Business Retention Project Featured in Joplin Globe

The Business section of the Joplin Globe featured an article on the WIB's Business Retention Project and its integration with the economic development strategy for the City of Carl Junction. The December 12 article highlights Carl Junction's focus on the needs of the existing business base and how city officials are collaborating with the WIB's project to provide deploy effective economic development strategy. The article appears in the Globe's print edition of page B1 and can be found online. For more on the Business Retention project, check out the WIB's website.

Save the Date! Workforce Summit set for January 31st

The future of Southwest Missouri’s economic prosperity is in its workforce. The region’s annual conference on improvement of the workforce for local businesses and communities is planned for January 31, 2007 in Joplin. Titled, “The Workforce Summit of Southwest Missouri,” the half-day conference will debut new research and workforce improvement solutions for business executives and community leaders. The theme for this year’s event centers around “Workforce Innovation as a Competitive Asset." More details will be released in early December here on the blog and at the WIB's website.

WIB Adopts Best Practices for Performance Impact

One of the key themes identified in the WIB Benchmarking Project is nature of high-performing WIBs to focus at a higher strategic level. One of many tools to help manage this organizaitonal priority at model Workforce Boards is the use of Consent Agenda to optimize the meeting process.

Accountability is one of the key strategic values of the Southwest Missouri WIB. As such, fudiciary and program responsibility will always remain on the WIB’s radar screen. The use of the Consent Agenda tool helps the WIB meet this responsibility efficiently while keeping the focus on strategic importance related to economic and workforce development for the region.

At its October 25th meeting, the WIB formally adopted a rule of order to utilize the Consent Agenda process at future meetings. In short, Consent Agenda consolidates routine, operational issues into one brief action at each Board meeting. The Executive Committee populates the consent agenda each month and all items are sent well in advance for members to review ahead of the meeting. If all is in order, the items advance as one approval. However, if members feel an item needs further discussion, items may be pulled individually and placed on the regular agenda while allowing other items to pass normally.

In addition to consent agenda, other measures were approved at the October WIB meeting to improve efficiency and effectiveness. The WIB re-organized its committee structure, eliminating basically all standing committees with the exception of the Executive Committee and the Youth Council. The Executive Committee will oversee the consent agenda as well as routine operational matters of personnel and finance as needed. The Youth Council was combined with the Youth Outreach Workforce Partnership of the Joplin Area Chamber of Commerce earlier this year as a joint effort to advance strategic issues of the emerging youth workforce.

The new structure emphasizes “workgroups” to carry-out strategic initiatives on an as-needed, project-driven basis. Unlike standing committees alone, the workgroups have a set start and end date with specific tasks and specific performance mandates accountable to the Board. As a result, full Board meetings will now be held every other month as opposed to monthly with meetings that focus on strategy, performance, and other big-picture issues.

Board members and staff alike are excited about the new structure and the realm of opportunities that lay ahead for the organization to make even greater impacts on economic development and prosperity for Southwest Missouri. Visit our website for more information on the WIB’s organizational chartering efforts

One-Stop Business Services Staff Trained for Occupational Analysis Projects

Business Services Staff from the Missouri Career Center joined together with WIB staff on November 21st to participate in a half-day training session to prepare for the rollout of the WorkKeys® Estimator occupational analysis tool as a valuable new service to business customers throughout Southwest Missouri. Steve Anderson from ACT®, the parent organization for WorkKeys® delivered the training and help local staff strategize on how to maximize the effectiveness of WorkKeys as part of the WIB’s Career Readiness Credential initiative.

Southwest Missouri’s approach with the WorkKeys® Estimator will help facilitate business customers in their recruiting, training, and development plans. Occupational profiles are analyzed and compared with local jobs to help businesses estimate the skill levels needed for top performance. Varying levels of occupational profiling are available. For jobs that need more complex analysis incorporated with high-stakes hiring decisions, the Alliance for Business Consulting and Development can take referrals from the Career Center.

For more on WorkKeys Estimator, contact Tracy Lemmons or Jasen Jones at the Joplin Career Center, (417) 629-3000.

Save the Date: MSSU Economic Summit Planned for April 2007

As reported in the newsletter from the Regional Economic Development Center at Missouri Southern State University (MSSU), their first-ever Regional Economic Summit is set for the last Friday in April. The event kicks off at 9:00 a.m. on the MSSU campus with world-renowned futurist Erik Peterson of the Center for International and Strategic Studies in Washington, DC. Mr. Pterson is the director of the widely admired Seven Revolutions futures project that examines the world economy and how to prepare for it.

The summit will feature break-out sessions on economic development nuts and bolts with legislators and professionals, sessions on the arts as development tools, the future of water quality and availability, international business in our region, and strategies to preserve our environment while accomodating development. Kansas Governor Kathleen Sebelius and Missouri Governor Matt Blunt are invited guests to address the Summit.

Brochures announcing the summit are being prepared for distribution in early 2007. Dr. Tom Simpson heads up the Regional Economic Development Center at MSSU. He may contacted by phone at 417-625-3016 or by email to simpson-t@mssu.edu.

National Survey Shows Gaps in Employable Skills Among American Workers

A new study conducted by The Conference Board, Corporate Voices for Working Families, The Partnership for 21st Century Skills, and The Society for Human Resource Management further validates a local WIB strategic priority in boosting the skills and employability of job seekers and incumbent workers.

Are They Really Ready to Work is an in-depth study of the corporate perspective on the readiness of new entrants into the U.S. workforce by level of educational attainment. The study includes results from both an in-depth survey conducted during April and May 2006 and interviews with a sampling of a dozen HR and other senior executives.

Among the most important skills cited by the more than 400 employers that participated in the research include: Professionalism/Work Ethic, Oral and Written Communications, Teamwork/Collaboration, and Critical Thinking/Problem Solving. A workforce readiness report card is included which provides a summary of the basic knowledge and applied skills that are either "deficient" or "excellent" in those areas that employer respondents rate as "very important".

Research like this is helpful to the Workforce Investment Board by affirming local strategy efforts in improving the soft and basic skills of Southwest Missouri's workforce. Local initiatives, such as the Opportunity Outlook report, and the Work Readiness Credential demonstrate the WIB's direction in answering the market demands of businesses in our region.

WIB Selected for National Business Learning Partnership Project

The Workforce Investment Board of Southwest Missouri was one of 39 groups selected nationwide to participate in the National Business Learning Partnership (NBLP) through the U.S. Department of Labor’s Employment and Training Administration. NBLP is a breakthrough opportunity for the WIB that will enhance its position through protege-mentor consulting and open doors for high profile federal grants and projects.

NBLP pairs WIBs that have proven track records with areas seeking assistance on particular issues. Through this peer-to-peer learning structure, workforce practitioners learn from one another and replicate best practices across the system. This peer-to-peer learning approach helps transform workforce investment boards so they are truly a player in developing and implementing regional economic growth strategies.

Southwest Missouri’s proposal to participate in NBLP leverages powerful regional initiatives and affiliations such as the Four State Health Professions Consortium and the Missouri-Arkansas Partnership. The true labor market comprises the crossroads of four state corners with both challenges and opportunities. The WIB desires to replicate its impact beyond political borders to become a more effective workforce intermediary. As the WIB builds on its successful economic development foundation, the integration of economic development and workforce partners in neighboring Arkansas, Kansas, and Oklahoma together with Southwest Missouri will provide strategic synergies and positioning to leverage local resources and collaborate on future projects utilizing an innovative, cross-state regional approach.

The National Business Learning Partnership (NBLP) presents the ideal learning and development venue for Workforce Boards and other economic development collaborations that are truly on the verge of greatness. As a prospective protégé, the Southwest Missouri Workforce Investment Board has embraced the next round of the NBLP opportunity to be paired with mentor organizations of similar size, geographic scope, and like-minded drive to innovate and succeed.

For the NBLP, the WIB has identified the Strong and Sustained Strategic Regional Partnerships and the Talent Development Strategies Driving Regional Economic Competitiveness categories as the two with the most synergistic alignment with the WIB’s current position and future prospects for regional impact. While these are separate and unique categories, they closely share the regional development focus to create the impact desired by the WIB.

WIB Executive Director, Jasen Jones, and Career Center Business Representative, Tracy Lemmons, will represent Southwest Missouri in a kick-off training event and match meeting set for November 1-3 in Denver, CO. For more information on NBLP and how it fits with the WIB, visit our website. Frequent updates on the NBLP project will be posted to the WIB’s blog. Information on previous NBLP projects may be found online at Workforce 3_1.