expected of youngsters; it's almost as if we believe that they are born with the right skills -or perhaps we feel it's the responsibility of parents -- which is strange when you realise that it's these same parents that businesses have to invest so much time, effort and money in! Of course, the main reasons that we don't coach our young people in this critical area are both financial and resource driven - high quality coaching is expensive, skilled coaches are in high demand in the business sector - and teachers are stretched to the max delivering the current curriculum. Is There Really a Problem? The CBI's report on functional skills quoted employers as saying that they were "genuinely more interested in attitude" than scores in an exam. They warned that many young people lacked a good manner with customers, the ability to turn up on time to work and were unable to take responsibility for themselves and their appearance. Major national employers are publicly bemoaning the current state of the pool from which they have to recruit. Sir Terry Leahy, former Chief Executive of Tesco and Sir Stuart Rose, outgoing Chairman of Marks & Spencer, have both spoken about the difficulty of finding literate and numerate recruits. As well as being able to apply mathematics, English and ICT to real life, employers need staff with "soft" skills that are harder to teach and difficult to examine. Many schools already do what they can, within the constraints of budget and