Developed as part of the Careertech Challenge, this evaluation toolkit provides a simple step-by-step guide to developing realistic, proportionate and high-quality evaluations.

The future of work is changing, providing opportunities for new careers and novel ways of working. Changes to the world of work will be driven by long-term trends such as technological and demographic change as well as the ongoing impact of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Future skills requirements will increasingly emphasise interpersonal, higher-order cognitive skills (such as fluency of ideas and active learning) and systems skills (such as judgement and decision making). The future workforce will need a combination of broad-based and specialised knowledge and there is currently limited evidence of ‘what works’ to support people to build these skills and support them into new careers.

This evaluation toolkit has been developed by L&W based on our experience as the evaluation partner on the Nesta and Department for Education CareerTech Challenge in 2020/21. This was a £5.75 million programme to encourage bold solutions to improve people’s working lives and unlock employment opportunities for the future. From March 2020, L&W worked closely with 11 innovators to evaluate the effectiveness of their digital and online learning solutions in building career adaptability skills and learner motivation amongst people who are working in shrinking sectors and occupations.

The toolkit is designed to support delivery organisations, developers and providers to consider the best ways to evaluate online learning interventions designed to support adults to build skills that support their careers. Through a collection of case studies, checklists, templates and question banks, this toolkit provides advice on how to evaluate interventions with a step-by-step guide to developing realistic, proportionate and high quality plans for an evaluation.

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3 November 2026

The road to net zero: How far have we come?

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3 November 2026

UK risks missing Net Zero target owing to shortages of skills and workers

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2 November 2026

Thirty years of learning: change without progress? Adult Participation in Learning Survey 2026

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2 November 2026

Adults’ interest in learning is undimmed – but class inequalities mean three million lost learners

The UK’s longest-running survey of adult learning marks its 30th year with the finding that just 2 in 5 adults (43%) have engaged in learning in the last three years – a figure barely improved since 1996 (40%).

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2 November 2026

Adult Participation in Learning Survey

Our survey series, which began in 1996, provides a unique overview of how many adults take part in learning, their reasons for doing so or not doing so, and how this varies by group and area.

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28 October 2026

Responding to Autumn Budget 2026

Learning and Work Institute Chief Executive Stephen Evans responds to the Autumn Budget on 28 October 2026.

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28 October 2026

Tax bills and investment in skills: How can tax relief on training better support UK engineering and manufacturing?

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28 October 2026

A Skills Tax Credit for businesses could unlock £2.2 billion skills boost, including in sectors key to growth

Research from Learning and Work Institute (L&W) published today alongside the autumn budget finds that a Skills Tax Credit could produce a £2.2 billion boost to skills across the economy by incentivising more employer investment in training.

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22 September 2026

Building an AI-ready workforce: Creating a skills system that prepares UK knowledge workers for the AI transition

AI has transformative potential for the UK economy and could present a net uplift to productivity of up to £80 billion by 2035. Yet the UK workforce does not – yet – have the skills to successfully adopt and scale AI technologies in a truly transformative way.

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