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Two primary approaches have been used to study employment brands and branding. First, there is a long history of the study of organizational attraction. Second, in the past 10–15 years, there has been growth in a hybrid stream of research combining branding concepts from the consumer psychology literature with I/O psychology frameworks of organizational attraction and applicant job search behavior. In this chapter, we take an entirely different approach and suggest that the theoretical models built around product/service brand knowledge can readily accommodate employment brands and branding without hybridizing the framework with I/O psychology. This merging of employment brand with product and service brands is accomplished simply by recognizing employment as an economic exchange between workers and employers and recognizing workers as cognitive and emotional beings that vary in their talents and have their own vectors of preferences for the employment offering. After developing a testable model of the components, antecedents, and consequences of employment brand knowledge, we review the existing employment brand and organizational attraction literature and identify multiple opportunities for additional research.

Kenya leads East Africa in creative goods export and enjoys high internet penetration. Therefore, identifying pathways, missed opportunities for accelerating job creation and development in the sector and strategies for mitigating youth-related challenges are essential. This paper therefore aims to examine the effects of digital media and the cultural and creative industry (CCI) on youth employment and economic development.

The document review and analysis data came from 45 scientific and 23 grey literature articles. While the lack of primary data is a study limitation, secondary data were drawn from the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development Statistics and the 2016–2022 entertainment and media outlook analysis. Microsoft Excel 2021 for Windows was used to analyze quantitative data and generate results.

Since the CCI sector is characterized by limited financial opportunities, low youth participation in the labor force and weak policy frameworks, success in the industry requires key pathways. These include investment in digital-led innovations, developing innovative models, building partnerships with the private sector, strategic investment by government in the potential creative industry sub-sectors and identifying successful scaling-up models.

Information gathered through this study is crucial to counter the youth unemployment challenge and strategy identification, which could be used in skills and capabilities development in the potential creative economy. Future researchers must explore how to apply the proposed creative capacity theoretical lens to inform research in the sector.

States it is widely recognised that, despite excellent higher education research and training expertise, the UK is generally weak in transferring this knowledge into marketable products (House of Lords, 1997). In particular, there is serious under‐utilisation of science and technology graduates by the increasingly important small and medium enterprise (SME) sector. The aim of this paper is to explore the potential for absorbing the “know‐how” of science and technology graduates into the SME sector. Special consideration will be given to the attitudes of these graduates towards SME employment, while business start‐ups as alternative career options are also explored. The data are derived from a survey of 250 Manchester‐based science and technology students. The paper concludes with relevant policy recommendations.

It is widely recognised that, despite excellent higher education research and training expertise, the UK is generally weak in transferring this knowledge into marketable products. In particular, there is serious under‐utilisation of science and technology graduates by the increasingly important small and medium enterprise (SME) sector. The aim of this paper is to explore the potential for absorbing the “know‐how” of science and technology graduates into the SME sector. Special consideration will be given to the attitudes of these graduates towards SME employment, while business start‐ups as alternative career options are also explored. The data are derived from a survey of 250 Manchester‐based science and technology students. The paper concludes with relevant policy recommendations.

The purpose of this paper is to consider the development of “Green” jobs in one region of the European Union, Scotland, where the government has sought to develop renewable and sustainable energy industries and associated employment.

The paper analyses selected secondary data and policy documents and conceptualises issues concerning employment in the renewable energy sector.

It analyses published data and projections on employment in renewable energy sectors, considering the reasons for the lower actual job creation. Many of the jobs in the renewable energy sector are likely to be high skilled, so there is need to support the development of low-skilled workers and job seekers so that they can enter and progress in the industry. Similarly there is a strong gender bias in the industry which may similarly reduce the entry and retention of the best staff and inhibit social equity.

The paper suggests that “Career first” recruitment and development policies are needed which emphasise improving both productivity and the “quality” and attractiveness of sustainable, long-term careers in the sector.

In addition to relying on general labour attraction policies and separate industry-specific skills initiatives for those already in work, more attention needs to be given to developing sustainable employment with career progression for people moving into, or already in, the industry.

The links between support for those moving into jobs and developing the skills of existing workers in sustainable industries have been under researched and this paper adds new conceptual developments, in terms of “Career” first approaches and empirical analysis of employment in renewable industries in Scotland.

In Australia, as in many other countries, refugees are over-represented in the ranks of the unemployed, under-employed and precariously employed and often become frustrated in their attempts to secure work. Despite the construction industry being a major potential source of employment for refugees, there has been a surprising lack of research into their experiences of securing work in the industry. Addressing this gap and also the general lack of voice for refugees in construction research, the aim of this paper is to explore the barriers refugees face in securing employment in the construction industry.

This paper reports a survey of refugees who have worked or attempted to seek work in the Australian construction industry.

Results show that the main barriers to securing employment in construction are: lack of local work experience; employer discrimination; employer failure to recognise previous qualifications, skills and experience and employers not understanding the challenges they face. Government employment agencies and systems are also perceived to be of limited value and overly complex, in contrast to the activities of not-for-profit support agencies.

While the research is limited to Australia, the findings contribute an important and missing refugee dimension to the emerging body of research on construction social procurement. They also contribute unique sector-specific insights into the broader debate about refugee resettlement and employment. Further research is needed in other national contexts.

Recommendations are made to address the barriers to employment identified including: initiatives to provide refugees with work experience in the industry; education to break-down negative stereotypes of refugees among employers; greater support for not-for-profits supporting refugees and reform of government and employment agency systems and procedures.

By enhancing understanding of the barriers to employment for refugees in construction and proposing solutions to reduce those barriers, this research contributes new insights into a growing global challenge of how we better integrate growing numbers of refugees into harmonious and prosperous societies.

The findings are important in facilitating the smoother integration of refugees into society. Beyond the moral imperative, there are significant social, cultural and economic benefits which successful refugee integration brings to host countries and industries like construction which in many countries are now being required to employ refugees in their workforce as a condition of public sector contracts.

The trends of growth in total product in Ceara and in each economic sector are shown in Table 1. For the sake of simplicity, we call “agriculture” all crop and cattle or fishing activities; “industry” includes manufacturing, construction, and utilities; and “services” includes all kinds of services, including private and public, economic services, and social services.

The purpose of this article is to study what platform-related user factors influence the employment potential of a lean platform for self-employed professionals.

The article employs the system data of a Dutch platform firm, which include consumers looking for painters (N = 17,224) and self-employed painters (N = 1,752) who pursue client acquisition by submitting proposals (N = 101,974). This data is analysed using non-parametric tests.

Study of this platform shows that the platform functions as a channel of acquisition for self-employed professionals. This lean platform enables matching of information of supply and demand, thereby facilitating processes of acquisition. The number of competitors, distance to a potential job and non-standard proposals are statistically significant factors that influence whether a consumer is interested in a proposal. Effect sizes are very small.

This platform is a two-way market for information about service jobs, which excludes a price setting mechanism. The findings of this study cannot be generalized to other forms of platforms.

The market for service professionals is very local; therefore, the platform firm may alter the algorithm to accommodate this. Self-employed professionals should approach using the platform in the same way as normal forms of acquisition.

This particular type of two-sided market is an extension of regular forms of acquisition by creating “weak ties” through the platform.

The article uses a unique data set to study the impact and limitations of digitalization of the (labour) market for service professionals.

An analysis is made of the effect of YTS participation on the subsequent employment and earnings of participants. It uses data from the first cohort of the England and Wales Youth Cohort Studies. These focus on a cohort of young persons who reached the minimum school‐leaving age in 1984 and were eligible for entry into the original one‐year version of YTS. The results indicate that participation is positively associated with subsequent employment and negatively associated with subsequent earnings.

Controversy in the literature exists over whether self-employment is driven by worker’s deliberate entrepreneurial choices (pull factors) or an indeliberate subsistence employment option (push factors) in developing countries. It is therefore very important to investigate whether the self-employed are the dynamic entrepreneurial group or the subsistence-oriented group. In this chapter, the authors examine the driving forces behind the plausible growth of self-employment in urban and rural Nigeria by analyzing the self-employment choices as a function of employment’s differences in predicted earnings, human capital, demographic and family characteristics. Using the 2010/2011 and 2012/2013 waves of the General Household Survey Panel data for Nigeria, this chapter utilizes the Random Effects Regression Models (OLS and Probit Models). This chapter finds that the predicted individual earning differences between self- and paid-employment has a negative significant effect on self-employment choices – contrary to developed countries’ evidence. In other words, overwhelmingly the poor are “entrepreneurs.” This therefore means that self-employment choice is driven by the necessity of survival – the subsistence self-employed groups rather than the dynamic entrepreneurial hypothesis. The implication of these finding is unique and interesting for an African country such as Nigeria where the self-employees are vulnerable to poverty and perhaps an involuntary employment option conditioned by economic failures.