What We Do

Overview

The economy is undergoing a rapid and unparalleled transformation. New approaches are needed to close a severe and widening workforce shortage. Through an unprecedented regional collaboration, the Center for a Competitive Workforce fuses data analysis with insights from the public and private sectors. The goal? To catalyze new economic opportunities and workforce strategies in the greater Los Angeles region. This is no easy task. With 10 million residents, the Los Angeles area is the largest and the most culturally and socioeconomically diverse metropolitan region in the United States.

Generating $544 billion in annual output, the region’s 244,000 businesses make Los Angeles a powerful international economic force, rivaling countries such as Sweden and Norway.

Add to that more than 300,000 community college students preparing to enter the workforce, who comprise roughly one-third of the largest community college system in the world. Guiding this economic goliath to meet future workforce demand is a monumental challenge. It requires harnessing industry insights and drawing upon the expertise of the region’s educational leaders. The Center for a Competitive Workforce aims to do just that by aligning educational programs with the urgent and dynamic needs of employers, and investigating some tough questions:

Are educational programs and policies hitting the mark in the region? And what can be done to calibrate them for the best possible outcomes?

CCW Work Cycle

In 2016, California embarked on a path to train 1 million middle-skill workers and develop workforce opportunities to provide greater overall upward economic mobility and lift residents out of poverty. To this end, the Strong Workforce Program was established to spur career education in the state’s 114 community colleges. Seven areas of student success have been targeted: 1) student success; 2) career pathways; 3) workforce data and outcomes; 4) curriculum; 5) faculty; 6) regional coordination; and 7) funding. The purpose is to increase the number of students enrolled in career education programs that will lead to more certificates, degrees, transfers to four-year institutions and employment in high-demand, high-wage jobs.

To achieve the Strong Workforce Program’s co-equal goals in the Los Angeles Basin, the region’s top business and community college leaders partnered to establish the Center for a Competitive Workforce in order to structure, deploy and structurally integrate the following five-part program model:

1. Acquire: Conduct economic research and applied analysis to better understand the region’s targeted industries, their associated labor markets, growth occupations and five-year forecasts.
2. Engage: Validate and amplify the quantitative research and analysis with primary research, including survey instruments and firm-level intelligence gathered through the Los Angeles County Economic Development Corporation (LAEDC) and Los Angeles Area Chamber of Commerce industry cluster councils.
3. Distill: Collect and refine data elicited through the above processes into translatable, useable information for consumption by the community colleges.
4. Translate: Connect quantitative research/analysis, primary research and firm-level intelligence to curriculum developers and other relevant decision makers at the community colleges; and
5. Develop: Customize new programs and courses through collaboration with industry professionals, that correct, modernize or enhance critical competencies and/or skills training gaps.