Page 69 - 914INC - July/August 2022

Workforce Development for Employers: Talent 101
FINDING THE CANDIDATES YOU NEED BY DAVID LEVINE
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Businesses throughout the country are experiencing an unusual if not unprecedented change in workforce development. The COVID-19 pandemic has only hastened an already emerging shortage of workers in a variety of industries; now, nearly every sector
of the economy is dealing with the “Great Resignation” of workers changing jobs, changing careers and in some cases sitting out entirely.
“We are in the midst of a transformation of the workforce, and we’re not sure exactly where it’s going to end up,” says Thom Kleiner, executive director of the Westchester-Putnam Workforce Development Board. “We do know that businesses need to be more creative” in finding, hiring, and maintaining good candidates for their open positions.
To help employers navigate this challenging landscape, Westchester County supports numerous resources, incentives, and organizations that help employers connect with the
right talent or train their existing talent. The problem: many employers don’t know these resources exist. Here are just some of the places to turn for finding the talent you need to succeed in today’s business environment.
NYS DEPARTMENT OF LABOR (DOL)
The DOL offers a wealth of resources for both job seekers and employers (dol.ny.gov/services-businesses) and Kleiner says something new is in the offing: a Virtual Career Center, the first of its kind in the state. Kleiner has been involved in early testing, and “it’s the best thing any of us have seen, really,” he says. “It lets you filter information on a pretty granular level — by ZIP codes, education levels. Indeed has something similar, but that’s pretty unusual for a public institution.”
The platform, which DOL says is powered by “robust” artificial intelligence, provides job leads that better match a job seeker’s skills and experience to job postings. It will contain more than 200,000 jobs, and is expected to launch sometime this year.
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