As America becomes more integrated with the global economy and national
boundaries diminish as barriers to trade and capital, we need new tools
to enable working Americans to be upwardly mobile. A Wisconsin experiment
provides an example of an innovative approach that communities nationwide
would do well to imitate. In the early 1990s, southeastern Wisconsin - like
much of the industrial Midwest - faced two pressing economic problems. At
the same time that many low-skill jobs were disappearing to foreign competition,
many other firms that were successfully introducing new technologies could
not find enough workers with the necessary technical skills. The community
responded by creating the Wisconsin Regional Training Partnership. This
unique consortium joins industrial firms that agree to invest in worker
training; labor unions and workers willing to develop new skills; and public
agencies and academia, which coordinate and advise. Today, the partnership
includes 46 companies employing 50,000 workers.
The Wisconsin Regional Training Partnership represents the kind of partnership
between business, labor, and government that not only can address the inevitable
dislocations caused by the New Economy but can help workers and companies
prosper amid global competition. These partnerships give working Americans
the tools to find jobs, keep jobs, and become upwardly mobile. However,
very few existing programs do all three. Almost all of these partnerships
make companies in their communities more competitive by supplying them with
more highly skilled workers. Their missions should be combined to create
a new breed of Community Workforce Partnerships.
Existing partnerships demonstrate the tools that Community Workforce
Partnerships could combine under one roof. For example, the Garment Industry
Development Corporation in New York helps garment manufacturers restructure
and modernize to meet marketplace demands. It established a 9,500-square-foot
training center to introduce small businesses to high-tech equipment and
to help workers upgrade their skills, including their language skills. In
Iowa, the Department of Economic Development fosters coordination among
Iowa firms with similar training needs, such as those in the plastics industry,
software development, and the recycling and insurance sectors - efforts
particularly helpful to small firms. The department succeeds because it
acts in concert with the business community. For example, the department
sponsors the Iowa Mold-builders Apprenticeship Program - bringing together
the Iowa Plastics Industry Consortium and the state's community colleges
- to ensure that the demands for skilled labor in the state's rapidly growing
plastics industry are met. Once hired by a participating company, students
from around the state attend on-line classes two days a week via the Iowa
Communications Network.
Operating locally, Community Workforce Partnerships would bring businesses,
workers, and educational institutions together with state and local government
agencies. Combined, they would provide workers and businesses with the skills,
training, and other services to survive and prosper in the new global economy.
Their tasks could include services such as inventories of job vacancies
and predictions of local workforce needs, but these partnerships would be
designed to respond to the specific needs of diverse communities. As in
the examples discussed above, they would depend on workers and business
each assuming substantial responsibility.
Successful Community Workforce Partnerships would expand upon the best
examples of community-based efforts led by the private sector. They could
look to Michigan, where the Virtual Automotive College specializes in developing
diverse methods to train automotive workers, including on-site training
centers, interactive television, CD-ROMs, and the Internet. They could look
to a new development called Easton in Columbus, Ohio, where a public-private
partnership sponsored by local business and government provides services
such as transportation, day care, and job placement to welfare recipients
entering the work force. And they could look to New York City, where the
Garment Industry Development Corporation has evolved over nearly 15 years.
Originally designed to help apparel factories find affordable real estate,
the group today trains workers and management.
These models can provide a template of what works. Success, their examples
suggest, requires:
- flexibility, so communities can design programs that meet their particular
needs;
- responsibility on the part of both workers and employers, who must
play a leading role in designing and implementing these programs; and
- a wide reach, to help all workers achieve upward mo-bility, not only
those who are displaced or downsized.
The recently enacted Workforce Investment Act takes a very significant
step in the right direction but focuses only on displaced and disadvantaged
workers. Community Workforce Partnerships would serve all working Americans
(and thus benefit workers and business more significantly), whether by providing
school-to-work assistance, transportation services, or other resources.
To build on these successful examples, the federal government should
offer matching grants to states and cities wishing to create Community Workforce
Partnerships to help workers be upwardly mobile or rapidly re-employed if
displaced. The communities seeking grants should demonstrate that the local
business community is involved and willing to lead. Beyond that, states
and cities should design partnerships to meet local needs. By rebuilding
confidence in all Americans' ability to be upwardly mobile, we can put a
human face on the global economy. Community Workforce Partnerships can help
us realize this very American aspiration for widely shared opportunities.
