Untapped: The Programme Dismantling the Class Ceiling and Rewriting the Story of Social Mobility in the UK

Untapped is a groundbreaking programme that exposes Britain’s false meritocracy by uncovering and elevating hidden talent.

LONDON , UNITED KINGDOM, October 17, 2025 /EINPresswire.com/ -- In a country that still likes to call itself a meritocracy, Untapped arrives with a different message: Britain’s class system is alive, unwell, and quietly suffocating the nation’s talent. Co created by Jo Whight a woman who went from homelessness to the senior leadership, Untapped is a groundbreaking new programme built to unearth the extraordinary ability hiding in plain sight and to give it the platform, the confidence, and the structure to thrive. This isn’t a “diversity initiative.” It’s a blueprint for change.

By the age of 18, Jo Whight had lost her only parent, faced homelessness, and had no network or safety net to fall back on. “There was no one whispering, ‘You’ve got this,’” she recalls. “Just grit, survival, and a stubborn belief that life had to be more than just making it through.” She did more than make it through. Over the next twenty years, she built a career in financial services rising through senior roles in banking, operations, change, and diversity leadership. She led teams, delivered transformation, and became, in her words, “the calm head in chaos.” But with every step up, she noticed something that she couldn’t unsee: The rooms she was entering were missing people like her.

Social mobility in the UK has been stagnant for more than a decade. According to the UK Government’s State of the Nation Report (2024), those from working-class backgrounds are 60% less likely to reach senior leadership positions, and when they do, they earn on average £6,700 less per year than their more privileged peers in the same roles. And the problem isn’t ability. It’s access.

Only 34% of people from working-class backgrounds currently enter professional occupations barely changed in ten years while those from privileged families make up 72% of senior leaders across finance, law, and media. As Jo puts it: “We keep calling it a talent shortage. It’s not. It’s a talent blind spot.” Untapped was born from that realisation. It’s a bold new programme designed to help organisations uncover, support, and accelerate the potential of employees from low-opportunity backgrounds—those who’ve had to work twice as hard for half the recognition.

For organisations, Untapped delivers a strategic, data-backed framework for social mobility. It helps leaders move beyond the rhetoric of “diversity” and into the measurable, lasting transformation of systems, culture, and opportunity.

For individuals, it’s part mentorship, part leadership accelerator, part mirror. It gives participants the confidence, clarity, and community to rewrite their own professional story to turn quiet resilience into visible leadership.

In Jo’s words: “Not all talent gets a seat at the table. Untapped changes that, by redesigning the table and giving people the belief and confidence they belong there.”

Britain has a haemorrhaging potential. Studies from the Social Mobility Foundation estimate that the UK loses £19 billion in GDP growth every year due to stalled social mobility. The class pay gap persists across industries from law to tech to media costing individuals and organisations alike. And in a time when companies are weary of corporate jargon, Untapped offers something rare: results. It demands more from leadership. It insists on data, accountability, and systems change. It challenges the idea that inclusion is a moral gesture, reframing it instead as a strategic advantage. “When people from working-class or low-income backgrounds rise, the entire organisation rises with them,” says Jo. “It’s not charity it’s good business.”

Untapped marks a decisive break from the corporate status quo. It isn’t a workshop or awareness session. It’s a movement. One rooted in experience, evidence, and an unshakable belief that talent is everywhere even if opportunity isn’t. It’s already being piloted with organisations across finance, tech, and education sectors each reporting profound shifts in how they see and support internal talent. As one early participant described it: “Untapped didn’t just change how I work. It changed how I see myself.”

Untapped is the flagship programme of Red Lotus Consultancy, founded by Jo Whight a former senior banking leader turned social mobility strategist. Red Lotus partners with organisations to turn inclusion from a slogan into a structure through coaching, strategy, story, and systems change.

Its mission is simple, but revolutionary: To build a world where success is about skill, not social class.
Where people don’t just survive in the workplace they bloom.

Alfie Brown
A-B MEDIA
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