What Works to Support Disadvantaged Groups Towards Employment? A Systematic Review

About the study

In November 2024, the Government published the Get Britain Working White Paper, which set out an ambition to achieve an employment rate of 80%. Part of this effort will involve supporting people with complex needs into work. This systematic review, commissioned by the Department of Work and Pensions (DWP), aimed to create a holistic picture of what interventions work to bring disadvantaged groups, specifically care leavers, ex-offenders, people experiencing homelessness, and individuals with substance misuse issues, closer to the labour market. The review also sought to understand how to deliver these interventions to achieve the best outcomes.

Key Findings

The review identified a wide range of interventions that can effectively support individuals from disadvantaged groups in their journey towards employment:

• Housing support, substance misuse treatment, peer mentoring and educational programs were seen to have a positive impact at earlier stages of the journey towards employment.
• For directly transitioning individuals into employment, the strongest evidence supported interventions explicitly designed for this purpose, like Individual Placement and Support (IPS) and various Employment Support programmes.
• Overall, multi component interventions that addressed more than one disadvantage tended to be more effective than those targeting a single issue. For example, housing interventions that also provide addiction or mental health support were generally more successful than those focusing solely on housing.
• The evidence for effective support of care leavers was weaker compared to the other groups. There were mixed conclusions on the impact of Independent Living Programmes (ILPs) and promising but limited evidence for extending care arrangements and fostering connections with family or caring adults.
• There was consensus in the literature that sensitive consideration of mental health was an essential component of any intervention aimed at disadvantaged populations.

Several limitations and gaps in the literature assessed were also identified:

• Most of the included evidence came from the USA and may not be directly transferable to a UK context.
• Many studies looked at populations experiencing multiple forms of disadvantage but didn’t attempt to disentangle the intervention’s effects by individual groups.

Methodology

This study used a systematic review methodology involving a rigorous and transparent process for searching, screening, quality appraisal, data extraction and synthesis of the evidence:

• Scoping phase – Led by a steering group consisting of DWP, the Ministry of Justice (MoJ), and the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government (MHLCG), this involved searching databases, consulting experts and engaging with charities to identify key literature and deepen understanding of the evidence base.
• Search strategy – academic literature was searched for using complex search strings applied to seven databases. Grey literature was identified by searching relevant organisations’ websites and consulting academics and stakeholders.
• Screening– screening was conducted both at title and abstract and full text according to a set of pre-determined inclusion and exclusion criteria. This left a total of 77 studies to be included in the review.
• Data extraction and analysis - A thematic framework guided the extraction of information on aims, interventions, and impact from included reviews. Data was then synthesised and organised according to the types of interventions, the evidence of impact and lessons for delivery for each of the four populations.