A new report launched by The Youth of Today project, in which the Young Foundation is a consortium partner, asks: What is youth leadership? Why does it matter? And how can we support and nurture the development of our young leaders? Taking the lead critically investigates youth leadership, bringing together experts' views and best practice from around the world, offering valuable lessons for both practitioners and policymakers.

The research provides a robust grounding in best practice for the work of The Youth of Today programme. Taking the lead is The Youth of Today publication which has been written by the Young Foundation. It is the first of three publications to be written for The Youth of Today's programme of global research into youth leadership. The next publication, due out in March 2010, will look at information and communication technologie as tools to enable youth leadership.

The report was authored by Lauren Kahn, Sarah Hewes and Rushanara Ali.