Workforce Development 

A region’s workforce in large part determines its success or failure.  A survey of leading manufacturers in the Milwaukee Region underscored the importance of matching jobs with the people who have the right skills to fill these positions.  Simply put, if we cannot meet the demands of our employers, those jobs and those companies will flow out of the region. While companies rate the quality of the workforce as one of the region’s strengths, they also see recruiting and retaining the skilled workers they need now and in the future as a major challenge.

Closing the Manufacturing Skills Gap

Manufacturers around the region continue to struggle to fill open positions because of an unskilled and mismatched workforce. To address this disconnect, a workforce session spearheaded by the Milwaukee 7, MMAC and the Waukesha County Business Alliance was held with more than 100 manufacturers, educators and community stakeholders on Oct. 26, 2011. From this full morning session a specific set of actions was developed to accelerate the training and development of skilled manufacturing talent. 

The session verified the importance of basic skills like reliability, flexibility and basic math for a career in manufacturing.  Manufacturers were clear that if more candidates began with these basic skills on day one, they could provide on-the-job training to start filling the gap. There was also strong consensus for increasing hands-on learning in high schools and technical colleges to provide greater exposure to the skills required in manufacturing.

There has also been a call to action to create a campaign to change the image of manufacturing and promote the wide variety of exciting career options in the minds of students, parents and teachers. 

A report on the findings was presented at the Milwaukee 7 Council Meeting on November 2.

Session Participants Contact Listing

Session Handout

Session Presentation

Manufacturing Skills Gap Session Summary

Milwaukee 7 Council Meeting - Skills Gap Session Recap Presentation

The WIRED Initiative

To cultivate new ideas and processes for developing our region's talent, the Milwaukee 7 Region received a $5.1 million Workforce Innovation in Regional Economic Development – or WIRED – grant from the U.S. Department of Labor.  The initiative encouraged regional collaboration among public and private entities to develop a skilled workforce that attracts economic development and jobs.  The Milwaukee 7 was one of 39 regions across the U.S. to have been selected for the grant. 

The WIRED Innovation Fund

One component of the WIRED initiative was the WIRED Innovation Fund, a $2.5 million resource that invested in innovative programs, projects and activities to transform key elements of the talent development system in our region. This funding was used to develop long-term programs and solutions for workforce development through new methods of training and education.  

Engineers & Scientists of Milwaukee (ESM) is leading science, technology,
engineering and math (STEM) awareness and outreach efforts on a local, regional and
statewide basis through the STEM7 Initiative, a strategic collaborative for the development of STEM talent in southeastern Wisconsin.

ESM’s STEM7 Initiative is the region’s partner for STEM talent development and has developed an intensive regional and statewide outreach effort linking the STEM talent pipeline to economic and workforce development, gaining positive exposure that has reached beyond the seven counties to the rest of the state and, in some cases, nationally. To learn more, visit www.esmke.org.