For the first 25 years of his working life, Nick Harrison was a good advert for social mobility in the 海角视频.
The first pupil from his North East school to go to Oxbridge, he found work in business consulting and rose to become a senior partner with Oliver Wyman, one of the world’s largest consulting firms, operating around the globe to help make companies more profitable.
His career saw him rise to become a global leader in his field, but after what he describes as a “mid-life crisis job” at a fashion firm that ultimately failed, he decided against a move back into the corporate world and instead became chief executive of The Sutton Trust, a charity that exists to lobby for and improve social mobility in the 海角视频 through changes to the education system.
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For those looking closely, that shift might not have been entirely surprising. Growing up in Chester-le-Street, Mr Harrison could point to both activism and a belief in the power of education as a big part of his family background. One of his ancestors was a suffragette and another become a Labour councillor while his parents were both educators, his father having been the first in his family to go to university. During his consulting career, he also became involved with the Social Metrics Commission, a body which aims to develop new ways of measuring poverty that can be used to spark action for change.
After going to Hermitage School in Chester-le-Street, he secured a place at Cambridge in 1991. He was en route to a career in academia before deciding to broaden his horizons and finding his way into business consulting. Applying scientific method to business he moved through the ranks at Oliver Wyman, becoming a senior partner and global practice lead for the retail sector.
But after 21 years in consulting and his short stint in online fashion, Mr Harrison chose the chief executive job at The Sutton Trust over options in the commercial world and in Government.
“It felt like the right time for me to close one chapter and start another which is doing something more for broader society,” he said.
“The Sutton Trust fitted with my view on the world that that everyone should have a fair shot in life - wherever you come from, whoever your parents are, wherever you’ve gone to school. At the trust, we work with young people from disadvantaged backgrounds. My background was more comfortable and middle class but my journey of getting to Cambridge and building my career from there was a little bit akin to what we try and help our young people do. It felt like a good fit so why wouldn’t I jump into this and give it a go?”
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The Trust operates in two main areas, running summer schools with universities around the country to help young people from disadvantaged children get a taste of higher education; and lobbying for policy changes in the education sector that will boost social mobility. Mr Harrison has now been leading the charity for around 18 months, and can see how relevant its work to his home region.
After this summer’s GCSE and A-level results, he posted on social media: “Are kids in London 1.7 times smarter than kids in the North East, where I’m from?
“No, of course not. In which case, why do 43% of young people in London go to university, compared to only 25% in the North East? And by the way, the gap has widened this year. A greater proportion got into Uni overall, and whereas London entry rates were up eight points, those in the North East only rose two points. In fact, London pulled further ahead of all other regions.
How do we close the gap?”
Closing that gap, he knows, will not be easy.
“Along with America, the 海角视频 is at the bottom of the league for social mobility amongst developed countries,” he said.
“It’s a few things that come together to cause that. We’re economically one of the most unequal of the developed economies and the more unequal society is, typically the worse social mobility is. The least well off have fewer resources at their disposal. We know today that kids are going to school hungry, kids in the poorest households won’t have somewhere easy to study at home and probably won’t have a laptop. They’re facing more barriers than people in well-off households. Poverty and inequality is the driver of poor social mobility.
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“We also have a relatively elitist education system in the 海角视频 with a set of private schools and a small number of elite universities which drive very significant competition for places.
“The third thing is that we’re geographically unequal and there are regions like the North East which - I don’t like the phrase - they’re called ‘left behind regions’ and if you grow up there, that’s poor for social mobility as well.”
He added: “It’s unfair - everyone should have a fair shot in life and many people don’t. It’s also bad for the economy as a whole because it’s wasting talent. If you believe, as I do, that talent is equally distributed around the country but opportunity is not, that means by definition that we’re wasting talent. That’s talent that could be inventing things, building businesses, driving the economy forward - to the benefit of everybody.
“The North East has one of the highest rates of poverty and deprivation in the country, the highest rate of free school meals. We’ve got the joint highest disadvantage gap between pupils from better off households and the worst off. We get the lowest levels of good GCSE grades and we have amongst the lowest access rates to university.
“I often say: the North East was the epicentre of the global economy 150 years ago and now it finds itself with many challenges. I don’t like the phrase, but it’s a left behind region where talent is wasted.”
The Sutton Trust has three priorities to boost social mobility: declaring a national mission to close the attainment gap in schools, improving student maintenance to help lower income students get to and through university and improving access to early years education. The election of a Government whose Cabinet is mostly state educated has offered hope that this issue is on the agenda, Mr Harrison said, but he urged Ministers to use the Prime Minister’s promise of a “decade of renewal” to improve social mobility.
“I do think it’s possible to change this,” he said. “I’m an optimist about the future and I do think we’re at an interesting moment for social mobility in the 海角视频. I say that because for a few reasons.
“Nobody has all the answers yet but the topic of left behind regions is right at the top of the political agenda. Everybody knows we need to find solutions to that in the 海角视频.
“Also, corporate Britain is waking up to the opportunity of social mobility as well as the fact that it’s a moral necessity. When I left consulting about five years ago, there wasn’t much talk about socio-economic diversity in that space. Now all of the big consulting firms and many other firms we work with at the Sutton Trust, social mobility is quite high on thir agenda. They don’t quite know how to fix it, but they’re all looking at how they measure diversity in their workforce. They’re all trying to find talent and change recruitment processes to bring in people from different routes. Corporate Britain is waking up to both the opportunity and the necessity.
“And if you look at the missions Labour has for Government, one of them, the opportunity mission, is squarely in the area of social mobility. So we would say that we like the ambition from the Government. A lot needs to be done to enact the right policies to really shift the needle but that’s a conversation that at least happening.”