For going on a decade and a half, much has been made of the chronic shortage of workers. Month after month, U.S. employers post millions of jobs while millions of Americans are actively seeking them — and yet those positions remain unfilled. The situation appears only to be getting worse: Workers entering the workforce find that they are unemployable; educators worry that their students lack the technical and foundational skills (problem-solving, communications) that employers seek; and companies struggle to deliver goods and services to customers in the absence of workforce-ready talent.
The Employer-Educator Partnership That Can Fill U.S. Jobs
Middle-skills workers — those with less than a four-year college education but more than a high school diploma — make up more than 60% of U.S. workers over the age of 25. These workers are the life force that keeps America’s economic engine humming, but, increasingly, as they enter the workforce they find that they are unemployable, even though companies have a growing number of jobs to fill. Much of the problem, the authors report, stems from inadequate collaboration between employers and community colleges, which represent employers’ largest potential source of talent. The authors offer practical suggestions for improving employer-educator collaboration, and they encourage business to take the lead in doing so, because they know the emerging requirements of work and control the most valuable currency in the labor market — jobs.