Last night we held an official launch for the second edition of The Careers Leader Handbook.

We spent the day running a workshop for over 30 careers leaders based on the book. This was a fascinating day where we learnt as much as we taught. It was a great to be surrounded by so many people who are doing the job and who were able to reflect on its joys and challenges and to be able to think creatively about how careers leadership might evolve over the next few years.

In the evening we were privileged to be joined by Oli de Botton the CEO of the Careers & Enterprise Company join us and say a few kind words about the book. We were also joined by many of our friends and the great and the good of the schools careers world.

The first edition of the book was published in 2018 and so the publication of the second edition gave us a great opportunity to reflect on how far we have come in the last five year. I’m normally focused on what is wrong with the system, but it is also important to reflect on real progress. Careers leadership and the Gatsby Benchmarks are now well supported by statutory guidance and embedded into schools across the country. This was not the case five years ago and recognition needs to go out to everyone who has made this happen from people working in Westminster to those actually delivering career guidance in schools. Hopefully The Careers Leaders Handbook has made a small contribution to this change, and hopefully the second edition will continue to support the next generation of careers leaders.

In the second edition we have updated the book to reflect the changes in the policy, educational and economic context in which careers leaders are now working. We have also described the new and addition forms of support, resources and other help that are now available to careers leaders and reflected on new evidence and what we have learnt about careers leadership over the last five years. In addition we’ve also added some new material on careers work in special schools and with SEND young people, provided some thoughts on the use of the book outside of England, and done some work to tighten up the material in the first edition and improve its readability.

If you haven’t got a copy of The Careers Leader Handbook, then you can buy it today from the Trotman website. It makes a great Christmas present for the careers leader in your life!