WorkforceRx

One of the oldest forms of training, apprenticeship, has new relevance in the age of AI according to today’s WorkforceRx guest Vinz Koller, a nationally influential voice on the subject and self-described apprenticeship evangelist. Why? Because the pace of change brought about by AI and other technologies has accelerated to a point where predictions about what specific skills workers in most field...

Our exploration of solutions for growing and strengthening the direct care workforce continues on this episode of WorkforceRx with a close look at a potentially transformative employee-owned cooperative model that’s gaining traction in California. In the eyes of our guest, Aquilina Soriano Versoza, the higher pay and better working conditions that co-ops can provide will help grow an urgently need...

“I think training is gonna be so different looking in the next few years than what we're used to,” says Anson Green who brings a very seasoned eye to the workforce training landscape. After decades working in adult education, Green is now helping Tyson Foods train an incredibly diverse global workforce and, in the U.S. 60% are immigrants with very limited digital and language skills. As he explain...

“I'm able to be here with you today because my son is at a wonderful childcare provider home,” says WorkforceRx guest, Rachel Wick, to illustrate how critical direct care workers are to our lives and economy. Wick, the senior program officer for Blue Shield of California Foundation, describes childcare and direct care provided in the home for the elderly and disabled as ‘the work that makes all ot...

If you would love to know what’s on the minds of the leaders of the nation’s largest health systems as they tackle workforce challenges and a host of other issues, but don’t happen to have the time to talk to all 150 of them, then this episode of WorkforceRx is for you. The well-placed source supplying this intelligence is Renee DeSilva, CEO of The Health Management Academy which provides advice,...

Evolving employee expectations for working conditions and years of a tight labor market have created steady challenges for human resources professionals. For a look at how those roles are evolving in response, and, to learn about current best practices, we turn today to Wendi Safstrom, president of the SHRM Foundation, the philanthropic arm of the world's largest HR professional society. “We're pr...

For those concerned about teacher burnout and retention issues in K-12 education, Curtis Johnson has seen an innovative model in action that could provide an answer: let teachers run the schools. Johnson, a veteran educator, policy analyst and author, says there are already several hundred such schools in twenty-three states, what he describes as a slow growing movement. While interviewing staff a...

As almost any employer can tell you, today’s workers have high expectations for compensation, the quality of their work experience, and the level of work-life balance. Today’s WorkforceRx guest, David Jarrard, would add one key item to that list: they also expect to have a voice when organizations make important decisions. That means leaders have to engage with workers, not just communicate to the...

In the battle against declining enrollments and declining perceptions of value, higher education organizations need to be flexible and meet employers and students where they are, says today’s WorkforceRx guest Karilyn Van Oosten. Her company, Unitek Learning -- a provider of workforce solutions and career training programs for the healthcare industry -- is doing that literally by bringing its educ...

“Because of the workforce shortages, there is more creativity and more willingness to be innovative, and I think we can make something out of this crisis,” says Rick Brooks, who has his hands full leading Rhode Island’s efforts to strengthen and grow the healthcare workforce. His optimism is based on new levels of engagement by key stakeholders to find solutions and the formation of some unlikely...

The growing crisis in homelessness across the US has understandably garnered a lot of news coverage and attention from policymakers, and today’s WorkforceRx guest wants to make sure one key facet of the problem is not overlooked as solutions are discussed. “There's a lot of over-representation of older people in the homelessness rates, and older Black Californians -- and this is a staggering stati...

State departments of health play a huge role in America's healthcare system, with responsibility for public health, licensure, public policy, and much more, so the workforce challenges they face have broad implications. “It will probably be twenty years before we really begin to bend the curve because many of the workforce shortages we encounter require very long-term strategies to change,” says P...

“If I looked at higher education writ large, as we've traditionally defined it, I'd say that the patient is sick right now,” says Michael Horn, a prominent national voice on reimagining education at both the K-12 and post-secondary levels. Horn sees a misalignment between education consumers who are seeking greater value, and education suppliers -- especially brick-and-mortar institutions -- who h...

Doctors who realize that creating a local jobs program can be as important to helping their patients as writing a prescription have the kind of broad perspective that today’s WorkforceRx guest wants all health providers to adopt. “I think that context is oftentimes lost on providers in medical school or nursing school where they're not connecting the patient to the entire context of their lives,”...

Although most US employers offer some form of tuition assistance, it’s estimated that less than 5% of employees use the benefit. There are several reasons for this, but according to Dr. David Ferreira, provost of Charter Oak State College, paying the upfront cost of tuition is high on the list. “Fifty-seven percent of Americans have less than $1,000 in their savings account. They cannot commit to...

Like all states, California is facing a shortage of physicians -- in its case a gap of 10,500 by the end of the decade -- but today’s WorkforceRx guest says the definition of shortage needs to go beyond just numbers to include their practice location and cultural diversity. “Oftentimes, we don't have enough access to physicians in particular areas or to culturally dynamic physicians,” says Lupe Al...

In the struggle to fill ongoing gaps in healthcare staffing, the days of waiting for people to apply for openings are over, says human resources veteran Laura Beeth. “We're going out deeply into the communities, especially communities with high social determinants of health, and really working partnerships to help them move into healthcare careers,” says the vice president for Workforce Partnershi...

According to recent reports from the University of Massachusetts and the US Department of Energy, the Biden administration’s historic investments in infrastructure and combatting climate change are already having an impact on the job market and will continue to do so with some economists forecasting the creation of millions of jobs over the next decade in those sectors. Harnessing these investment...

The use of simulation in healthcare training used to be confined to actors posing as patients and the use of medical mannequins. But the options have grown far beyond that to include 3D virtual reality, augmented reality, and game-based learning, among other approaches. On this episode of WorkforceRx, we're going to get an overview of the space with one of its leading experts, Dr. Parvati Dev, CEO...

While there’s little that matches the excitement a new school year brings, it’s tempered somewhat this year by the need to continue recovering from the many disruptions caused by the COVID-19 pandemic. Learning loss, declining enrollments and increases in behavioral problems are just a few of the issues that education leaders are grappling with. Our WorkforceRx guest, Carissa Moffat Miller, is in...

“Healthcare is just so large and complex and expensive. We've got to find better ways to reach across political divides, ideological disagreements and narrow, sector-based perspectives,” says Tanya Harris, who runs the Health Innovators Fellowship at the Aspen Institute which is designed to do just that. The program provides a diverse group of mid-career professionals with the opportunity to do th...

There’s an old solution for some of the toughest challenges facing today’s US labor market, including a lack of skilled workers, inequitable access to well-paying jobs and an aging workforce: apprenticeships. That’s according to our WorkforceRx guest, Dr. Mardy Leathers, executive director of Apprenticeships for America. “Apprenticeship programs are great at upskilling, they're great at supporting...

Worsening staff shortages in healthcare are prompting some big shifts in how hospitals are approaching the issue, and New Mexico is a good case in point. As we learn from today’s WorkforceRx guest, Troy Clark, who runs the state’s hospital association, a traditionally competitive mindset is yielding to a more collaborative approach. “We have this limited workforce that we're all fighting for, and...

“We're asking students effectively to take a bet on themselves and what we have seen in recent years is the growing problem of debt that doesn't pay off for them,” says Sameer Gadkaree, President & CEO of The Institute for College Access and Success. Among the 44 million Americans affected, the debt load is $30,000 for the average borrower, including those who did not complete their certificat...

While it will be years before researchers can render a verdict on how the wholesale shift to online learning during COVID impacted student performance, it’s already clear that in higher education, post-pandemic use of education technology and positively attitudes about it have both increased. Research also shows that professors and students expect more use of digital course materials and technolog...