Workforce Developments

WTF is Meg Whitman doing on my blog?

Imagine my surprise when I clicked over to WorkforceDevelopments the other day only to find Meg Whitman's face smiling at me from an ad in the right column.

Meg - since she's advertising on my blog we must be on a first name basis - is running for governor of California. Why anyone would want to play nanny to a notoriously ungovernable state that's running a $21 billion deficit is beyond me, but that's for another day. Meg's biggest claim to fame (and source of money to bankroll a run for gov) is that she used to be CEO of eBay.

Why in the world would someone I'd never vote for buy space on my li'l ol' blog? I was immediately worried that readers might think her appearance here constituted my endorsement.

Then again, maybe Meg's been trolling the web for new job-creation ideas and was impressed my posts calling for a New Deal-type program to put people back to work. Or she's been reading conversations in the comments (and here) between unemployed workers helping each other figure out how to access their benefits and decided this a good site to reach Real Americans. 

Which gave me a moment's pause. I shouldn't dismiss her candidacy out of hand. Maybe someone who ran a company that changed the way Americans turn the stuff in their garages into cash has innovative new ideas for these unprecedented economic times. And California's never had a woman governor - why not now? So I clicked the ad to find out what Meg's all about.

Turns out Create Jobs is one of her three main platform issues. Two million of them in five years, to be exact. She'll start by laying off 30-40,000 state employees.

What else will Meg do to create all those jobs? Cut taxes and eliminate regulations while building infrastructure for water, energy and transportation. Yawn. I think we've seen that movie before. And in the midst of one of the biggest federal green jobs investments in history, she seems to think that environmentalists don't like jobs.

I don't think she's been reading my blog.

Now I'm left with this conundrum: Should I throw Meg off? I use a third-party provider to handle those flashy ads so I don't see them before they appear. The ad company takes most of the profits and sends me a few pennies per click. However, I do have the ability to block ads that promote things I don't support.

So I leave the question with you, dear reader. Please vote: 

 

Your help needed: rate the best online job search tools

With every crisis comes the con artists, and in the 21st century, they proliferate the web. Think about all those "Obama wants moms to return to school!" ads you've seen online. 

With so many websites and online job boards claiming to help job seekers, how can you separate the good resources from the garbage? 

The US Department of Labor's Employment and Training Administration has issued a challenge to help job seekers and the workforce development professionals who serve them find the best online tools available for their job search. They're harnessing the power of the internet to find out what works best, and your input is needed. 

DOL's Tools for America's Job Seekers Challenge is went live today. Here's how it works:

Step 1 (Nov 30 through Dec 18): Do you know of any good online job seeker tools? The site developers should post them to the challenge site. They might be 

• General job boards, listing sites and aggregators
• Niche job boards
• Career tools such as ladders, transition tools, etc.
• Web based career exploration sites
• Web 2.0 social media sites specializing in job searches or job postings
• Other job matching and career advancement tools

Step 2 (Jan 4-15, 2010): Look through the online job seeker tools on the challenge site. Take them for a test drive and see how they work. Then rate them and comment on them - what works, what doesn't?

Step 3 (beginning Jan 18): Find out what job seekers and your workforce development peers rated as best. DOLETA will publish the top tools in each category.

This challenge is based on the concept of crowdsourcing, and the idea that together, we are smarter than we are individually.

It's the same idea that drives much of the social web, from Wikipedia to the comments section on a blog like this - I don't know everything in workforce development. We all gain knowledge when you add your thoughts, ideas and wisdom by commenting below. What's more, if you find a mistake here (and it has been known to happen), you can help by correcting it. James Surowiecki's The Wisdom of Crowds explores the concept in much more detail.

The more people engage in nominating online tools and rating them, the better DOL's challenge will work. We'll get more ideas and more input from more people. So get to the challenge website and start adding your favorite job tools today. You can also help by spreading the word to friends and colleagues.

And if you think this all sounds too modern and web-savvy to be the Department of Labor you know and love, read the bureaucrat-ese version of the challenge with all the details in TEN 16-09 below: 

Tools for America's Job Seekers Challenge -

Upcoming workshop: Social networking for writers

This Sunday, November 15, I'll be teaching a workshop in Los Angeles on Social Networking for Writers. The good news is that there are a few seats still available.

In this workshop we'll cover the basic principles and key tools of social networking and web 2.0, from the technicalities of how online content management systems work to managing your online identity to building an audience online.

The workshop will run from 2 - 5 p.m. at Writers at Work, in Silver Lake.

Click for more info, or email me. 

Handouts: Social media and workforce + economic development

Thanks to everyone who participated in my workshop on last week on Social Media and Web 2.0 at the Washington State Workforce and Economic Development Conference in Spokane. If you didn't get a copy of the handouts or if you want to share them with a colleague, you can view or download them here: 

Social Media and Workforce + Economic Development -

The full slideshow will be posted soon.

See you in Spokane!

I'm headed to Spokane, WA, this week for the Washington State Workforce and Economic Development 2009 Conference. If you're at the conference, stop by and say hello. I'll be doing a workshop on Social Networking and other Web 2.0 Tools on Wednesday afternoon at 3:15 p.m. Click for the full schedule.

If you can't make the conference, I'll be blogging and tweeting periodically to let you know what I'm learning. And I'll post my powerpoint presentation as a slideshow later in the week.

Microsoft Office tips and tricks for workforce development staff

This month, I thought I'd share some useful tips for using Microsoft Word. These are some quick tips and tricks that may help you use Microsoft Office better:

 

Note that this article applies to MS Word version 2000 & 2003 not version 2007 and above.

 

1. Say you wrote a grant proposal to fund your latest project. Throughout the document you referred to your organization as WAU, the accronym for Workforce Agencies United (a fictional name). Later, you decide you want to change all the places where it says WAU and replace it with your actual name. Ok, hold down Control and hit the letter "H" to open up the find and replace dialogue box. Enter WAU in the first empty space, and type Workforce Agencies United in the second space. Then click "Replace All." If you followed directions, all of those places were instantly changed. For more on Word's advanced find and replace tricks go to and article on the web called, "Using MS Word’s Advanced Find and Replace Function" by Tibor Környei.

 

2. Now you're working on a document and you want to insert a form from another document into this one. You have options; 1) you could open up the form separately, select everything, then cut and paste it into your current document, or 2) you insert your cursor where you want the new text, click on the menu bar on "Insert" then click "File," then choose the form and double click the form in the list. You may need to understand how Word uses cut and paste to preserve the formatting by reading this article.

 

3. Has anyone sent you a microsoft password protected file that you couldn't work on? First, make sure this is a password protected file not just a form.  If it's password protected so that you can only read the document, but you can't type, then click "Tools" in the menu bar, and look about halfway down the list of options and you will see "Unprotect Document." When you click that, it will ask you to enter a password. If you have reached this far, click this article from Dave Taylor to see how to crack open that Word doc.

 

If, you clicked "Tools" and you saw the word "Protect Document," then you are actually just working on a form that is locked. This is easy to solve. Click "View" in the menu bar, then click "Toolbars" then click the "Forms" toolbar. On that toolbar, you will see a little padlock icon . When you click on that it will unlock the form (BINGO!). To learn more about forms click this microsoft article.

 

---

Other useful keyboard shortcuts using the Control (Ctrl) key:

Ctrl+M = indent the paragraph
Ctrl+Shift+ > or < = increase or decrease font of selected word
Ctrl+S = Save
Ctrol+C = Copy
Ctrl+X = Cut
Ctrl+V = Insert (Paste)
Ctrl+L = Left justify paragraph
Ctrl+R = Right justify paragraph
Ctrl+E = Center text
Ctrl+Shift+N = change selected text to Normal text
Ctrl+Alt+1 = change selected text to Heading 1
Ctrl+Alt+2 = change selected text to Heading 2
Ctrl+Alt+3 = change selected text to Heading 3

For more keyboard shortcuts visit this Microsoft KB article.

Contributor Bryan Lundeen works for the Solano County (California) Workforce Investment Board

Creating a workforce development social network - it ain't easy

WeToo Arizona is a social networking and collaboration platform being created for workforce development in Southern Arizona. Funded by a DOL WIRED grant, it's intended to be a regional knowledge exchange to center efforts to create a sustainable economy. Rather than get more bummed by writing how I feel about the latest unemployment numbers, I thought I'd share an anecdote about our adventures in job creation.

Creating a social network is not a simple thing. I was reminded of this this past summer when my BlackBerry kept chiming with incoming emails. After the tenth consecutive chime I looked to see what all the fuss was about and saw I was getting automatic notifications that my account was being deleted from WeToo. Except it wasn't my account, it was the accounts of all the members of WeToo in Michigan, more than a hundred of them as the emails pouring into my now trembling hand accumulated without abating. I thumbed a text into my BlackBerry (of course) to my tech team:

"OMG evry1 in MI wetoo is getting these emails! How do I stop this madness?"

(They are student interns, OMG is their language, my language has been edited for family viewing).

After a few hours we were certain that it was just me getting the automatic notifications from our website, and I calmed down. We reset the auto notification functions we were configuring and the WeToo communities in Michigan and Arizona lived to see another day none the wiser. I was relieved for WeToo AZ. It's a fragile young thing, still wet from the research and development lab here at the University of Arizona. To cultivate a social network you certainly don't want to annoy people with a senseless barrage of perplexing notifications. This is life in the trenches as we fight the good fight and nurture entrepreneurship, collaboration and the cultivation of home grown talent.

Today we collaborated on creating a Logistics training program across the four counties, where the One-Stops and three community colleges have created a curriculum that responds to employers' needs. The training is free, funded by an innovative grant. You can watch us work at our node within the WeToo workplace. And when I entered the event for our next meeting, only the members of the Regional Knowledge Exchange committee received an auto-notification. Sweet!

Contributor Lewis Humphreys leads the Corporation For A Skilled Workforce's community transformation initiatives in the Southwestern U.S.

WorkBook for the young American worker - one tool for solving the unemployment problem

One of the most alarming bits of bad news in a sea of unwelcome statistics about unemployment, is just how bad it is for the young American worker these days. The latest from BLS states that "the proportion of young people who were employed in July was 51.4 percent, the lowest July rate on record for the series, which began in 1948."

This is the future of our country being dealt a raw deal. It is the responsibility of workforce development to think outside the box and create new methods of mentoring, offering career ladders that make sense, and nurturing an entrepreneurial culture to foster innovation.

When thinking back to my own career and its challenges, I realized that I know something about looking for work during a recession. (In fact I was born during the recession of 1958.) I graduated from college in the recession of 1981. I turned to the government agency for help. My employment counselor told me my BA was worth "bugger all" and wouldn't help me contend with the dearth of good jobs. I waited tables until American Motors was hiring and got laid off three months later. Entering the workforce during a recession ensured I would remain underemployed until I decided to go to graduate school.

An unemployed person is in a vexing solitary cycle of rejection. This recession amplifies the alienation anyone out of work experiences, and it is even more so for young people who are used to the support and camaraderie of a social group. When you look for work, you're on your own. Many commentators on blogs blame a higher minimum wage for higher youth unemployment rates, and make comments like "Most of these teens and twenty-somethings aren't worth a damn even when they are "employed".

Wow! When you are young, you are often undervalued by your elders. You're told to work hard to get ahead but no one tells you how, and you have to find your own way. We love people who succeeded through adversity with hard work.

But if we are to successfully transform this great challenge into opportunity, we all need to counter the pessimism and negativity floating around America right now with forthright action that offers help, wisdom and compassion. Here in Southern Arizona we are at work on a workforce development collaboration platform.

WeToo was initially created for entrepreneurial sector growth in Michigan, where it is much needed. Most of young America is familiar with social media, yet many of the tools they use to find work keep them isolated, alone in their search and experience of rejection.

What I propose is that workforce boards, One-Stops, all levels of government create a FaceBook for workers, WorkBook if you will, where young workers can find mentors, network, and benefit from the social interaction. Websites are not a magic bullet, but they do address many of the vexing problems of alienation and isolation that create a sense of hopelessness in the face of so much adversity. Online profiles lead to visibility, visibility leads to chats and a sense of community. Job opportunities can come as a tweet, and mentors can offer advice and wisdom from their BlackBerry while at Starbucks.

We should all pay attention to this serious problem of youth unemployment. We owe it to our children and grandchildren to help them help us create the eventual recovery and a sustainable economy.

Contributor Lewis Humphreys leads the Corporation For A Skilled Workforce's community transformation initiatives in the Southwestern U.S.

Commuter carpooling meets social media

I suppose it's obvious. If social media is all about helping connect people who don't know each other in real life, it should work as a perfect tool for organizing rideshares. Either regular carpools to work, or one-time needs for a ride to an event.

There are a growing number of online tools and cell phone apps to help you connect up, whether you're looking for passengers to help share the cost, or a driver and car to help get you to your destination.

For example,

Old-timer CarpoolWorld has been around since 2000

Zimride is online, on Facebook and on your cell phone

NuRide allows you to earn rewards for every ride you share

ZoomPool does background checks on its approved members

Need a ride right now? Avego uses GPS to connect people up in real time

This article from Sean P. Aune on Mashable.com gives a good rundown of online ridesharing tools, but it's a year old. Use a Google search to find new options.

Carpooling is good for your wallet and good for the environment. It can save on time and your mental health. If you remember setting up a carpool or rideshare as posting an index card on a bulletin board and hoping not to get phone calls from too many crazies, check out these social media tools. They make it faster and easier than ever before. 

Photo source: Commuter Connections

What I learned at the Google grants workshop

On August 4th and 5th I attended a workshop at Google for the Google Grants program. Basically, Google Grants allows nonprofits to advertise on Google with an advertising credit that Google gives them. It is not a traditional "grant" in the sense of being monetary funds, but a limited allowance of free advertising. From beginning, Google's founders wanted to set aside money to help nonprofits worldwide. Therefore, an entire division of Google is designed to help nonprofits be more effective and efficient and help the populations they serve. Google officially started the grants in 2003. Read the official guidelines to learn more.

 

At the workshop I learned about this history and all of the things that Google offers to help nonprofits. Google offers many online applications and services that have been very useful to nonprofits. Not only can you receive $10,000 credit in advertising, but Google offers services that can help you with creating maps for your website, surveys, message boards, training videos, and even site creation and optimization. I learned some of the best practices of other nonprofits and how they used the grant to recruit more volunteers, start more satellite groups, get more funding, and inform their boards. Google's online tools and applications help to communicate with funders, board members, staff members and supporters.

 

I also had the chance to pick the brains of some of the project managers and engineers at Google. I couldn't help but note the decentralized, people-oriented-culture of Google and how happy and productive it seemed to make the employees.

 

One of the workshops I attended broke some of Google's tools into four categories to easily explain to stakeholders. Those categories are: Sharing, Engaging, Listening, and Asking. As these tools were explained in these categories we were asked to list stakeholders that may be interested in using this technology. I'm going to share with you what I learned in that workshop, however, these are by no means the only tools available for free from Google.

 

Sharing: Blogger & Picasa

At the Workforce Investment Board of Solano County our Executive Director prepares a "media report" for the board members at their quarterly meeting. This report is compiled from news articles collected between meetings. Blogger allows a CEO or ED to publish their own commentary to a web page that would then inform board members instantly. No more waiting until the next board meeting to find out what the CEO thinks about the recent layoff at the manufacturing plant. Picasa is an excellent way to share photos of the attendees at your career fair. You can publish slideshows directly to the web allowing people to see just how exciting the career fair was.

 

Engaging: Google Groups & Google Calendar

Google Groups can allow you to post conversations on a bulletin board. One example would be to post your RFP to a group you create and allow competing companies to post questions for all to see. Then you post the answers. This saves time after a bidders conference and allows the Q&A to be easily accessed and easily read. Google Calendar could be used to post your training schedules. For all the workshops you are offering, job trainings etc. Having that schedule on a public web page that is easy to access is very convenient. 

 

Listening: Google Reader & Google Alerts

Reader allows you to read blogs, newspapers, websites, job boards and anything with an RSS feed on one simple webpage. That can be very powerful. How else do you think I keep up to date on technology? With Google Alerts you can type in search terms such as "Workforce Development" and every time that search term comes up in a blog, news article or web page, you will be notified in the manner you choose. Either via an email message or by a post to your Google Reader page.

 

Asking: Google Docs & Google Moderator

Google docs is a surprisingly, simple office-like program. There is a word-like app, an excel-like app, a presentation app, and the ability to read pdf documents and create very simple surveys. The survey feature built into the spreadsheet application is very powerful for sending surveys to your job clients, program participants, and job fair attendees. All the information they fill into your survey is tabulated and stored in a spreadsheet and as simple charts. Google Moderator allows you to post a question and then rate answers to the question thereby finding the best answer. It's a bit similar to Yahoo Answers.

 

One of the most useful technologies I've used is Google Sites which allows you to create a dashboard that displays all of the above mentioned apps. Read this post by Enterprise Dashboard to see how.

 

Also, don't forget to check out Google MyMaps and Google Earth.

 

For updates on the latest info on Google Grants see the Google Grants Blog 

See the Google for Nonprofits YouTubeChannel and watch this video.

 

What uses for Google do you think your stakeholders should know about?

 

Contributor Bryan Lundeen works for the Solano County (California) Workforce Investment Board

Social media and workforce development: Will welders tweet?

With the recent events in Iran, the tipping point for Twitter as social innovation has happened. Most likely if there is a successful change of power in Iran, it will likely be known as the Twitter revolution. Throughout the world there is a new awareness of how people use social media to transform everything, from knitting to the US Army. In June, Army officials ordered U.S. bases to stop blocking soldiers' access to some of the most popular social-networking sites.

As reported on Wired.com, the order states: "The intent of senior Army leaders to leverage social media as a medium to allow soldiers to 'tell the Army story' and to facilitate the dissemination of strategic, unclassified information, the social-media sites available from the Army homepage will be made accessible from all campus area networks."

As I watch the adoption of social media by various government agencies I think: Why not workforce development?

This is the question I am posing to my community as we tangle with the enormous challenge American workers face in our rapidly shifting and unpredictable economy. Here in Tucson, despite the downturn, some employers are still having trouble recruiting key high tech workers because of skills gaps. We're creating the WIRED Innovation Frontier Arizona (IFA) regional knowledge exchange in response. This is an innovation collaboration platform intended to transform workforce education and training programs and enable them to be nimble enough to keep pace with employer needs.

The IFA regional knowledge exchange builds on the development of entrepreneurial collaboration platforms for WIRED regions in Mid-Michigan and Southeast Michigan where CSW  and WIRED partners have created WeToo, a feature rich social networking site that supports the regional WIRED goals and objectives.

The Arizona office of the Corporation for a Skilled Workforce (CSW) has entered into a partnership with the University of Arizona's Eller College MIS program to create the regional knowledge exchange. The WeToo Research and Development Lab has been established to support workforce development strategies for four counties in southern Arizona. Eller MIS students are working together with CSW, academic faculty, government agencies and private sector partners across the region to launch the new online collaboration platform later this summer.

The new WeToo platform will support innovative workforce education and training initiatives across industry sectors. This is the first time the academic institutions, One Stops, economic development professionals and employers in the different communities have worked together to create joint workforce development programs. It includes a rural entrepreneurial education program that will transform the lives of many young people in our area who previously didn't have access, to one of the best entrepreneurial programs in the country at the University of Arizona. The WeToo regional knowledge exchange will support WIRED objectives to facilitate project collaboration, sharing and archiving information, creating virtual work spaces, and assist partners in attaining benchmark goals.

As we work together in creating the knowledge exchange we're confronted with concerns about community adoption of the platform and users adapting to new work methods - issues confronting the workforce as a whole. Once again the way work is done is being transformed by technology, but it is happening with such rapidity that the time honored necessity of keeping one's skills up to date is virtually impossible for the majority of workers. Not to mention those of us who do our best to learn the utility of all of the proliferating apps we download to our desktops or into our BlackBerrys, iPhones and Google phones each week.

Our task is to help workforce development professionals use technology to address this vexing problem of skills shortages in a time of high unemployment, as reported in the New York Times "Despite Recesssion High Demand For Skilled Labor."

Will welders tweet? It seems unlikely, but social media is helping everyone be more nimble in responding to the workforce development challenges at the end of the naughties. This is something workforce development professionals should be paying attention to.

We tweet: @lewishumphreys / @wetoo

Contributor Lewis Humphreys leads the Corporation For A Skilled Workforce's community transformation initiatives in the Southwestern U.S.

Welcome new contributor Lewis Humphreys to WorkforceDevelopments.com

Based in Tucson, Arizona, Lewis Humphreys leads the Corporation For A Skilled Workforce's community transformation initiatives in the Southwestern U.S.

Combining an abiding fascination with social media with his extensive background in workplace theory, labor relations, and economic development, Lewis helps a wide array of community stakeholders understand the unique potential of their regional assets to create workforce innovation strategies. Currently he is contributing to the WIRED funded Innovation Frontier Arizona regional knowledge exchange, a web based social networking and workforce development collaboration platform. Lewis will be writing monthly on this blog about various aspects this endeavor as it develops, to help workforce development professionals (and others!) understand what works, what doesn't, and how social media can work for you.

Lewis holds an MSc in Industrial Relations from the London School of Economics, and an MA and BA from Dalhousie University in Halifax, Nova Scotia.

Lewis composes, performs and podcasts music, owns a yoga social media business, reads and debates consciousness theory, and, together with friends and his community, weaves the social fabric of the Old Pueblo. 

You can tweet Lewis @lewishumphreys.

How to create a map for your website

I recently attended a workshop on grant writing where one of the topics of discussion was how funders decide to award a grant to an organization. Many times the number of supporting organizations is a factor in deciding to award grant money to an applying organization. A map can be an excellent tool to show the world who your community partners and supporters are.

In this post, I'm going to show you a quick way to create a map of your partners/supporters for your website. 

I've go two methods for you to look at. The first method is to use the method from Google's maps page called "My Maps." Go to http://maps.google.com and click in the upper right corner below Google's logo where it says, "My Maps." From this page you can type in a location and make a map with markers for each address on your map. Your markers can include information about your partners, including contact info and even a photo. This map can be embedded into your website by clicking the word "Link" in the upper right of the map. 

If you don't already have one, you'll need to set up a Google account. You don't need a Gmail address to do it - use your regular email address and follow the instructions.

The second method is for those who have a spreadsheet of the addresses and want to create a whole page with links to those who are partners of your organization. To do that you will need a little more knowledge about html so you may want to contact your webmaster for help. To get you started though, take a look at some of the following bookmarks I've collected on this subject:

One of the best examples of how this is done is on the Digital Inspiration blog.

My inspiration for this post was from the 10,000 Words blog.

Recently Chris Peters and Mano Marks wrote on TechSoup (a source for free/low-cost software for nonprofits) an article on How to Use Google Maps and Google Earth for nonprofits. The topic is very relevant to all workforce agencies as well.

You can also check out Aardvark maps, a great all-in-one map creating web page.

Contributor Bryan Lundeen works for the Solano County (California) Workforce Investment Board

How to use GoToMeeting to create a job fair

What is a "virtual" job/career fair? 

There are many different ways to organize a virtual career fair. They could be run during an actual brick-and-mortar career fair. They could be simply a live presentation of what employers are looking for. A career fair could be a chat room where employers interview and ask questions of potential candidates. Allow your staff to be creative and try new ideas.

 

Who is using virtual career/job fairs?

There are a few organizations that use web technology to host career fairs. Companies such as Directmagazine, California Job Journal, CareersRN, and UNISFAIR. UNISFAIR uses a very creative implementation of an online environment based on Second Life. Some organizations simply use a job board and call it a virtual job fair, however, if you want to be more sophisticated there are other resources available.

 

What resources would someone need to have a virtual career fair?

One popular tool is GoToMeeting or GoToWebinar (paid services). In this article I'm going to show you a very brief overview of how to set up a GoToMeeting virtual job fair and give you some links to follow for a more detailed tutorial. Other companies offering similar tools are WebX and ZohoMeeting.

 

A quick note on verbage
Many people prefer to use the term "Career Fair" over "Job Fair." This is a personal preference but know that for marketing purposes, the term "job fair" is searched for 9 times more often. So when you market on the internet, know that if people are typing in a specific term you want them to find your website.

 

A quick tutorial on seting up GoToMeeting as your career fair venue 

Set up your GoToMeeting space and invite employers to register. As in any brick-and-morter job fair, you have to pre-register your employers and make sure that they understand the venue that you are promoting.

You'll need to decide in advance how long each employer will get to present their company and the jobs they want to fill. Let's say you have 12 employers from one industry and you give them 10 minutes each to describe the company and the positions they want to fill. This gives you a two hour industry-specific career fair in this example.

Attendees can either view this presentation on their computers, or to call in to a special phone number that GoToMeeting will give you to listen to the presentation. After the virtual career fair is completed, attendees will be able to view the entire presentation again as a streaming broadcast on their media player. Each employer presentation should include contact and application information.

The employers can use any programs on their computer including the internet as part of their presentations. By setting each employer as "organizer" during his or her allotted time, everyone who is watching from a computer can view the desktop of the organizer along with the presentation they are giving.

Here's a basic rundown of the process you'll need to set up your virtual career fair:

1. Visit GoToMeeting and sign up.
2. Setup your meeting space.
3. Invite employers to register for the event.
4. Advertise your career fair allowing attendees to pre-register.
5. Send invitations to career fair attendees.
6. Have your job seekers download the GoToMeeting software.
7. Host your virtual fair on GoToMeeting.
8. Post the link to download/view the career fair on your website.

Check out some of these links for more detailed tutorials and ideas for virtual job fairs. I especially recommend the ebook from Ramesh Sambasivan.

• Watch this video playlist on how to use GoToMeeting.
• See the citrix quickrefs at the NTAP website for helpful resources.
• View this really informative 27 page ebook on designing virtual career fairs by Ramesh Sambasivan 

Contributor Bryan Lundeen works for the Solano County Workforce Investment Board

Welcome new contributor Bryan Lundeen to WorkforceDevelopments.com

Tomorrow your favorite workforce development blog will launch a new monthly column on technology in the field, from Bryan Lundeen.

Bryan has more than ten years experience supporting executive management in the workforce investment field and currently works for the Solano Workforce Investment Board. He focuses on using technology to improve document flow, organization, and productivity, and he's a big believer in "getting things done."

Bryan holds a Microsoft Office 2003 Expert Certification and uses his skills in the workforce investment industry to prepare professional documents, proposals, grant submittals, bids and contracts. Bryan manages a small number of Search Engine Marketing campaigns, writes a personal blog, and is currently finishing a bachelor's degree in the "hot" industry of Healthcare Administration at the University of Phoenix.

He joins contributor Racy Ming who writes monthly in this space about prisoner re-entry, as well as earlier guest bloggers from the National Network of Sector Partners, the Aspen Institute and Worksystems Inc. If you're interested in writing for the WorkforceDevelopments blog, please drop me a line.

To contact Bryan directly, please send him an email at blundeen [at] solanowib [dot] org, or visit his personal blog, World of Big Bry.

Finding resources in the Recovery Act (ARRA): An interactive tool

If you're trying to get details on resources are being made available to help families and children through the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA), you might want to check out this interactive online tool.

The tool was created by Zero To Three, a national nonprofit that "informs, trains and supports professionals, policymakers and parents in their efforts to improve the lives of infants and toddlers."

The tool is basically a slideshow with extensive hyperlinks allowing you to jump straight into details about specific programs you're interested in. Programs are organized into three categories, those for Good Health, Strong Families and Positive Early Learning Experiences. WIA and other DOLETA programs are included in its listings.

The tool indicates which programs are new, shows how much each is getting, and links to outside sites for more details where appropriate.

This resource goes well beyond the field of workforce development, but may be useful to workforce development program planners, as so many of the people we're helping have families who need additional assistance beyond what we're providing. This might help you get thinking outside the DOL silo and help you identify programs for partnerships.

To get started with the interactive tool, click here.

Google makes it easy to see the unemployment rate

This post is from Bryan Lundeen of the Solano County Workforce Investment Board. Bryan writes about technology and its uses in workforce development - and much more - on his blog, World of Big Bry.  

Where is the current unemployment rate in comparison to five years ago? Or ten? In comparison to other states and counties?

In California, EDD publishes a "monthly data release" which shows current unemployment rates and states on their website. "Each month the EDD releases revised and preliminary civilian labor force, unemployment rates, and industry employment by geography for California, metropolitan areas, counties, and sub-county areas." This data can be useful to job seekers, their coaches, and workforce development staff that try to follow trends in unemployment. However, like a lot of "useful data" found on the internet, it can be difficult to understand. One way to do that is to show statistics in comparison to other statistics.

This month, Google started making searching for public data much easier. Go to Google and in the box type your state, and the phrase unemployment rate. For example: South Dakota unemployment rate.

The first result that shows up is a small thumbnail graph of the unemployment rate of that state. Then click on the link for that statistic and you will find a search application that graphs all the states and counties in the U.S. based on statistics from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics. Click the little plus sign next to your state too see counties.

Let us say you want to show someone the comparison of rates between Hughes County and Meade County. Make a check mark in each of the boxes next to the county name in the list under South Dakota. You should see a graph like this one:

If there are other lines from other counties displayed you can uncheck those. Then up the in the upper right hand corner of the graph you will see the word Link. Click that and a little box will open that gives you the link to that graph.

Just brainstorming here: what uses can we find for this?

1. Make a decision on where you want to commute?
2. Maybe you want to move and know what the unemployment rate compares to other cities?
3. You are a One-Stop and you want to design an information dashboard for your clients?
4. You are a job coach and you want to market to cities that have higher unemployment rates than where you usually market?

What other uses can you find for this data?

For more information:

• Link to Google Unemployment statistics
• Google Help explanation of this new feature
  

Promoting a green recovery: Sec Solis talks new Dept of Labor priorities

As President Obama released his 2010 budget (news coverage here) last Thursday, Labor Secretary Hilda Solis appeared online in a pre-recorded video to give an overview of the part her department will oversee. Then she opened it up for questions that she answered in a live text chat online. After the first hour, DOL staff took over answering questions.

You can watch the video and read all the questions and answers here. Staff reports they will continue answering questions over the next few days.

I submitted a question during the live chat via Twitter, and am looking forward to reading their answer: Does DOL have plans to incorporate social media into programs & svsc, or fund grantees for that?

A few highlights from the live and ongoing chat:

On DOL's new priorities:

My priorities for the Department's FY 2010 budget include promoting a "green" recovery, beginning to restore the capacity of our worker protection programs to vigorously carry out their mission, ensuring that our programs are transparent and accountable, and promoting diversity and stakeholder inclusion in every aspect of the Department.

On unemployment:

While the Obama Administration's efforts are beginning to turn the economy around, millions of Americans, who are willing to work but cannot find a job, are being helped by the current Federal unemployment benefit extension. As we get closer to the end of the year, when the current program is scheduled to expire, the Administration will be taking a close look at economic conditions and the continued need for benefits.

On apprenticeship:

The Department is actively working on a comprehensive set of Solicitation for Grant Award which will, amongst other policy goals, encourage greater partnerships with and promotion of Registered Apprenticeship programs. Also in our ARRA Policy Guidance, we are encouraging the publicly funded workforce system to more actively reach out to Registered Apprenticeship programs, including labor management organizations.

Finally, in the past year, ETA has provided over $10 million in discretionary resources to support and promote Registered Apprenticeship. $6.5 million was made available to national organizations to incorporate elements of the revised regulatory framework governing the National Apprenticeship System. $2.5 million was made available to State Apprenticeship Agencies to assist in their efforts to modernize their Apprenticeship systems. Finally, technical assistance resources were provided for a series of Action Clinics around the country to promote greater collaboration with Registered Apprenticeship.

On the Career Pathways/Community College program:

This program was not cut. The 2009 budget included $125 million for Community-Based Job Training Grants. The 2010 budget renames and refocuses that program as Career Pathways Innovation Fund and increases funding to $135 million. The new program will focus on developing career pathways in community colleges for high-growth careers in partnership with workforce investment boards, faith-based groups and other community groups.

On Workforce Investment Act reauthorization:

We have received numerous letters identifying issues relevant to reauthorization of the Workforce Investment Act, and we are appreciative of your interest and input. The Department looks forward to working with Congress and stakeholders as legislation takes shape. President Obama has called on Congress to work with him to reauthorize the Workforce Investment Act, and the Department's FY 2010 Congressional Budget Request continues to support efforts to improve the effectiveness of the workforce system. The Administration is conducting a comprehensive review of federal job training programs to assess their effectiveness, which will inform the Administration's proposal for an improved workforce system.

First state government to launch an iPhone app is...

Utah!

Just last week Utah launched two free applications for the iPhone, making them the first smart phone state government.

The first app, Utah.gov, allows you to quickly find state agencies and services, plus news about the state. The Utah Professional License Lookup allows you to check to see if someone you're thinking about having do work for you is licensed by the state.

Marshall Kirkpatrick over at web-centric ReadWriteWeb argues that governments shouldn't be paying to create iPhone apps during a recession. I couldn't disagree with him more. Anything that makes government more accessible, available and efficient for the public is worth investing in. The good news is that 80+ percent of his readers disagree with him too. (Add your vote.)

I do agree with Kirkpatrick that web and cell phone applications that are available to more people on more platforms would be better. Where's the app for the Google phone? What about text-based information shared via other phones?

What kinds of services do you provide that could be done via cell phone?

What government services do you use that you would like to access via your phone?

Help wanted: Seeking Workforce Developments contributors

The Workforce Developments blog has been online for more than three years now, and I think it's time to widen the range of voices on these pages.

I'm looking for regular monthly columnists and guest bloggers to help expand these pages.

Most of the posts you read here are written by me. In addition, Racy Ming writes an excellent monthly post on prisoner re-entry. I've also had some terrific guest bloggers, including Tim Lorentz of the National Network of Sector Partners, Allison Gerber of the Aspen Institute and Tricia Ryan of Worksystems Inc.

Who should write for Workforce Developments? You. Especially if you're a workforce development professional and you

• Have an expertise you'd like to share with others
• Want to raise your profile with the national workforce community
• Have been thinking about blogging, but want to take it for a trial run first
• Already blog elsewhere and want to bring readers to your site, or 
• Find that you have more to say than you can in your 140-character Twitter feed 

Some specific topics I'd like to cover more regularly on this blog:

• Green jobs
• Unemployment
• Grants for workforce development
• Community colleges
• Tales from the One-Stop front lines
• Sector initiatives
• Job hunting
• Inside DOL
• Workforce development in the states

Or propose another topic you think folks in workforce development would like to know more about.

If you know someone you think would make a great Workforce Developments contributor, please send them this info. 

You don't have to have any tech skills, but you do need to be a decent writer. Or have some multimedia talents to apply to the workforce development field. This is an unpaid opportunity right now, but if this blogging venture ever turns profitable, I'll happily share the wealth.

To find out more about being a Workforce Developments contributor, send me an email at bronwyn [at] bmauldin [dot] com. Tell me a little about yourself - specifically your experience in the workforce development field - and what you'd like to write about.

I look forward to hearing from you.