The Texas Workforce Commission has produced an occasional paper that delves into the problems of quantifying and thus analyzing the  “green collar” labor force. While policy makers are increasingly touting these kinds of jobs, few people have taken the trouble to define what the term “green collar” includes, what knowledge/skills its occupations require, and how anyone can possibly track the growth and demand of these workers in the national (not to mention regional) labor market. This paper offers a reality-based perspective that gets beyond the hype and examines real problems in growing a workforce for alternative energy and energy-efficient industries. From the report:

That which is not defined cannot be measured. That which is not measured cannot be improved. That which is not improved will languish. Without a clear definition, green policy initiatives will be too diffused to be effective and success will be impossible to measure.

On Monday, September 29th, EMSI will be releasing a “beta” or testing version of its dataset as an option for all users. The current stable data release will continue to be available as the default during this testing phase; you will have to manually change your preferences to see the beta release. We encourage all Strategic Advantage users to take a look at the new data and offer their input on the results of our enhanced methodology.

You will only see the new data if you specifically choose that option. The first time you log in after the Monday release, you will see a splash screen informing you of the new dataset. Click through to reach the Strategic Advantage home screen, then under “Account Management” select “Preferences.” At the bottom of the options page under “Data Options,” you will be able to choose “Fall 2008 Release (BETA).” Please be advised that we intend this dataset to be used for testing/evaluation only at this time; since it has not been fully tested we do not yet recommend using it for decision making, publications, or wide distribution.

What’s new in EMSI’s Fall 2008 data? We’ve made a few important additions to our methodology in order to improve the timeliness of our data:

1. Current Employment Statistics (CES) now informs current year projections. Until now, the time lag inherent in our main data sources as well as our own biannual data release schedule meant that our current year of data was always projected, and the most recent year of data was often a partial projection (for Spring data releases). We’re now filling that gap by using CES, which is released monthly with month-old data. While CES does not contain nearly the industry or geographic detail of other sources (or EMSI’s final data), it is still very useful to benchmark our more detailed current-year projections, especially in times of rapid economic change. We also now use the current year as the base year for future projections. Given the economic turmoil of the past year, you will find that many of the major differences between the current and new data releases (for current and future years) are a result of these changes.
2. Nearly all of our major data sources have been updated since our last release, including the Quarterly Census of Employment and Wages, the BEA’s Regional Economic Information System, County Business Patterns, Nonemployer Statistics, Occupational Employment Statistics, and about half of the states’ own employment projections. We have included these updates and they will affect 2006-2008 data as well as future-year projections.

If you have any questions about this beta release, or if you would like to offer your feedback on the new data and methodology, please contact EMSI Customer Solutions at 866-999-3674. Thank you!

When the Belgian high-tech materials company Umicore decided to expand its germanium wafer production to the U.S., its search led it to three cities. Two were not surprises (Phoenix and Albuquerque), but one was off the beaten path in the tiny town of Quapaw, Oklahoma (pop. 966), near the Ottawa County seat of Miami (pop. 14,485). Umicore’s Opticals division has an existing plant in Quapaw, so it knew the cost of business would be low, but it needed proof that the surrounding region could provide the necessary workforce for the new plant.

Read the full case study (PDF): Oklahoma / Umicore Case Study

Update: EMSI made some preliminary economic impact estimates for the project, which are quoted in this article.

Update: See the event schedule here.

Economic Modeling Specialists Inc. (EMSI) is pleased to announce the first international launch of its Strategic Advantage economic analysis suite at The Institute of Directors in London on November 13th. The web-based software, which has some 2,000 users at more than 400 organizations in the United States, is currently being customised to display and analyse data for England’s counties and unitary authorities. The launch event will include a product demonstration and seminar (download the invitation or book now with Protocol National).

“We are very pleased to be able to bring practical, user-friendly economic and labour market research tools to the UK,” said EMSI CEO Andrew Crapuchettes. “We are doing some really ground-breaking work in making this kind of information accessible and usable for public and private sector organisations alike.”

Strategic Advantage will launch initially with two core modules.

• The “Economic Impact” module allows researchers to build customised “input-output” models of regional economies. These allow simulations of how many jobs in an area might be gained or lost due to the “ripple effects” of hypothetical changes in one or more industries. Whereas in the past such models have had to be constructed on a region-by-region basis and were available from only one or two firms, EMSI allows anyone to build a model for a custom-defined region in minutes over the Internet, and individuals can instantly use the model to run impact simulations.
• The “Economic Forecaster” includes past data and projections for an area’s industries, workforce, and population demographics.

EMSI plans to follow up in early 2009 with additional modules that would help connect labour market trends to colleges’ workforce-oriented programs as well as to occupational knowledge and skills.

The key advantages of EMSI’s tools that have made them so popular in the United States include

1. Integration of multiple government statistical databases into a single source,
2. Value-added estimation and extrapolation for gaps in published data,
3. Built-in analysis and reports that help make sense of data and are displayed instantly over the web, and
4. The ability to perform custom aggregations/groupings of geographic areas and data types.

US community and technical colleges in particular, equivalents of the UK’s further education or FE colleges, have flocked to EMSI for the information they need to anticipate and meet the demand for a more skilled and educated workforce.

“In the US, these colleges are taking on a central role in agile, demand-driven workforce development, which is critical for national competitiveness,” states Crapuchettes. “We help them carry out that mission.”

EMSI, which has already carried out socioeconomic impact studies for dozens of FE colleges,  expects them to be in the first line of customers for Strategic Advantage as well. EMSI sees the college impact study and Strategic Advantage tool are complementary: the former informs the public about a college’s role in building regional prosperity while the latter helps the college optimize that role by aligning itself with regional workforce demand. To address these issues Ioan Morgan, principal of Warwickshire College, will be a main speaker at the November 13th launch event.

EMSI anticipates that many types of organizations and companies, not just the FE sector, could benefit from the information available in Strategic Advantage. “In the US, many public and private organizations are beginning to see the advantage of getting all their economic and labour market data from a single source,” says Crapuchettes.

Further details on the UK version of Strategic Advantage (still under development):

• Initially data will be available for England only, with the entire UK expected to follow next year.
• Industry, occupation, and population data will be available for NUTS 3 areas (generally counties and unitary authorities, with some exceptions) and custom groupings of these areas.
• Industry analysis and input-output models will include detail on over 200 industries.

For more information about EMSI and Strategic Advantage, please contact Mike Church at EMSI (+1 866 999 3674, US Pacific Daylight Time). For information on the launch event and booking, please contact Lauren Gage at Protocol National (0115 911 1227).

Gary Box
Business Retention Coordinator
WIB of SW Missouri
Gary Box has successfully used Strategic Advantage to provide convincing data on workforce availability to businesses looking to relocate to his region. Recently, he had the opportunity to assist in a project that resulted in the acquisition of a Best Buy/Geek Squad call center. He used Strategic Advantage to show the site selectors that Southwest Missouri has the necessary number of available workers in the target occupations within a 30-mile radius. The Best Buy/Geek Squad call center has already hired 200 employees and is now open and in full operation.

Erika Volker
Partnerships for Innovation
FutureForce Nebraska
Erika Volker recently used Strategic Advantage to provide data-driven reports to a consortium of educational providers throughout Nebraska. This group, Partnerships for Innovation, aims to improve programs, increase student achievement, and meet Perkins IV requirements throughout the state. Erika created three reports for secondary schools in 20 service areas. These reports included a look at the educational attainment, economy overview (industry size and growth), and career clusters (ranked by size) of each region.  These reports connect the economic demand/labor market side of program creation with student interests, which student surveys provide. Both are necessary to provide program development with a well-rounded, data-driven and student-driven environment. These reports have already begun to generate dialogue among secondary and post-secondary institutions, and Erika hopes that the education consortium will use these reports to form common goals and data-driven program offerings.

In 2006, a major confectionary plant in South Central Pennsylvania announced that it would be closing, and another four in the area indicated that they would be making significant cutbacks. The total job loss would potentially reach around 600 jobs. To respond, the Lancaster, Berks, and South Central Workforce Investment Boards (WIBs) partnered to build a strategy around the looming dislocation in this industry sector.

Read the full case study here (PDF):  Threats of job loss lead to innovation in south central PA

A couple of weeks ago EMSI hosted a webinar for Strategic Advantage users to be (re)introduced to the Career Pathways module and the O*NET data that powers it.

The webinar kicked off with a description of the basic components of O*NET data and how the Career Pathways module integrates O*NET data with EMSI labor market data. Tom Tveidt, Director of Research for Asheville Chamber of Commerce, shared a personal example of how EMSI’s Career Pathways tool has reinvented the way he shows workforce availability to prospective businesses. Dave Williams, EMSI Customer Solutions Consultant, demonstrated how to apply Career Pathways in two scenarios:

• Business Recruitment: How to show workforce availability to prospective employers based on O*NET data and the region’s potential labor pool.
• Rapid Response: How to quickly find viable job options for displaced workers.

Follow this link to see the recorded webinar (requires the Flash plugin for your browser).

Note: Due to some screen resolution issues we encountered during the webinar, the screen will appear somewhat “stretched” in the second part of the recording.