The federal government must have funds from the stimulus bill (known as the Recovery Act, or by its acronym ARRA) allotted by March 19, 2009. That's 30 days after it was signed into law, and less than two weeks from......

With the number of mass layoffs announced by U.S. companies over the past two weeks approaching 100,000, you might wonder why we don't have a Labor Secretary hard at work in the Frances Perkins Building yet. The Senate Health, Education,......

Last week I blogged about Larry Robbin's training, "From Jails to Jobs."  In this post I will go into more detail on his tips for a turn-around speech and a turn-around packet.                    A turn-around speech is ...

Over the past few weeks I've been closely following the effort in Congress to pass legislation for an emergency extension of unemployment benefits for folks who've been out of work for a long time. Currently it's attached to HR 2642. It has passed both the House and Senate but in different forms, so...

Couple weeks ago I went to hear Deloitte CEO Barry Salzberg give a talk titled: Who Took My Workforce? New Realities for a New Era. The talk took place over lunch at Town Hall L.A. Salzberg focused on how hard......

Monday I posted about the Top ten hardest working countries in the world, according to OECD's Factbook 2008 data. I've looked a little closer at the data and asked the question, Does it pay to work so hard? Take a look at these two tables, both built from data in the Factbook. The first lists the to...

Earlier this year I wrote about what's the ultimate purpose of workforce development (click to read part 1 and part 2)? I worry that our effort to serve everyone and to serve employer needs first often comes at the expense of those we refer to as "hardest to serve." Not because we care les...

Increasingly, firms find that it is necessary and prudent to expose their promising talent to international assignments.  Sometimes it works out fine, other times it doesn't. One of the reasons cited by expats that leave posts (or firms) is "career blockage", or better known as the fe...

It's happening all over the country where affordable housing is dwindling, and the workers needed to sustain the local economy are unable to find inexpensive lodging. For these communities, you might as well tell workers, keep clear - we're unaffordable places to work in... Add high fuel costs, and ...

A recent article I found on the Columbia News Service proves that the construction industry still doesn't get the idea that women NEED to be an increasing part of the skilled construction workforce. A well written article, entitled "Hard-hatted women struggle to land construction jobs"&nbs...