WorkKeys Solutions Providers Link Employers, Educators, and Communities

Tom Hadlick is working hard to close the gap between today’s workforce and tomorrow’s jobs.

“Our role is to raise awareness of workforce readiness issues with local educators, employers, and decision makers,” said Hadlick, executive director of the WorkKeys Center at Syracuse University–University College in Syracuse, New York. “We strive to educate the community about the gaps between the emerging workforce and the high-wage, high-skill jobs of the future. Though there is a pool of highly educated people in our area, the incumbent workforce is aging out, and the need for highly skilled people is increasing every day.”

Ken Gurka and Elizabeth Buerkle tell employers that they can’t afford not to do job profiling. Gurka and Buerkle, WorkKeys program coordinators at Houston Community College, work as a team to profile jobs for companies throughout Texas. “We tell them that job profiling is a bargain compared to the cost of a bad hire,” said Gurka.

The WorkKeys^® job profiling component offers a concrete way for organizations to analyze the skills needed for specific jobs and to describe those needs to educators, students, and job applicants. Job profiling identifies the WorkKeys skills and the skill levels an individual must have to perform a job.

Syracuse University and Houston Community College are part of the WorkKeys Solutions Provider (WSP) distribution network. WSPs include two-year and four-year colleges, vocational and adult education centers, one-stop employment centers, career counseling centers, and government agencies. As licensees, WSPs are permitted to resell WorkKeys assessments to employers and other third parties who pay for the tests. Many WSPs are self-supporting—they sell WorkKeys business-to-business to generate funding.

Collaboration is a key factor for WorkKeys Solutions Providers who work closely with employers, educators, and communities on initiatives that build awareness of issues affecting education and the workplace.

Services include test administration, scoring services, and score reporting. Many WSPs also conduct job profiling and deliver WorkKeys skills gap training. They typically offer services in conjunction with job placement, career counseling, and custom training programs.

“As a WorkKeys Solutions Provider, an organization has opportunities to develop long-term relationships with local employers, help educators meet the needs of learners and local businesses, and build a database of information about jobs in the local community,” said Ed Conard, partner manager in workforce development at ACT.

He said organizations often become WSPs as a way of helping their local communities meet current and future labor needs. That’s one of the reasons Syracuse University got involved in WorkKeys.

“Our goal has always been to collaborate with those involved in education and workforce development on how WorkKeys can help them achieve their objectives,” said Hadlick. “We are advocates on issues that concern both education and workforce—career exploration, career awareness, and skill building.”

The WorkKeys Center at Syracuse offers job analysis, skill assessment, instructional support, and training services to employers, job seekers, and students. Though the center promotes WorkKeys in area middle schools and high schools through various programs, its core business is employers.

The center has partnered with local organizations on many different programs, projects, and initiatives affecting local businesses. Staff members are currently collaborating with the Greater Syracuse Chamber of Commerce on a project involving four employers and about 70 participants in a refugee program.

Gurka and Buerkle also focus on employers through Houston Community College’s WorkKeys service center, which offers test administration, scoring services, and score reporting. Job profiling is a key activity of the center. Gurka and Buerkle offer 25 years of collective experience in job profiling.

“We have dissimilar personalities, so we work well together. We find that someone may not respond well to one of us, but will to the other,” said Buerkle.

The duo is never lacking for clients, said Gurka. “The team profiling is a big benefit. People appreciate getting two for the price of one, plus working together makes us more efficient. One of us can be doing one thing, while the other does something else.”

They complete needs analyses, assess employees, and profile jobs for various companies. They typically spend a week at a company, delivering all appropriate services.

Convincing employers of the benefits of job profiling is easier now that the pair has profiled jobs at their own workplace, where they completed job analyses and profiles for a large number of human resources and clerical positions. Their work resulted in the reclassification of several positions and some staff promotions.

“Employers place a high value on WorkKeys. We often hear that they’ve never hired employees as qualified as they have with WorkKeys,” said Gurka.

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