Strengthening the Regional Talent Pipeline:

Aligning Business, Education and Public

Sector Leadership

Texas Workforce Conference

December 8, 2016

Houston, TX

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• Session’s Learning Objectives

• Identify current and near-future career

opportunities in the regional workforce pipeline

• Identify employability skills required of workers

entering the regional workforce pipeline

• Identify paths to employment in high wage high

demand careers

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• Session Presenters

• Dr. Allatia Harris, Vice Chancellor, Strategic

Initiatives, San Jacinto College

• Peter Beard, Senior Vice President, Regional

Workforce Development

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Houston Jobs

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• Houston’s Middle Skills Blueprint

• UPSKILL HOUSTON: The Region’s Blueprint to

build a quality regional workforce and talent

pipeline

– Key Industry sectors that drive Houston’s regional

economy

– Demand Driven—to meet the needs of employers

– Supply Quality—to help residents become aware of,

connect to training, and obtain good-paying jobs

– Collective action and impact to address the challenge

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• Regional Economic Drivers

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• Supply Chain Challenge

• Employer Leadership: Demand Driven

• Strengthen the Quality of Supply

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• Our Objectives

• Attract, Train and Place

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• No Single Solution

• The Regional/System Challenges Cannot be

Solved Alone:

• Address Awareness and Perception Challenges

• Improve the level of Employability Skills

• Coordinate and Align the work of multiple partners

that touch our various talent pipelines:

– Emerging Talent (our youth)

– Un- and Under-Employed adults

– Incumbent Talent

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• Collective Response

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• Key Learning #1

• Employer Leadership is Essential

– This goes beyond engagement

– Go to where Employer Leaders already meet

• Collective Mindset: We Share a Workforce

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• Construction Leadership

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• Petrochemical Leadership

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• Healthcare Leadership

• Identifying industry

leadership and the

employer table

• Exploring key pain points

for employers

• Apply learnings from our

previous work

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• Key Learning #2

• Foster Collective Seeing

– Connect Dots

• Facilitate Collective Learning:

– Help Partner Institutions Translate How

Employers Think

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• Key Learning #3

• Support Collective Doing

– Prototype efforts to address a

meaningful challenge and get into action

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• College Leadership

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• Community Leadership

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• Success Doesn’t Require a 4-year Degree