Anne Bailey

Following senior communications roles at Safeway and Suffolk County Council and running her own PR agency, Anne shifted her focus to education. She ran BT’s £10million CSR education programme before setting up Form the Future, a social enterprise that supports young people into employment. She’s been a judge for the Teaching Awards and a member of the Communication Trust Forum for Hello, the National Year of Communication. She developed training for schools to improve behaviour. She’s been on the boards of Papworth Hospital and the Eastern Academic Health Science Network, and is currently a member of the Regional Advisory Council for the Institute of Directors Eastern Region, Cambridgeshire Learning & Skills Committee and the Local Governing Body for Cambridge Academy for Science & Technology.

“The workplace is changing rapidly and finding people with the right talent and skills is businesses’ biggest challenge. My organisation, Form the Future, provides the interface between schools and business, supporting young people to move from education into employment. We help schools to achieve the Gatsby Benchmarks (for good careers guidance) by providing local labour market information, careers guidance and plenty of contact with employers.

Employers have an important part to play in driving up skills, which is essential if we’re to meet the demand for labour in our growing economy and increase productivity. Brexit, if it does restrict access to labour from Europe, makes it even more urgent to prepare young people with the skills needed by our growing industries. We strongly support the creation of an education and skills system that’s tailored for the needs of the region.”