By Joan Crigger
October 4, 2010

The U.S. Conference of Mayors Workforce Development Council held a technical assistance and training workshop on September 20, prior to its 22nd Annual Congressional Forum. The workshop, The New Normal: Doing More, Doing Better with Less, included Best Practices presentations by workforce development leaders from across the country.

Janet Sten, Chief of the Division of Workforce Systems in the Office of Workforce at the U.S. Department of Labor (DOL), delivered the keynote address. She provided an overview of DOL's Credentialing Policy and its newly released Skills Transferability Tool. Sten shared DOL's strategy to increase attainment of post'secondary credentials through better access to post'secondary education and training. She indicated that DOL would soon be seeking grant applications from community colleges and state workforce agencies to develop Industry Competency Models and increase credential attainment. She emphasized the goal of Secretary of Labor Hilda Solis in increasing the number of workers gaining credentials by ten percent.

Sten discussed the DOL Employment and Training Administration's (ETA) recently launched tool called mySkills myFuture. The website helps jobseekers ‘cross-walk' skills from previous work to new occupations, showing them real job openings available to them. It combines the functionality of two labor market systems used in One-Stop Career Centers: ETA's Occupations Information Network (O*NET) and JobCentral National Labor Exchange.

Peer-to-peer Best Practices sessions were delivered by local workforce leaders, including members of local Workforce Investment Boards (WIBs) and their private sector partners. The Best Practices sessions included:

• A Baltimore Talent Development Study,

• A Sectoral Panel Approach from Seattle,

• Serving the Professional and Technically Skilled Job Seeker in Sunnyvale and San Diego,

• Highlights from Boeing Charleston on Meeting the Needs of Employers,

• New York City's Employment Engagement Strategy, and

• On-the-Job Training Implementation Issues from Pembroke Pines.

Russell Kimmons, Division Vice President of the Whiting-Turner Contracting Company and Vice Chair of the Baltimore Workforce Investment Board (WIB), and Dr. Carolane Williams, President of the Baltimore City Community College and a member of the Baltimore WIB, discussed the Baltimore Talent Development Study, a labor market study conducted by the Baltimore Workforce Investment Board. The study determined which sectors of the economy were expanding and what training would necessary to meet the needs of those sectors.

David Allen, Executive Vice President of McKistry and a member of the Seattle-King County Workforce Development Council, and Marlena Sessions, CEO of the Council, gave an overview of the Washington State Sector Panel Approach.

Workshop participants heard from Jan Cheyer, Administrative Coordinator at the NOVA WIB in Sunnyvale, who discussed how NOVA uses LinkedIn to serve professional and technically skilled job seekers; and Todd Philips, Director of Government Relations at the San Diego Workforce Partnership, outlined San Diego's partnership with three local public universities to serve these same job seekers.

Paul Connerty, head of Trident Workforce Board, Jim Maxon, Project Director for readySC Boeing in the State Technical School System, and Jess Stone from Boeing Charleston, presented the Charleston WIB's partnership with technical schools to recruit and train workers for Boeing.

The workshop also included a Profile of New York City's Employment Engagement Strategy by Matt White, Chief of Staff of the Workforce Development Division at the NYC Department of Small Business Services, and An Outline of Technical and Implementation Issues in Delivering On-the-Job Services by Rochelle Daniels, Assistant County Attorney for Broward County and the Broward Workforce Development Board.