Ed Gordon's article makes a good point. It will be leveraging regional collaborations that will drive success in the workforce arena. CareerSource Capital Region is part of the Florida Georgia Workforce Alliance that consists of three workforce boards in north Florida and three in south Georgia.

The state structures that govern our workforce efforts are very different, however, we are looking toward leveraging our resources in the training provider area and in the business services area. Both areas seem to hold an opportunity to leverage and combine efforts to assist multi-site businesses in more than one workforce area to provide services and approve needed skills training that can be used across all six workforce areas.

The data continues to show that vacancies in skilled positions go unfilled nationwide. Locally, some business owners are realizing that apprenticeships can be a great answer to filling their talent needs and the worker earns a wage while going to class. The is no "college debt" in Florida. If you are in an apprenticeship, the training is free.

This opportunity should be considered by every parent before they push their child on to college. Technical colleges, like Lively Technical College, offer a wide variety of hands-on skills training to good-paying jobs. Welding is in high demand as is IT technicians. Healthcare continues to have a slew of openings that the hospitals find hard to fill.

Some of the root causes for these openings are 1)Low wages, 2) Lack of a skill centered pipeline developed in the K-12 system, low unemployment locally that translates into fewer people in the job searching pool. 

CareerSource Capital Region is looking to lead the region with innovation in technology, an integrated services approach to benefit the career seeker and business solution that adds value to the employer community.