KCSpeaks

Another year has passed and it is that time when we reflect on what has passed and contemplate what we hope to achieve.   Rather than try to summarize everything that has happened, I am leaving 2016 behind and looking to the future. Resolutions are difficult. Too much pressure. Instead, I am looking to find one word to inspire and motivate me for the upcoming year that can assist me personally and as a workforce professional.   Believe The word believe implies that there is something magical in the world that each person can tap into.   People can believe in things or people. Believe implies wonder for children such as imaginary figures or that as adults we should believe in a greater goodness of mankind. As workforce professionals, we can believe in the capability of our job seekers to achieve their employment goals.      Dream When we dream, our minds wander and explore possibilities. Before we set goals, we dream of possibilities to d...

Looking for the perfect gift this holiday season? Are you looking for the kind of gift you can give to friends, family, workforce development professionals, and job seekers alike? Is there a one size first all kind of gift that not only is the right size for your person and your budget? The perfect gift is an idea. Why give an idea? The reason is to inspire another person. With an idea, an individual can do many things. A person may decide to try something new or it may re-invigorate a current endeavor. For workforce professionals, an idea may lead to increased performance. For employers, an idea may lead to increased revenue and business growth. For a job seeker, an idea may lead to employment or even self-employment. For many people, an idea can lead to a hope for their future. Once you have an idea, the possibilities can be endless. There are multiple ways to give someone an idea. The most timeless and classic way to gift someone an idea is to buy them a book.   Dependi...

There are two sides to the front line workforce development programs. One side is all about assisting job seekers and business customers and the tools and techniques necessary for success. The other side is about the numbers and benchmarks necessary to achieve success. In a perfect world the two would go together and create the perfect mathematical formula for workforce development success. In reality, this may not be true.   There are many times that the benchmarks for success rely on the perfect potion for success. All the best ingredients that complement each other must be entered into the pot for the best outcome. As we know in workforce development, many times this is not the case. Sometimes there are too many job seekers without the correct skills and experience for the hiring employers. Other times, the barriers of the job seekers are preventing them from achieving employment. Additionally, the success of providing services to business customers may be dependent upon ...

Election Day is quickly approaching in the United States and soon each person that is registered to vote will be choosing the next President of the United States as well as other federal, state, and local officials. This week, I am not going to discuss whom you should vote for, but rather why a workforce development professional should be a voter. Workforce development professionals are funded by many different streams. Some professionals work in programs that are federally funded, such as Workforce Innovation and Opportunity Act (WIOA) and others are working in programs that are state funded. When government money keeps the doors to a program open, it is imperative that workforce professionals vote for the people that make the decisions on how tax payer money is spent. Workforce professionals meet so many people, many of those whom cannot advocate for themselves. For example, a workforce professional may work with an impoverished single mother. The workforce professional is ...

In the world of workforce development, we are aware that there are several misconceptions about job searching out there.   It turns out that tricks are not limited to Halloween. Some job seekers have decided to engage in strategies that will scare workforce development professionals.   Quantity vs. Quality: Despite the advice from job search experts, many job seekers feel that getting a job is a numbers game, like collecting candy on Halloween. Job Seekers are applying for everything and anything regardless of their qualifications and or the position criteria. Since job seeking is simply as easy as clicking a button on a website, this scary numbers game is rampant.     Wrong Costume: Repeatedly, so many job seekers are not dressing appropriately for job interviews. The job may be a laboring or food service, but the interview is not. Therefore, job seekers need to understand that they need to look professional. Clean and neat clothing without any dist...

Many workforce development professional use motivational posters, quotes, and pictures to create a positive atmosphere for their job seekers, but can the use of these materials actually reduce motivation? I don’t know if there has ever been a scientific study on the use of motivational, but my observation is that there can actually be too much motivational bling.   Motivational bling is my term for all the motivational “stuff” that people like to use for themselves or others. Some workforce professionals enjoy adding bling to everything in their office or presentation in the hopes of sparking the drive and passion in job seekers to become employed.   Words are powerful tools. Motivational quotes have their most power when the reader has time to think and digest them. They are like deliciously rich foods, decadent for a few bites, but can easily make you ill if you ingest too much. So how much bling is too much bling? My recommendation is to spread out the motiv...

This year marks the 15 th anniversary of the day that terrorists attacked the United States. The 9/11 anniversary is a somber day to remember those whom have lost their lives. For those of us in workforce development, we can also pause to think about how the American working world has changed.   The biggest change has been the focus on security of all types.   Protective Services as an industry has exploded with public and private protective services. For example, buildings that may have been open for the public to walk in without any screening, now have a Security Guard and often metal detectors stationed in front. At the airport, we have learned to be aware of what we carry in our luggage and what we are wearing. There are now people charged with screening our baggage, our bodies, our footwear, and the liquids we carry.   The federal Department of Homeland Security was created in response to the September 11, 2001 attacks and is now has about 240,000 employees...

Each year Labor Day in the United States marks the end of the official summer season and kicks off fall activities like going back to school, pumpkin picking, and leaf peeping, but Labor Day is not just a day for Americans to eat one last hamburger on the grill. Labor Day is a celebration of the American worker. The United States Department of Labor’s website indicates that the day is “a creation of the labor movement and is dedicated to the social and economic achievements of American Workers. It constitutes a yearly national tribute to the contributions workers have made to the strength, prosperity, and well-being of our country.”   ( https://www.dol.gov/general/laborday/history ) People whom work in America have built a country from the ground up. Regardless of your job in America, a worker has contributed to the economy in this country. From farmers to carpenters, office workers to retail sales clerks, each worker in America has made an impact. This includes workforce d...

I have been paying attention to successful people lately and it seems that there is one thing that both successful job seekers and successfully employed people, including workforce development professionals, have in common.   The big “O” stands for organization.   Organization is the key to success for everyone. If you look online, you can find many ways to organize all aspects of your personal and professional life. If you go to the store, you will find hundreds of products designed to keep some aspect of your life organized, so it should not surprise you that you will find that successful people are organized.   For a job seeker, this is a subject that should be discussed as part of the advising process. It is important to ask the job seeker how he will be staying organized during the job search. Will he be using traditional paper log record keeping or will he be recording his job search online through an app? How about tasks and meetings? Will a paper...

This past week, a colleague and I were brainstorming solutions for a job seeker that was having difficulty obtaining employment. This is not an uncommon discussion, but in this particular case the job seeker was having difficulty due to some personal limitations she had imposed on herself. This job seeker had a résumé that demonstrated great education, skills, and experience to work in an administrative and payroll capacity. On paper, she looked great, but she was having difficulty before she even applied. This job seeker was being super selective about the opportunities before she even applied for them.   For this job seeker, there were many advertised job openings that she met the requested qualifications. Unfortunately, she found problems with most of the positions before she even applied. The issues ranged from company size to website design. Although the job seeker had an urgent need economic reason to obtain employment, she continued to challenge many of the options ...

Everywhere you turn it seems someone is playing the latest craze, a game called “Pokémon Go.”   For those that do not understand how the game works, I am going to simplify the process for the non-players. After downloading an application to a smart phone, a player turns on the phone’s GPS option. This allows the application to know the player’s location and turns the physical location into a land full of Pokémon monsters.   The phone becomes a lens to overlay the Pokémon into your real environment, and the player travels the world to “catch `em all”. Certain places a player may wander will be “gyms,” where a player will meet other players of the game and their virtual monsters can engage in a battle. There are additional “PokeStops” for Pokémon to gain resources, and the game allows people to form teams if desired. This game may be just a trend, but the popularity of it has made the news all across the country. There are people passionately against the game and others th...

Each day into the 21 st century that passes, the line between home and work get foggier.    This means that as long as we work, we do it for longer hours and in more places. We can thank the wonders of technology that we cannot live without, including internet connection, cell phones, laptop computers, and tablets, for our ability to work anywhere and anytime. This includes on vacation.   There are countless studies about Americans and vacation time. Studies show that some people do not take any of their earned time off annually, while others do not take all of their annual allotment. There are still many people that do have any paid vacation days at all. Comparing this to many other countries, where the love of vacation is culturally in grained, it seems that Americans have the issue with work.   Many Americans take vacation only to check the email remotely. The reason may be to clean it up or ensure that nothing urgent is happening, but in reality it g...

In celebration of the men whom have helped shape my life and how I view the world of work, I wanted to write about how fathers shape our view of careers. I have been one of the fortunate people in the world to not only have been influenced by a father, but also two grandfathers. One lesson from both of my grandfathers, was to work regardless of the cards you have been dealt in life. To say my mother’s father was born into poverty and as a teenager had to leave school at the conclusion of the eighth grade and enter the world of work. It was no longer feasible for my mother’s father to afford to attend school and to not work and support his family. He was an intelligent man that found himself a young adult during the Great Depression. As a young married man with a family, he worked two jobs and did so through most of my mother’s childhood. He worked as an office clerk during the day and in the United States Post Office at night. I did not know him during his working life, but I di...

Time at conferences goes fast and the final day of the 2016 NAWDP Annual Conference was not any different. I began day three in presenter mode, rather than attendee mode. My session called "Follow the Yellow Brick Road: Career Paths in Workforce Development" was well attended, despite its placement on the last day. Attendees learned about positions in workforce development, the skills, education, and experience necessary to obtain each position. Additionally, attendees learned ways to use the research in organizational and individual development.   The next highlight was the luncheon. The last day of the conference always has a NAWDP business meeting with the lunch. My boss, a member of the NAWDP executive committee, was celebrating her birthday and I was able to interrupt her very important message about membership with a group birthday song.  It was also announced at this luncheon that the 2017 annual conference would be in N...

My second day at the NAWDP conference was a busy day.  Workforce development is an industry full of passionate and talented people and today showcased them beautifully.   My day began attending the session of the next generation of workforce leaders, the New and Emerging Professionals cadre presentation. This session allowed each member to discuss his/her contributions to NAWDP and the field of workforce development for the past year.  Each cadre member completed a capstone project for this program and NAWDP. The topics showcased each member's passion for an area of workforce development.   The second day of the NAWDP conference always included the  awards luncheon. The winners had amazing stories and are a true inspiration to workforce development professionals. The wealth of knowledge the winners had in leadership, customer service, training, and development could never be bottled and sold. When you listen to the stories of each award recipient, ...

Day one of the 2016 NAWDP Annual Conference is complete. My experience is that the NAWDP conference is more of a reunion for many professionals to see people from across the country that they cannot see every day. If I could summarize day one in one word, it would be "networking."   My day began with a networking breakfast in a local restaurant to see people that I had not seen in a year. As great as social media, email, and telephones are, nothing beats meeting face to face with people to hear about the latest achievements and to brain storm about issues in workforce development. Problem solving takes on a different perspective when it involves people from across the country.   Day one of the conference means key note speaker time. The opening session keynote speaker was Michael Angelo Caruso. His presentation, "How to Engage Someone in 15 Seconds: The Power of Persuasion" was informative and was entertaining.  He gave some great tips to engage people in d...

I did not know as a young child I wanted to be a workforce development professional when I grew up. Not only did I not know, I did not even have an idea what workforce development was. Like most people, I ended up in workforce development by accident. I was working for a local social service agency performing enrollment and parent involvement for the child care center. Many of the parents that were enrolling their children were required to participate in employment services because they were receiving TANF assistance. After learning more about this job, I obtained my first position in workforce development, performing case management for job seekers enrolled in TANF and WIA employment services. As a new workforce development processional, I knew I wanted more. I knew I wanted to learn and grow in the industry, but I had no idea how to get to the next step or if there was a next step.   Fast forward a few years and a few jobs in the industry. I found a path through the wood...

In honor of Mother’s Day, I thought I would focus on the career advice that people receive from mothers and other care takers.   I want to share with you some of the career advice that I have been given from my family. My grandmother did not think about careers. She thought about jobs. My grandmother was a woman that lived through most of the 20 th century having been born right after World War I. She lived through the Great Depression and World War II.   She saw great prosperity in the country, but also great poverty. Her perspective was not as much about what kind of work, but where are the jobs. There was one day in my young adulthood that I was having a conversation about jobs with her. She stated to go to the Post Office. She said that the Post Office had jobs for everyone that wanted a job. Interestingly enough, this conversation was at a time when the United States Post Office was beginning its decline. She could not understand that there would be a time when there...

As a workforce development professional with extensive experience directly with job seekers, I get asked for tips and tricks in all areas.   A common thing that happens is that many workforce development professionals feel that they run out of “new material,” meaning that the basics of job search have been covered with a job seeker. This is especially true with job seekers that may be taking what seems like a long time to become employed.   My recommendation is to develop a thing for the month. The “thing of the month” does not have to be a theme. It is something that you as a workforce development professional are covering with each job seeker. Your thing does not have to be complicated or elaborate. It just needs to change monthly. Below are some ideas for your “Thing of the Month.”   ·        Information on upcoming events, such as a job fair, family event, or community health clinic ·     ...

I am a dramatic movie lover. My favorite time of the year for movies is when all the dramatic big story movies hit the theaters. Unfortunately, there is not enough time to see them all. The best part of modern life is that I can get to see them at home at my leisure. For the past few weekends, I have been catching up on all that I missed in the theaters. Why dramatic movies versus romantic comedies or action films? It is the depth of character and thought provoking plot that comes with these films. I find the stories inspirational and cannot help but see the value for workforce development in each of them. In workforce development land, we are always looking for stories to motivate people to pursue something bigger and better for themselves in life, the kind of stories that call people to keep on working towards their goals, even when the challenges are huge. Now that I am all caught up, I wanted to share with you three movies you may have missed that offer great motivation...

I was watching television and I happened upon a makeover show. On this show, people are given make overs of clothing, hair, and make up. Before the makeover begins, a picture of the person in their chosen attire is presented to random people on the street and are asked their impression of the person. After the opinion is given, the random person is asked to rate the show’s participant based on looks.   The statements of the random individuals is not favorable and the person is given a makeover by professional stylists and beauticians.   The same random people on the street are asked again what the opinion is and of course it is much more favorable. The random people now “love” the image of the person.   I watched two episodes of this show. Each time the makeover candidate was asked why she wanted to change her appearance. Each time the reason was career related. One woman was unemployed and seeking employment. The other was employed, but seeking a career change. T...