they’d taken on the Kickstarter permanently were so rewarding – and we had plenty of them. That was the real sense of achievement for me, knowing that we’d facilitated an opportunity for these young people, and they’d grasped it with both hands. It made the whole initiative, and the hard work behind it, totally worthwhile.”
In a year that’s seen so many challenges, it’s been a ‘good news’ story we are very confident that a number of these young people will now go on to have long and successful careers in the golf industry.
The scheme is now closed for new funding applications but remains open for golf clubs with unused grants wishing to take on new staff up to 31st March 2022.