The best portrait photographers are those who spend time getting to know you. I once had the privilege of having mine done by David Bayley for GQ for a feature on people who have shaped Britain’s dining scene. I turned up at his studio at the allotted time, and we sat on a sofa chatting for the best part of an hour. What I didn’t realise then about what he was doing was that he was looking inside me, to get beyond the character brief the editor would have given him, to decide how he sees me.
Just as our hour-long schedule was coming to the end, he stood up and said: “Right – I’ve got you now. Stand over there.” A couple of minutes later I was done (Chef Nobu Matsuhisa, a much more worthy candidate, was up next).
Some years later, a session with another brilliant photographer called Franklyn Rogers was gifted to me by an art gallery in Shoreditch which I was just completing my term of chair as. He spent even longer – more than two hours – getting to know me. One of his questions was who in my life had made me the angriest and instantly I said my school careers adviser. I had applied to a sixth form college to do my A levels and when I arrived for my interview, I was given my file and asked to wait and pass it on to the lecturer who would meet me.
Naturally, I opened the file and read the report from Mr Williams, my school’s careers officer. I couldn’t believe what I read: “He’s coming to you about A levels but frankly, he won’t pass his O-levels so I wouldn’t waste time with him. He’s trouble.” Luckily the college let me in, I then got into the LSE and started to do the stuff I ended up doing.
There are many people with similar stories, my favourite being that of Sir Tim Martin, whose careers officer told him he’d get nowhere in life. If you’ve ever wondered why is called giant pub chain JD Weatherspoon, it’s because that was the name of his career officer who did the same to him.
Sir Paul Macartney has a new album out today at the ripe old age of 83. In an interview in today’s New York Times, he’s quoted as saying: “I’m just some kid who went to school, went to the careers master who said to me, you know, ‘You haven’t got qualifications and, there’s not … I don’t see a great future for you.’”
Franklyn Rogers told me a woman he’d recently done a shoot with was told at school the best she could hope for in life was to work in the local factory. She became the vice chair of The World Bank. I suggested Frankly stage an exhibition titled: “People who refused to fail”.
This morning we’re all reading that for the first time, over one million young people in Britain can’t find a job or training despite 84% saying they want to. This costs the state £124 billion a year in benefits and associated costs – more than we spend on education.
For decades I’ve watched young people turn up for job interviews late, not really know anything about the company they’ve come to, don’t look their interviewer in the eye. About 15 years ago, I found out that only 44% of graduates from the University of East London ended up with graduate level jobs. I got to know the then Vice Chancellor there and asked him why he didn’t have preparation for employment and the learning of soft skills as core curricular activities so that the people from under-privileged backgrounds who typically attended there could have a greater chance of making it in life. His answer was – and I’m not kidding – “Iqbal, it’s not my role as an educationalist to teach people how to get jobs.”
Back to my old school. Early in my 20s, I became a published author and had a rising media career. One day I got a call from my old headmaster congratulating me on my early career gains and asking me if I’d like to become a governor of the school.
“On one condition,” I said. “Is Mr Williams still there?”
“Yes, and he’s also the teacher governor.”
“Then I’m coming.”
I spent most of that first meeting staring at Mr Williams. At the end we were all invited to the pub next door where I quickly pulled to him to one side and asked him how many young peoples’ lives he had ruined by writing references like the one he had done of me. His reply made me realise something I’d never considered. His main job was as the school’s PE teacher, and this role had been bolted on. No training, no targets – just a role the school was obliged to assign to someone.
If there are so few jobs around, why aren’t we using a bit of that £124bn to subsidise employers properly to take young people on? Why not use a fraction of that to help young people develop their entrepreneurial ambitions and become self-employed?
And why not use a bit of that to create an educational system that’s fit for purpose to give young people solid paths to be the leaders, workers and wealth creators they’re desperate to become and who our future needs them to become?