In some families in the UK, the third generation might still be unemployed. This has created a new culture within families. The hard-to-reach unemployed do not volunteer for government employment programmes and are therefore not offered any job training or employment opportunities.

Sunderland City Council was not able to get the unemployed to work by using the existing procedures. They hired a service design company to take a different perspective on the problem and use service design methods and skills to reach and support individuals to get jobs.

The service design company was able to understand the cultural problems, and designed a new solution for how the long-term unemployed could interact with employment services. The long-term unemployed need to be engaged in their local communities by people who understand their situations. By bringing together a coordinated approach involving a number of specialist community organisations covering mental health, drug rehabilitation and careers, the unemployed felt they were being understood and served properly. Once the unemployed feel well and socially stable, they are promoted into job training and then into jobs.

To date, the scheme has provided support to over 800 people, 200 of whom have already found employment. On average, it costs £62,000 to get a person on incapacity benefit into the work world, while the average cost per individual of the Make it Work pilot is less than £5,000.

Source: http://www.livework.co.uk/our-work/Sunderland-City-Council