BUILDING A COMPETITIVE WORKFORCE FOR THE

NEW ECONOMY!

Hans Meeder
National Alliance of Business

Roger L. Cude
McLeodUSA, Inc.

Abstract

Current and future workforce shortages and skill misalignments pose significant challenges
for long-term economic viability and growth. Projections of population growth, job growth,
education patterns, and demographics have profound implications for decision-makers in
organizations and human resource professionals. In response to economic and societal
changes, more individuals are taking advantage of postsecondary education and lifelong
leaming opportunities. The demise of post World War II-based assumptions of long-term
attachment between employers and employees, requires a new model of workforce
development that recognizes employee mobility, competitive pressures, globalization, and the
pace of change in valuable technologies and skills. The Knowledge Development Network
(KDN) is presented as an emerging model of collaboration among business, education,
employee organizations, and policy makers. The KDN addresses the need for ongoing
education and training for workforce preparation and development.

Learning is what most adults will do for a living in the 21st century.
-Perelman

Today's economy creates workplace opportunities and challenges. To better

understand the issues, we discuss the implications of demographic and

! The authors acknowledge the valuable research contributions of Robert Harmon, Staff
Economist, National Alliance of Business.
22 Building a Competitive Workforce

macro-economic factors on our collective ability to ensure that qualified

workers are available to fill the jobs created by economic growth. After all,
people provide the foundation for competing in the world marketplace. Our
discussion begins with u.s. factors because of that country's great impact on
the world economy, and because u.s. data were more accessible. We then
compare world economic and demographic projections. To address the need
for a current and future workforce development model, we propose a
Knowledge Development Network (KDN) model for accelerating the
collaborative efforts that are required to build the workforce of the future.
The term network is defined here as a strategic alliance of stakeholders in
knowledge development. Decision-makers in business, education, and HRD
can use the KDN model to implement effective strategies to develop workers
who are prepared for the requirements of the new economy.

u.s. jobs and growth: The old deficit

Many of us recall personal experiences or stories of lean times in the United
States when jobs were scarce and economic development was flat. However,
during the past 17 years, with the exception of an 8-month period during
1990-1991, the u.s. has experienced the longest sustained period of
economic growth in its history. Since the early 1980s, the U.S. economy has
created 40 million new jobs at an average rate of 2 million jobs per year.
And nearly every expert projection tells us that job growth can be expected
to accelerate (Employment Policy Foundation, 2000, p.8).
We also know that the rate of growth of qualified workers will not keep
pace (see Figure 1).
But the gap is not widening as quickly as one could expect. As the Baby
Boom generation moves through the workforce, the average age of workers
climbs (see Figure 2). Individual workers are healthier than ever before and
more likely to remain in the workforce for longer periods of time. Given the
Baby Boomers' vast knowledge and experience, their extended involvement
in the U.S. workforce is certainly good news. But this generation of workers
is beginning to leave the workforce. Furthermore, they will not be
completely replaced by the U.S. workers in subsequent generations or by
current immigration levels. The projected annual growth rate of the
workforce is expected to range from 1 percent per year in the years 1998-
2015 to nearly 0 percent per year in the years 2015-2025 (Porter, 2001).
In addition to the expected increase in jobs and decrease in qualified
workers, jobs in the U.S. economy will continue to shift dramatically from
manufacturing to information work. Nearly 93 million American workers
(holding approximately 80 percent of all jobs) do not spend their workdays
Building a Competitive Workforce 23

Growth in Jobs and Labor Supply, 1998 to 2028 (in thousands)

I =:=~:::"" I
210,000
200,000
190,000
180.000
170.000
160.000
150.000
140.000
130.000
1~000~--------~----------~------ ____~________~
1998 2008 2018 2028

Sources: U,S. Department of labor. Bureau of labor Statistics, Bureau of the Census.
Current Population Survey. and National Alliance of Business.

Figure 1. Growth in jobs and labor supply

making or growing goods. Instead, they move products, process or generate

information, or provide services to people (Atkinson, Court, and Ward,
1999). In combination with rapid advances in technology, globalization, and
consumer demands, the knowledge and skills needed to perform these jobs
are dramatically changing. The challenge is to build a workforce equipped
with the requisite abilities to perform.

Highly qualified knowledge workers: The new

deficit
The Hudson Institute forecasts that 60 percent of all new jobs created in the
early 21 51 Century will require skills possessed by only 20 percent of the
current U.S. workforce (Judy & D'Amico, 1997). Moreover, the State New
Economy Index (Atkinson, Court, and Ward, 1999) found that "knowledge-
based jobs (those requiring postsecondary, vocational, or higher education)
grew from approximately 27 percent of total employment in the U.S. in 1983
to 31 percent in 1993 and are expected to grow to about 33 percent in 2006"
(p.16). Clearly, large segments of the U.S. workforce will require rapid
development in knowledge and skills. To meet the demands of the new
economy we must develop new ways of constructing and implementing
24 Building a Competitive Workforce

035 and Older

.Under 35
100%

80%
49%
60"1. 65% 66% 67%
60%

40%

20%

0%
1978 1998 2008 2018 2028

Source: U.S. Census Bureau and National Alliance of Business

Figure 2. The aging workforce

workforce development initiatives. If we do not, many potential workers will

be left behind at a time when all are needed to sustain the competitiveness
that fuels economic growth in the u.s.
A sign that we recently spotted outside a restaurant may be truer than we
care to admit. It read, "Got a pulse? Apply inside!" However, many of the
jobs being created demand a complex set of technical, problem solving,
teamwork, and critical thinking competencies-and of course, "a pulse."
In specific disciplines, the growth in worker needs and the educational
requirements of jobs will be dramatic. For example, the Bureau of Labor
Statistics estimates that by 2006, the need for workers in certain technical
fields (e. g. science, engineering, skilled manufacturing, computer science)
will increase by more than 20 percent (Bureau of Labor Statistics, 2001). The
Information Technology Association of America (ITAA) estimates that for
want of qualified applicants half of the jobs posted for information
technology (IT) workers (in IT companies and in IT-reliant companies) will
go unfilled in coming years (ITAA, 2000). Overall estimates of job growth
in IT occupations have dropped since early 2000 when the high-technology
sector began to slow. However, the mismatch between available jobs and
available workers with the right skills continues to challenge business
organizations in the U.S. and in most industrialized nations. The recent high-
technology slowdown only temporarily allows us to catch our collective
Building a Competitive Workforce 25

breath. Organizations in industries that rely on high technology, such as the

financial services industry, are continuously creating jobs to enable their
efficient and innovative business practices. So how are workers in these and
other sectors reacting to the scarcity of qualified labor?

How is the workforce responding?

Jobs are becoming more intellectually challenging and are creating demands
for workers with postsecondary education. In 1973, only 28 percent of U.S.
workers had education beyond a high school diploma. By 1998, 57 percent
of workers had some college education and more (Carnevale & Desrochers,
2001, p. 50).
Today's workers are engaged in much more lifelong learning after they
obtain an initial experience of postsecondary education up to and including a
"terminal degree." Figure 3 indicates that between 1991 and 1999 the
participation rate of adults who had already received at least some
postsecondary education in continuing education increased by 10 percentage
points, from 47 to 57 percent. Figure 3 also indicates that individuals with
higher levels of terminal degrees participated in continuing education at
higher rates. Higher learning begets the need for more learning.
In addition to the continuing education offered by colleges and
universities, corporations have increased their educational opportunities.
Employers are spending increasing amounts on training the current
workforce. According to surveys conducted by Training Magazine (October
2000), expenditures for employer resources dedicated to all forms of training
were estimated to be $54 billion.
Adults access learning opportunities in a wide variety of settings. Of the
5 million non-degree seeking students enrolled in community colleges in the
U.S., 30 percent already have bachelor's degrees or postgraduate
coursework. These adult learners are enrolled in school to upgrade their
current skills, take career-specific courses, and earn certifications (Philippe
& Valiga, 2000). In an environment where accelerated job creation is
marked by a concomitant change in required competencies, the demand for
systematic workforce development continues unabated. We have seen
workforce-development models change from focusing on traditional
education providers to offering increased flexibility to learners. For example,
the chapter titled, "Using Adult Learning to Bridge the Digital Divide," by
Ghost Bear and Conti shows how adults engage in self-directed learning on
the Internet. Moreover, adults are starting to engage in smaller and more
specialized learning units. They then stack or sequence these units to meet
the changing requirements of their jobs and professional disciplines.
26 Building a Competitive Workforce

Postgraduate .,. "O!: .£ -!

degree
.1999

I
01995
BAdegree ", , 01991
c
~c:
~ AAdegree
.

'g" Some college ,'Ii' •

~
; VocationaV technical

.3
Any postecondary ."
0% 10% 20% 30% 40% 50% 60% 70%
Percent Participating

U.S. Department of Education, National Center for Education Statistics. Digest of Education
Statistics, Various Years

Figure 3. Percentage of adults participating in continuing education

Workforce development globally

Economic growth, job creation, and demographics in developed countries
follow patterns similar to the U.S. For example, Turpin (2000) states that
thousands of companies in Britain are affected by major shortages of skilled
staff and that many companies may soon cast their recruitment efforts
worldwide under a new government plan to fast-track workers through the
immigration process. Moreover, a recent article in the Wall Street Journal
(Zachary, 2000) reported that German workers were angry that efforts to
protect their jobs from foreign workers were breaking down. The Federal
Institute of Labor blames corporate Germany for the shortage of skilled
technicians. Compare this to a plan recently implemented in the U.S. to ease
immigration requirements for computer programmers from India and other
countries that have developed the ability to provide highly trained
technology workers quickly.
Table 1 shows the projected population growth and job growth
worldwide. A quick look at the population and job projections worldwide
shows similarities between the U.S. and worldwide data.
Building a Competitive Workforce 27

Similar to U.S. projections, these worldwide job and population growth

projections support the need for new workforce development models.
Factors that could especially impact non-U.S. countries and drive the need
for new workforce development models include the spread of free markets,
improved international labor conditions and workers' rights (U.S.
Department of Labor, 2001), and the emergence of powerful economic
alliances among countries.

Table 1. Population, Labour Force and Labour Force Growth,

1950·2025

Region Population (millions) Labor force (millions)

1950 1985 2000 2025 1950 1985 2000 2025
World 2.516 4,837 6,122 8,206 1,189 2,164 2,753 3,649
Industrialized 832 1,174 277 1,397 387 568 615 636
Countries
Developing 1.684 3.663 4.845 6.809 802 1.596 2.138 3.013
Countries
Africa 224 555 872 1.617 99 214 318 650
Eastern Africa 63 166 272 537 32 75 111 228
Middle Africa 27 60 92 170 13 24 33 69
Western Africa 65 169 277 558 31 68 101 219

Average annual labor force

Region Labor force growth (millions growth rate ('Yo)
1950-1985 1985-2000 2000-25 1950-1985 1985-2000 2000-25
World 975 589 896 1.73 1.62 1.13
Industrialized 181 47 21 1.10 0.53 0.14
Countries
Developing 794 542 875 1.98 1.97 1.38
Countries
Africa 115 104 331 2.22 2.69 2.89
Eastern Africa 43 36 117 2.45 2.67 2.92
Middle Africa 11 10 35 1.66 2.26 2.92
Western Africa 37 33 119 2.29 2.67 3.17
From: "Demographic, employment, and development trends: The need for integrated planning"
by G. M Farooq and F. l. MacKellar, 1990, International Labour Review, 129(3), p. 301-305.
28 Building a Competitive Workforce

Knowledge Development Networks

We propose integrating new workforce development efforts into a model for
collaboration, the Knowledge Development Network (KDN). The network is
fashioned after the concept of supply chain management (Chopra & Meindl,
2000). We speak of "knowledge chain management" that will help to create
the workforce required in today's and tomorrow's competitive world. The
model allows us to observe and include the many effective workforce
initiatives that occur in various geographic areas and industrial sectors. After
we define the KDN model, we will explore three aspects of implementing
such a network: consortia, competency models, and non-linear learning.
A new workforce development model is needed because the post World
War II assumptions about the long-term attachment between employers and
employees have been bypassed (Osterman, 1999). The two dominant
employment models of the post-War era, IBM and the auto industry,
although they were different in many respects, shared an inherent
assumption that employees would remain attached to a single employer for a
long period of time. In that relationship, employees entered employment
with a basic set of educational or skill credentials, and additional learning
would occur through company-directed efforts.
For the most part, assumptions oflong-term attachment are a relic of the
past. The new model of employee development is a loose hybrid of
company-facilitated training and individual efforts to upgrade skills and
knowledge. Drucker (1998) states,
The knowledge society will inevitably be far more competitive than any
society we have known-for the simple reason that with knowledge being
universally accessible, there will be no excuses for nonperformance. There
will be no 'poor' countries. There will only be ignorant countries. And the
same will be true for companies, industries and organizations of all kinds
(p.545).
Calls for new approaches that are more flexible and responsive to
changing market forces are emerging.
The KDN attempts to capture the energy and the flexibility necessary for
today's fast-paced, global economy. Modeled after the concept of supply
chain management, it is intended to spur collaboration and enable faster and
higher quality workforce development efforts in communities, industries,
and market segments. Futurist Joel Barker (1993) suggests that many
breakthrough innovations involve borrowing ideas and concepts from one
discipline and applying them in another one. In supply chain management,
organizations with specific core competencies work closely together in
complex, interactive sets of relationships. They form an integrated network,
often under the direction of a single company that provides the ultimate
Building a Competitive Workforce 29

consumer product or service. For example, employers, insurance companies,

health care providers, pharmaceutical companies, and others form an
integrated network to provide routine healthcare to employees and their
families. The entire set of organizations involved in producing or assembling
a product or providing a service may be considered a supply chain. Recently,
however, a new term, supply network, has replaced the older term. It better
represents the spirit of the highly interactive relationships that form among
organizations that actively seek mutual advantage in collectively providing
customer products and services. Moreover, integrated supply networks have

We apply fundamental aspects of supply

chain management to workforce development.
adopted state-of-the-art technology solutions (e.g., B2B, extranets) to
increase the speed and the effectiveness of end-to-end processes. In the KDN
model, we apply some of the fundamental aspects of supply chain
management to workforce development.
Atkinson, Court, and Ward (1999) proposed a similar idea in their State
New Economy Index. These authors contended,
In the new economy, states' economic success will be increasingly
determined by how effectively they can spur technological innovation,
entrepreneurship, education, specialized skills, and the transition of all
organizations, public and private, from bureaucratic hierarchies to
learning networks" (p. 4; emphasis added).

Consortia, competencies and non-linear learning:

Implementing the Knowledge Development
Network
KDNs involve strategic alliances of community partners that must work
together by building a deeper and broader set of learning alternatives. A
KDN is comprised of a complex, interactive, adaptive system of
relationships between employers, education and training organizations,
employee organizations, community organizations, public policyrnakers, and
the individuals who seek employable skills. Although new technology is
currently being used in some areas ofKDNs, we believe there are significant
opportunities to increase the use of technology in developing consortia,
competencies, and non-linear learning.
30 Building a Competitive Workforce

Consortia are the foundation of KDNs

We have found several cases where efforts are underway that embody some
or all of the principles embedded in the KDN to successfully educate the
workforce in the u.s. (a few examples are highlighted later in the chapter).
In these cases, a handful of educators, policy makers, concerned parents, and
business people in the local community launched integrated development
efforts. They developed a shared vision, secured minimal funding, and
implemented programs. But these organizers would be the first to admit that
such programs are not easy to create. For example, when a roomful of
educators, policy makers, business people and parents ask the question "who
is the customer?" the concept of mutual interests immediately starts to break
down. The educators claim students are the customers. They believe
education is for the students. The parents claim they are the customers
because they are responsible for preparing their children for life. The policy
makers claim taxpayers are the customers because they fund the programs.

The network challenge begins with gathering together

the many customers of workforce education efforts.
The business people claim they are the customers because they need
qualified workers to fill jobs and create economic growth within the
community. Finally, the adult learners claim they are the customers because
they should be able to choose the learning options that fit their career goals.
All are correct.
The network challenge begins with gathering together the many
customers of workforce education efforts. One of the authors participated in
such an organizing process in a local community. The members of the
organizing group, who were committed to finding common ground, worked
through their differences in several long sessions. They finished with a
shared vision of creating sustained competitive advantage for several
stakeholders:
• Local businesses need to create a competitive advantage in the war for
talent by building a local labor market with high skills and the right
skills.
• Students need to have an advantage in the competition for good jobs.
• Policy makers need to build competitive advantage in attracting new
development and growth to the community based on an excellent
educational infrastructure.
Their shared vision allowed all stakeholders to embrace the initiatives
and programs because they clearly understood their shared interests. Once a
Building a Competitive Workforce 31

vision is established, the leaders of the KDN must address at least three
strategic issues: the demand for knowledge and skills, alignment, and
communication.

The demand for knowledge and skills

A KDN must establish processes to accurately measure and report the

knowledge and skills needed by the labor market at two levels. At the macro
level, the network must develop a shared understanding of the occupations
that are currently in demand and the trends that will influence future needs
for skilled employees. Businesses contribute by sharing their high-level
workforce plans. Policy makers contribute by communicating their high-
level economic development plans. And, educators contribute by sharing
their best practices and the latest techniques for assessing and developing
skills in essential occupations.
At the micro level, individual jobs and occupational clusters will be
analyzed to understand the strategic mix of academic, workplace, and
technical skills that reside in current and future jobs and tasks.
With a deep understanding of demands for knowledge and skills and
labor market trends, the KDN will share this information with all educational
and training partners, including high schools, 2-year and 4-year
postsecondary institutions, private for-profit training companies, publicly
funded workforce-development programs, adult literacy organizations, and
community-based organizations. As all members of the consortia take
advantage of their access to common information about essential workforce
knowledge and skills, they can appropriately align their education and
training programs.
When consortia members align programs around specific human capital
development, adult learners in the area of the network can access a broad
and expanding array of educational and training opportunities that are made
available to them by the education and training partners. Moreover, these
educational programs can be made available through traditional classroom
learning and through Web-based, self-paced on-line learning or any
combination in between. A KDN becomes most effective when all
educational opportunities are aligned around the career goals and the
learning needs of the students and the goals and the workforce needs of
business and policy makers.

Aligning resources

Over the next thirty years, tens of millions of adults already in the workforce
will need to engage in learning activities at postsecondary levels. Within a
32 Building a Competitive Workforce

purely competitive paradigm, educational organizations will be reluctant to

align their programs for fear of losing their students. In the past, many
institutions tried to be all things to all people. For two reasons, we advocate
their taking a more specialized approach to workforce education to achieve
the vision of a local KDN. First, policy makers and businesses generally
work to create a local "critical mass" in one or more industry sectors. The
existence of an integrated "supply network" that can provide qualified
workers is fundamental to the sustainability of competitive advantage of
local businesses in industry sectors. Second, opportunities to market
educational products to other local geographies will arise as other
communities attempt to build human competencies and organization
capacities in the same industry sectors. Using technology and distance
learning, local organizations will be prepared to export their educational
products and services. The chapter titled, "Implementing a Remote and
Collaborative Hands-On Learning Environment," is an excellent example of
exporting best practices for work-force education in telecommunications.
Educational consortia that are aligned to achieve shared goals are bound
to create the ease of entry and enhanced flexibility that will appeal to
potential learners. As a result, much larger numbers of youth and adults will
grasp opportunities to become lifelong learners. Thus, rather than trying to
get their proverbial "bigger piece of the pie," most learning organizations in
a KDN will work together in an open-source system that will "grow the pie."
One definition of insanity, often attributed to Albert Einstein, is doing
the same thing over and over and expecting a different result. Businesses,
policy makers, and education providers have often worked together in the
past. Since the early 1980s, businesses have been urged to get involved with
education. A Nation at Risk (National Commission on Excellence in
Education, 1983), the landmark report that called for systemic reforms to
improve the quality of the American education system, caused many
businesses to eagerly form school-by-school partnerships. In addition,
businesses developed relationships with specific institutions to create
educational programs designed to relieve narrowly targeted, site-specific
skill shortages. However, given the future marketplace trends and extensive
challenges outlined in the beginning of this chapter, all stakeholders in a
KDN will need to collaborate in meaningful ways. Some serious "heavy
lifting" is required for the strategic work of developing a KDN.

Using communication to build community

Communication is at the heart of maintaining alignment in any consortium.

Multiple stakeholders in a KDN will need to assess continuously their
progress toward established goals and periodically evaluate the changing
Building a Competitive Workforce 33

needs of competitive business organizations for skilled, technologically

prepared workers. Continuous interaction among all stakeholders in a KDN
contributes to building a thriving community that is focused on meeting the
challenges and the opportunities of building sustained competitive
advantage. In addition, frequent interactions among stakeholders are vital for
creating effectiveness and efficiency within a well-integrated network. When

Some serious "heavy lifting" is required

for the strategic work of developing KDNs.
discussing these multiple stakeholders, Drucker (1998) states that together
these organizations are the community and both the public and private
sectors must share in the work.
Effective communication requires a common language. A major
challenge in developing an effective consortium is that businesses find it
difficult to articulate their needs to the educational community and
educational institutions find it difficult to communicate their learning
outcomes to the business community. This issue can come closer to
resolution when all stakeholders in a KDN employ the language of
competencies in articulating job requirements and workforce knowledge and
skills. In addition, network participants can benefit from building
community by applying the Habits of the Heart that Taulbert describes the
chapter titled, "Touch and Technology."

Competencies

An effective KDN allows employers to articulate the knowledge, skills and

competencies that the labor market is and will be demanding. First,
employers can specify the skills and knowledge that are needed for various
occupations. Job-task analyses are helpful in defining competencies that are
required nationally, internationally, and by industry. Job-task analyses also
identify the general academic preparation, the workplace skills, and the
technological fluencies that all workers need. Further, they articulate the job-
specific competencies that are needed within similar clusters of job
occupations. In the chapter titled, "HR to the Power of e: Internet-Powered
Transformation of Human Resources," the author outlines how human
resource professionals in businesses are using technology to create
competency-based management systems. A natural extension of the KDN
model is to begin exploring real-time sharing of non-proprietary information.
The KDN will measure and forecast new directions in the job market in
order to understand the extent to which certain sets of knowledge and skills
will be needed in the future. Such information about the labor market will be
34 Building a Competitive Workforce

valuable to all stakeholders in many different ways. Real-time knowledge

sharing at this level benefits all KDN stakeholders because they can beat the
competition in responding quickly to market needs.
Having access to macro-level information about job and skill trends
enables individual workers to make well-informed decisions about their
education and skill-building efforts. In many cases, individuals will begin to
see a bright line between education and training and personal career

Effective KDNs allow employers to articulate

the knowledge, skills and competencies
that the labor market is and will be demanding.
opportumtles. Although many individuals are internally motivated to be
lifelong learners, others may need incentives, such as greater confidence in
the specific competencies that are valued by the regional labor market.
Information about the macro and micro labor markets and occupational
job-task analyses can inform the planning efforts of education and training
institutions., They can focus their resources on areas that represent
significant job growth and the need for skills. Educational organizations that
better understand the current and future work environments of their learners
can more effectively provide curricula that are aligned with the required
learning outcomes. Of course, the educational organizations will not be
required to reduce their curricula to achieving only these outcomes, but they
will be better prepared to ensure that their programs provide just-in-time as
well as just-in case content Further, educational organizations may develop
or adopt specific learner assessments and offer credentials that better
communicate to the business community the competencies their graduates.
This phenomenon is already evidenced by the explosive increase in the
number of workers who obtain certificates in specialized areas. Of course,
some institutions clearly benefit from offering courses leading to professions
that are not in high demand or for which the cost of training outweighs the
financial benefits to the student (e.g., cosmetology, outdoor recreation, low-
skilled technologies). These and other preparatory courses may be in high
demand because students perceive them to lead to good jobs or, at least,
attainable ones. Since consumers are willing to pay tuition for such courses,
it is certainly not in the institution's immediate financial interest to curtail
their offerings of courses that are in high demand. Furthermore, although
local job opportunities may not exist, if students are willing to relocate, it
may make sense for them to obtain certain skills and knowledge.
In some instances, public policymakers have chosen to limit public
expenditures on courses for which little local demand exists. In some ways,
this makes sense, especially when institutions seem to take advantage of a
Building a Competitive Workforce 35

student's ignorance and the bill for education is footed almost entirely by
taxpayers.
But draconian efforts to curtail educational choices could backfire by
creating a bureaucratic bottleneck that puts significant educational decisions
in the hands of a few decision makers, further limiting schools' abilities to
respond to changing educational needs. We suggest that the best policy for a
KDN is develop a strong customer information system that will give
consumers direct access to information, formatted in an easy-to-understand
way, about job trends and the level of education and training needed for
various types of jobs.
Finally, the information developed by KDNs makes it easier for
complementary and competing institutions to align their efforts. They can
collaborate to help learners navigate through multiple learning options and at
the same time avoid unnecessary duplication of content. High schools can
create outcome standards and curricula that will encourage lifelong learning
and outcomes that are aligned with the entrance standards of postsecondary
organizations. Alignment reduces the need for remediation and allows
students to matriculate in the programs of multiple learning providers as
their learning needs and situations change.

Non-linear learning

Cross (1981) describes a particular social norm found in most industrialized

nations, "the linear life plan." This plan dictates that education is for the
youth, work is for the middle-aged, and leisure is for the elderly. While
many expectations of this norm have eroded, they still seem to be embedded
in the "DNA" of many industrialized nations. Best and Stem (1976) argue
that such expectations damage our society because they inhibit career change
(mostly because of the need for additional education that accompanies career
change) and because they have constrained lifelong learning goals for adults.
The belief that education is key to finding new career opportunities, when it
is accompanied by the belief that education should be completed early in
life, presents a dilemma.
The focus on career learning has been further complicated by the
changing assumptions of the relationship between employer and employee.
Traditionally, U.S. companies managed career learning on behalf of their
employees. New technologies were introduced to employees in classroom
instruction and on-the-job training, or managed through the employee union.
Training was offered on the job. Individuals were not required to assess their
own career paths and to make choices about their training. Although many
Americans are not happy about it, for the most part, long-term employer-
employee relationships are a thing of the past. While companies still invest
36 Building a Competitive Workforce

considerable sums in training their current workforce, they typically provide

training to those who are able to benefit immediately from the training and
to implement these new skills on the job-essentially this amounts to
relatively incremental training.
By contrast, when a company dramatically re-directions its business
strategy, it may lay offlower-skilled workers and simultaneously hire higher
skilled workers. The onus for remaining employable-for maintaining and
developing a set of skills and knowledge that employers find valuable-is
now placed on the individual, not the company.
The KDN works to break down this cultural norm by providing
information to individuals about new career opportunities and the specific
competencies needed to take advantage of them. In time, individuals will
gradually abandon the linear life plan paradigm and accept that a non-linear
life plan is best for career advancement and for meeting the opportunities
that will arise during their lifetimes. Carl Rogers has stated, "I have come to
feel that the only learning which significantly influences behavior is self-
discovered, self-appropriated." Adults are becoming "free agents" in career
learning and job choice.
A brief analogy will clarify what we mean by non-linear learning. The
technology of video editing in the early 1980s required the editor to cut
video clips in the sequence in which they were to be shown. If the video
editor wished to insert a clip in the middle of a finished product, all the clips
that followed the insertion had to be re-edited to maintain the appropriate
sequence. A similar situation prevailed in education. Often, students who
completed a few courses at a junior college and then transferred to a
university had to re-take several courses. This requirement held even when
the content of the courses was essentially the same and the students had
demonstrated proficiency in the subject matter. In the 1990s video editors
adopted non-linear digital editing technology. Today they can insert any
form of media into any section of a finished video product at any time. The
insertion is instantly integrated into the finished product, and the sequence is
maintained. Likewise, it is feasible to create a career-development process
and an educational system where adults can insert formal and informal
learning into their repertoire of competencies at any time. However, before
adult learners strive to develop proficiency in specific competencies, they
ought to know the value that employers place on those competencies.
Moreover, adult learners ought to know which educational resources will
most efficiently and effectively help them develop specific competencies.
A question arises about our capacity to develop the competencies that
will be required by business, non-profit, and government organizations.
There are 9600 learning organizations for adults in the U.S. These include
large public universities, tiny private liberal arts colleges, 1600 2-year
Building a Competitive Workforce 37

colleges, 650 local Workforce Investment Boards that manage federal

training resources, and over 5000 private-education vendors of training that
serve a relatively small populations. In addition, incentives are provided by
state subsidies to public institutions. State funding is targeted to encourage
technology learning. Massive federal and state funding is provided for
disadvantaged students to participate in college. And an array of
miscellaneous tax credits is given to individuals and their families and
companies to encourage continuous learning. We have no shortage of
providers or funding mechanisms. The U.S. educational system has the
capacity to fill the need. It is the means by which nearly all current and
future employees will prepare for work. Other countries are either building
similar capacity or relying on the U.S. and other industrialized countries to
provide educational resources, particularly at postsecondary levels.
Moreover, distance-learning technology is removing geographic barriers to
participating in the best education and workforce-development resources in
the world. Thus, we are not suggesting a need for additional funding for
education through the KDN model. We are suggesting a way to optimize the
resources already in place.

The emergence of KDNs

As we conceptualize the Knowledge Development Network, many regional
efforts are underway that embody some or all of the principles embedded in
the model. In this section, we briefly profile these efforts.

Pierce County Careers Consortium

The Pierce County Careers Consortium, located in Pierce County,

Washington, is a successful partnership of Pierce College District, Bates
Technical College, Clover Park Technical College, Tacoma Community
College, and numerous business, labor, government, and community-based
partners. The mission of the consortium is to provide model Information
Technology (IT) programs that will educate and train a highly skilled
workforce in response to Pierce County's explosive gain of more than 100
technology companies in the last two years. To address this large-scale
demand, colleges are committed to working together to develop IT curricula
that correspond with Working Connections II (a Washington state initiative)
program goals.
In two years, the consortium partners implemented a number of worker
re-training projects, and collaborated on the development and integration of
industry verified IT skill standards. The specific plan articulated "2+2+2"
38 Building a Competitive Workforce

agreements where learners begin in high school, move to a 2-year college,

and then to a 4-year university. The large number of educational institutions
in Pierce County necessitates a coordinated effort for initiating and
maintaining articulation agreements among the 31 high schools, four
community and technical colleges, and five universities.

Houston Gulf Coast Board: Addressing nursing shortages

The WorkSource, a regional partnership of business, education, labor, and

community organizations, is committed to providing the education, training,
and labor market services that will make employers and residents more
competitive in the global economy.
The Work Source system covers a 13-county region in Southeast Texas,
which includes Houston, the nation's fourth largest city. The system is
available to the more than 90,000 businesses and the 4.5 million residents in
the area.
When the Gulf Coast Workforce Board identified the health care
industry as one of the 10 industries in the Gulf Coast Region most in need of
current and future employment assistance, it decided to find a way to help
and to make a difference. It asked the Greater Houston Partnership to join it
in the effort by approaching CEO's of the region's hospitals to learn which
of the many positions in their service systems were in the most critical
condition. The answer was registered nurses.
A partnership was formed between the two organizations and the Health
Service Steering Committee. Together with the hospital CEOs and their
representatives, the partnership has been working since the latter part of last
year to meet the challenge. A low estimate of the current shortage of
registered nurses in the Workforce Board's 13-county service area is
approximately 1,000 vacancies for hospital and non-hospital positions.
To approach the problem from different directions, the Steering
Committee divided into four action subcommittees. They are
• Marketing Career Opportunities in Health Care. This group is charged
with developing an ongoing, region-wide marketing campaign 1) to
change the image of nursing in a hospital setting and 2) to develop and
implement an industry-based outreach and recruitment effort. Target
markets include students K-12, minorities, and employees who currently
work in health professions and who want to become registered nurses .
• Enhancing Educational Capacity and Increasing Access to Career
Opportunities. This group is working with community colleges in the
region to determine how current nurse training and degree programs can
be expanded to allow more educational and associate degree program
Building a Competitive Workforce 39

opportumtles. Opportunities to increase funding for faculty,

scholarships, loans and other incentives for registered nurses to earn
advanced degrees are being employed, as well as The group is also
exploring employer/education partnerships and distance learning via the
Internet.
• Addressing the Internal Challenge, the Work Environment in Hospitals.
This group is exploring ways to attract and retain registered nurses from
the inside out. Issues under investigation include salaries, transportation,
national recognition, increased control over work environment, and
attitude change towards the profession.
• Making Government a Facilitating Partner. This group is charged with
determining how government strategies could correspond with that of
the Texas Nurses Association and the Texas Hospital Association.
Specific areas of support are in the areas of increasing nursing school
capacities and faculty salaries, addressing in-state tuition and fees for
non-state residents, and similar issues.
Work on the Health Services Steering Committee is ongoing. Once goals
are met for the registered nurse crisis, other health care occupations will be
approached in a similar manner.

Pittsburgh Technology Council and Southwestern

Pennsylvania Industrial Resource Center (SPIRC)

The Pittsburgh Technology Council located in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, is

one of the largest regional technology trade associations in the U.S. and has
a special emphasis in the Advanced Manufacturing, Biotechnology, and IT
clusters. The Southwestern Pennsylvania Industrial Resource Center
(SPIRC), the Council's sister organization, helps small and medium-sized
manufacturing companies improve their competitive performance and
enhance the 13-county region's ability to sustain manufacturing growth.
Two initiatives are:
• Manufacturing Pathway Initiative, sponsored by the Council's Advanced
Manufacturing Network. This initiative uses the Ford Academy of
Manufacturing Sciences (FAMS) curriculum, which integrates work
skills into an academic curriculum, as its core. The curriculum teaches
students basic skills that can be integrated into a number of careers,
including information systems, statistics, and communications, and
reinforces these concepts through such employer and community-based
support services as internships, job shadowing, and mentoring during
the summer and the school year.
40 Building a Competitive Workforce

• Technology Literacy Initiative. This initiative recognizes that

technology literacy has become part of the menu of basic skills required
for all learners and all workers. It utilizes the IT Pathway/Pipeline model
developed by the Techforce Initiative, a partnership of the Education
Development Center, the Information Technology Association of

The Technology Literacy Initiative recognizes

that technology literacy has become part of the menu
of basic skills required for all learners and workers.
America, and the National Alliance of Business. The model focuses on:
1) providing technical assistance to school districts to assess curriculum,
2) strategically integrating IT skill standards into all K-12 classrooms, 3)
developing community and business partnerships to support students,
teachers, administrators, and school directors, and 4) engaging students
in meaningful industry partnerships. Initial activities included the
formation of partnerships with school districts, awareness building
among employers, and crosschecking the technology literacy skill
matrix with Pennsylvania's Science and Technology Academic
Standards.
Future plans include establishing a Web-based clearinghouse for
employer involvement in school and community programs to serve as a one-
stop information exchange between business and education.

Conclusion
Paul Osterman (1999) observes,
The rules of the postwar labor market-its institutional structure-fitted
together in a logical way and constituted a coherent map of behavior for
employers and for workers. This map has been erased, and this erasure
explains why-even in the face of some good economic news-the sense
of unease is so widespread. The erosion of the old rules also helps explain
why some outcomes we dislike are becoming increasingly common.
A major part of the angst surrounding this transition from a set of old
assumptions to new revolves around the need to develop a sustainable model
for
• Helping individuals gain knowledge and skills to remain employable
• Helping companies obtain the talent they need to remain competitive
• Helping regions develop the base of successful companies and aligned
talent to remain prosperous and able to promote general civic health
Building a Competitive Workforce 41

The KDN model, recognizes and adapts to the mobility of today's

workforce, the enormous competitive pressure placed upon businesses, and
the fast-changing nature of technology and related work-place competencies.
We see strong evidence across regions and localities that KDNs are
emerging in various stages of maturity. Business, educators, employee
organizations and policymakers must recognize that old relationships and
assumptions have vanished, and no amount of yearning for the past can tum
back the clock. Rather, these partners should aggressively and creatively
work to develop new organizational structures, new public policies, and new
ways of thinking about developing human resources that can capitalize on
this period of significant change.
We hope that the ideas and information presented in this chapter will
help partners see the opportunity before them so they can adopt a positive
approach to change in building a series of effective Knowledge
Development Networks.

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