The future of the United States’ industrial sector relies on finding a new generation of workers to replace a rapidly aging one: estimates have told us that an additional 2.4 million manufacturing workers are needed in the next decade. Further, these new workers will have to be skilled at managing the technologies that are radically changing how we manufacture. The sector will need to incorporate diversity, equity, and inclusion into its workforce to respond to these challenges. It is widely accepted that lasting sectoral partnerships between communities and companies are the most effective strategy to build a skilled workforce. But establishing racial equity intentional partnerships is easier said than done. 

In the final webinar for the Urban Manufacturing Alliance and The Century Foundation’s Industry & Inclusion cohort program, I&I Cohort members – Catrina Crane, director of workforce development and business solutions at Menomonee Valley Partners in Milwaukee, and Stephen Tucker, president and CEO of Northland Workforce Training Center in Buffalo – as well as I&I advisory board members – Héctor Huezo, senior workforce equity coordinator at Jobs to Move America, and Jason Drake, executive director of WorkRoom Program Alliance at Dan T. Moore Company – introduced innovative partnerships they have forged with unlikely entities in their communities. These partnerships build relationships with community, form trust, and create new opportunities for neighborhood residents and manufacturers alike. Our presenters discussed why partnerships were formed, the processes they went through, and the outcomes that demonstrate the power of partnership. I&I project leaders – Andrew Stettner, senior fellow at The Century Foundation, and Katy Stanton, programming & operations director at Urban Manufacturing Alliance – framed the discussion, and Dr. Ron Williams, assistant professor at Coppin State University, UMA board president-elect, and I&I academic advisor facilitated the discussion and provided historic and contemporary context behind the conversation.

KEY TAKEAWAYS 

To build race conscious programs, you have to understand how race and gender discrimination intersects with land, labor, and capital – the core elements of the US’ economic strategies. Because inequalities are built into economic development strategies in the United States, correcting these issues must be at the very core of building new workforce development strategies. This is especially true when it comes to manufacturing. In order to work together with partners of all kinds – education, industry, community groups, etc. – it is important to increase awareness and transparency in hiring practices and workplace culture. This requires thinking about equity everyday and thinking about how each decision an organization makes can create new beneficial practices or repeat harmful ones. 

More employers are seeking to diversify their workforce, they often just don’t know how or where to start. Catrina Crane of Menomonee Valley Partners (MVP) and Stephen Tucker of Northland Workforce Training Center (Northland) both shared the importance of starting by going directly to the communities that most need access to new opportunities. MVP made it a point to learn how people who live in proximity to manufacturing businesses look for work and found it wasn’t in the traditional ways. Instead of job seekers coming to the industrial corridor, MVP held their job events directly in the neighborhoods that surround it. These new job fairs are walkable and help connect people immediately to the businesses hiring. Individuals can ask questions directly to the manufacturers, fill out applications, and have interviews on the spot. The new neighborhood job fair brought in educational partners and the city workforce board so that if someone was underqualified for immediate jobs they left with new connections to training opportunities. Northland’s strategy to go where the community is meant building their training facility in the neighborhood they wanted to have the most impact. This helped remove a big and immediate barrier: transportation to training and job facilities.

Build diverse coalitions that leverage different opportunities and resources. Héctor Huezo of Jobs to Move America pointed towards the power of government procurement contracts as a form of public investment and illustrated that when used constructively, those contracts can create jobs, especially in disadvantaged communities. To achieve this Jobs to Move America works in coalition with public agencies to teach them how the procurement process can create the most good jobs, and then helps develop more impactful purchasing regulations and accountability strategies. Jobs to Move America also works with manufacturers that have won procurement contracts directly, helping them implement new hiring practices to achieve the goals that they defined in their contract applications. This also means helping manufacturing businesses build the right support systems to increase the success and retention of the new employees. 

Pursuing diversity, equity, and inclusion is an industry wide effort and has to be treated as such. Technology and COVID are forcing a redefinition of what community means. Place-based redevelopment must be embedded in a comprehensive understanding of DEI and other factors that have led to the decline of manufacturing in the United States in the first place. Jason Drake of Dan T. Moore Company believes it is possible to address underlying factors and connect communities to fair wages and career advancement which can go a long way toward rebuilding our neighborhoods in healthy ways. Manufacturing has a big role to play in the redevelopment of urban communities; it can once again be the ladder to the middle class that it has been historically. To get industry involved, intermediary leaders are creating new programs that bring traditionally competitive businesses together to build and leverage new workforce training programs that have DEI practices embedded into them. This is an example of building new infrastructure that, as more companies tap into, will spread the ethos of DEI across the business community.

The manufacturing industry needs better examples of what good partnerships look like. When building partnerships it is important to spend time being selective and doing your due diligence to make sure the potential new working relationship is beneficial. This is applicable whether you are evaluating participants for a board seat or finding educational partners and recruiting employers, and everywhere in between. You can start by looking for an existing history of promoting and working on DEI practices. There are other signals too: Are your potential partners adopting trauma-informed language and socio-emotional awareness; do they implement internal strategies to promote DEI; are they offering family sustaining jobs and pathways to advancement; or are they part of the public conversations and social discourse? For companies that are just starting to change, it is important to know if they are open to having courageous conversations, are they willing to explore their company’s ability to change from the factory floor to the administration, and are they willing to take on accountability. Being a good partner also means providing space for companies who don’t share the same DEI history and hearing their struggles, sharing best practices, and helping them become more accountable, engaged partners. Good partners are committed to working collaboratively to make external change and are willing to open themselves up for reflection and change as well. And good partners believe that when there is a need to face issues head on they work to make sure that change happens.