Work force initiative shaping up

Heading into its second year of funding, the Rhode Island Manufacturing Industry Partnership Initiative is taking shape as an effective clearinghouse of information and resources to support manufacturers throughout the state.
The new initiative is funded by the Governor’s Workforce Investment Board and jointly administered by the Rhode Island Manufacturers Association, Train Rhode Island and RIMES, the state’s manufacturing extension partnership.
The aim of the manufacturing-industry initiative is to provide a more comprehensive approach to work force development for the state’s diverse manufacturers, and is the result of an ongoing restructuring of Rhode Island’s work force development efforts by the governor’s office, said Leslie Taito, RIMES’ chief executive.
“They are funding this initiative to start looking at a holistic approach to work force development, as opposed to kind of point-solutions that have happened in the past, and really looking at streamlining the system, so that there is a clearinghouse effect that happens within the industry,” Taito said.
“They’re looking for work force development training,” she added. “They’re looking for, ‘How do I attract really good individuals into manufacturing? What kind of skills do they need to have?’ So you can start working with adult education programs, K-12 programs, to expose them to manufacturing, so that they understand there are good career paths within the industry.”
RIMES, RIMA and TrainRI wrote the grant for the new initiative, which received $90,000 in funding in its first year, Taito said. The program can write up to $150,000 in work force development grants this year, she said.
In its first year, the three organizations worked to structure the program to best serve the needs of manufacturers, Taito said. In focus groups of manufacturing leaders that the initiative conducted to gauge their work force development needs, many reported they are capable of training employees to use new technologies and equipment but that a more pressing concern to their businesses is the high number of employees who come to their jobs needing much more basic skills, including literacy.
The program recently sent out a “skills-gap” survey to manufacturers throughout the state to see if they’re work force training needs mirror the needs of those who participated in the smaller focus groups. The results of the survey will be used to further position the initiative, she said.
“If we’re going to create a demand-driven work force development system, we’ve got to have information back from those manufacturers about what they’re lacking, what their current needs are and what their future needs are going to be,” Taito said.
“In the coming year, we’ll take that skills gap study and we’re going to be looking for patterns, obviously. If they say ‘I need X,’ is the system readily available to provide them with that training? If it’s not, how do we bring that training to be – how do either create the curriculum or how do we put the appropriate training providers in place so they have access to that? And is it a hard skill or a soft skill – you know, are they prepared to go to work, do they show up on time – or is it really that they need the hard-core technology skills?”
In the coming months, the initiative will convene a meeting of all the state’s manufacturers, large and small, to start having strategic discussions on ways that they can better share information, Taito said.
“You start sharing best practices within the industry, so if I’ve got a manufacturer that’s doing really well at work force development – they’ve spent and they invest, they take the time to train their individuals – what worked? And if it worked over here, would they be willing to share it with another manufacturer to make sure that that works,” she said.
“You raise the industry as a whole, and that’s what they’re looking to do,” Taito continued. “Really streamline the system so they have easy access and information is readily available, so that they can make decisions for their work force development accordingly.” •