Parents Now Start Thinking About Their Child’s Career at Five, Not Fifteen

Parents of young children are thinking about their child’s working life a decade earlier than the generation before them did. New research puts the most common starting point at four to six years old, the Reception and Year 1 stage, where parents of today’s young adults mostly began somewhere between 15 and 18. Nearly two fifths of that older group now wish they had started sooner.

Key takeaways:

• Three in ten parents who have thought about it began when their child was four to six; 58 per cent began during the primary school years.
• Half of parents with children now aged 19 to 24 started at 15 to 18, and 38 per cent wish they had begun earlier.
• 78 per cent expect artificial intelligence to change the jobs available to their child, and 49 per cent do not know which skills that child will need.

A Decade Earlier Than the Last Generation

The research covers 2,500 UK parents across two surveys commissioned by BMW Group UK, one of parents raising children now and one of parents whose children have already reached early adulthood. Setting the two side by side is what makes it interesting, as it measures a change in behaviour rather than a mood.

Of the 2,000 parents who have already started thinking about their child’s working life, 58 per cent began during the primary years, between four and 11. The single most common answer was four to six, chosen by three in ten, which is the age at which a child is learning to read.

The comparison group looks nothing like that. Among 500 parents of 19 to 24-year-olds, half began when their child was 15 to 18, around GCSE results and sixth form. Almost two fifths of them, 38 per cent, now say they wish they had started earlier.

There is appetite for schools to reflect that shift. More than three quarters of parents, 76 per cent, think primary school children should get more chances to visit workplaces and try practical activities such as engineering and technology, rather than meeting that world for the first time at secondary school.

What Is Driving It

The anxiety in the numbers is specific. More than three quarters of parents, 78 per cent, expect artificial intelligence to change the jobs available to their child in a significant way. Almost half, 49 per cent, say they do not know which skills that child will need to succeed.

Nearly two thirds, 63 per cent, think it will be harder for a child to find a job in ten years than it is now. Almost three quarters, 72 per cent, say they would feel more confident about their child’s prospects if employers told them more about what is coming.

That combination explains the earlier start better than any enthusiasm for careers advice does. Parents are not planning a career at five. They are reacting to a working world they cannot predict, and starting earlier is the one thing within their control.

The routes parents favour have shifted with it. Asked what they would like their child to consider at the end of secondary school, 48 per cent said university and 39 per cent an apprenticeship, with full-time employment on 35 per cent. For a generation of parents who were steered almost automatically towards degrees, an apprenticeship sitting nine points behind university is a notable change.

The Campaign Behind the Research

The surveys were commissioned to launch Apprentice 2036, a BMW Group UK campaign aimed at children who could be applying for their first apprenticeship a decade from now. Its centrepiece is The Spark Lab, an electric vehicle engineering workshop built for five and six-year-olds, which took its first group of Year 1 pupils from Grazeley Church of England Primary School in Berkshire through batteries, charging and designing an EV of their own.

The commercial interest is plain enough. BMW Group employs around 9,000 people in the UK across plants at Oxford, Swindon, Hams Hall and Goodwood, a headquarters at Farnborough and its retailer network, and currently has nearly 500 apprentices. A manufacturer that needs engineers in 2036 has reason to talk to their parents in 2026.

Sam Jarvis, HR Director for UK and Ireland at BMW Group UK, said: “Parents can see that technology is changing working life, so it is understandable that many are beginning to think about their children’s futures earlier.

“The vehicles today’s five and six-year-olds could one day help to design, build, maintain or explain will be very different from those we know now. What we do know is that we will need curious, creative and highly skilled people to help create and sell the cars of the future.

“Apprenticeships combine recognised qualifications with practical experience and the opportunity to earn a salary from day one. They give young people skills that can serve them throughout their careers while helping businesses develop the talent they will need in the future.

“Through Apprentice 2036 and The Spark Lab, we want to make engineering and technology feel exciting and accessible, and show children that they can have a place in their future.”

Christine Armstrong, a future of work expert who contributed to the campaign, put the case for starting young without asking children to decide anything.

“Introducing children to the world of work at five or six seems early, but it isn’t about asking them to choose a career. It’s about them and their parents seeing different kinds of jobs and workplaces, noticing what fascinates them and broadening their understanding of the opportunities available to them.

“People joke that younger generations all want to become YouTubers or influencers, but it makes sense when those are some of the careers they see most often. There are thousands of jobs and routes into work that children, and parents, simply may not know exist.

“As the world of work changes, one of the most useful things parents and employers can do is broaden children’s horizons by helping them explore what different careers can look like. Trying to choose a job is a daunting challenge. But initiatives like BMW Group UK’s Spark Lab can help make that thinking feel tangible from an early age.”

For a parent reading this with a child already at secondary school, the practical takeaway sits in Armstrong’s middle point rather than in the workshop. Children aim at the jobs they can see, and most of the working world is invisible to them. Widening that view costs nothing and does not require a car maker to run a workshop.