LEADERSHIP TEAM MEETING NOTES – February 11, 2011
In Attendance: Lewis Boren, Ben Lopez, Sue Bailey, Kimberly Patterson, Gerry Fluharty, Roy Highsmith, Vickie Gideon, Linda Angel, Susan Kamas, Horace Dicks, Vivian Naramore, Terry Gearhart, Jerry Haisler Wendy Ann Riggs, and Tom Elmore.
Last Meeting Review:
Phone Tree: Vivian reported that her action team has been established but needs to be culled to become smaller and more manageable. The team has not yet met.ACTION: Supervisors compile a new list and send back to Vivian
Best Companies: See notes on page 3 of the handout. The team discussed what other smaller organizations are doing. By comparison, lots could happen but in a government environment some things are not possible. We need to find the time to get our new employees on board with Best Companies/quality and how we do things and why. It is possible that the new employees’ orientation needs to be longer, possibly another half day.
Workforce Update:
Texas Association of Business: Texas officials spoke (Comptroller, Governor, etc). State budget issues are the hot item now. Cuts may be broken out as 60% Medicaid, 30% education. It is tough to make cuts. There will be some hard choices.
Conference of Mayors: No new news. Susan conversed with mayors on the workforce committee and got on C-Span TV (need to get a copy of this). It is all gloom and doom about the pending budget cuts. The opportunity for consolidation of workforce staff was not well taken by their staff. The news media is focusing on workforce along with Senator Coburn of Oklahoma and the GAO (See pages 5-6 and 13-14 of the handout). Republicans are promising to attempt to cut $100 B from the continuing resolution that will probably be necessary to keep the government working. There is some talk about possibly a 1st quarter suspension of funding that would impact us greatly. From the reports it is obvious that most places are not integrated.GAO is zeroing in on questionable costs by several states and areas. Some data pointed to the opinion that the Summer Youth Program of 2 years ago was a disaster due to a lack of jobs (definitely successful here). Workforce has the most performance standards of any program and we are looked at closely. See page 13 in the handout for highlights. Texas, Utah, and Florida have full consolidation.
NAWB has published the levels of service between 2008 and 2010 (page 10, handout). The chart looks good but…. See e-mail on page 12 of the handout. Adam can’t provide the same data. He says that three states decided to co-enroll ES and WIA so this report is inflated. NAWB also sent a Workforce Investment Works info page (see page 11).
Pages 18-23 in the handout contain more information on the issues surrounding the possible actions.
TWC: Tech assist says we may need to start procuring books for those in training programs. This has created a controversy and a committee will be formed to look at this.
Greg Newton: we are set for this next week. A list of who needs to attend what has been sent out. The second day may be played by ear. Adam Leonard and Laurie Briscoe are to be our guests.
Camp Workforce: begins in March. There will be 6 sessions over 3 days. The LT could pay for snacks and things; keep it simple. Donna is the collector and Lewis will notify all concerned of the schedule.
Performance: Linda covered performance quickly. We are no longer the lowest in market share. See page 60 for the month to month print out. The trend data, page 63, tells more. Market share is trending better. Ben reported that in CHOICES incentive we are #2 and possibly #1. WIA is currently #1 as well. We have a long way to go before November however.
New Career Center Process: Wendy Ann Riggs and Tom Elmore presented the results of their committee to redraw the center process for handling profiled dislocated workers and the requirement for EP preparation. Preparation of EP’s for this group is a large increase in workload. Question was how we can implement the EP process with the staff we have. The process attempts to eliminate time spent for zero results.
The committee looked at making customers pro-active. UI recipients would be required to work with staff. All others would be given the option. See the flow charts on pages 25 and 26. The forms start on page27. They may choose self- service or staff assisted. Assessment would be the basic Prove-It assessment of math and spelling as customized by the center to include a self-assessment, a partnership agreement, and the EP.
LT discussed thathow to control the number of staff-assisted to fit the ability to case manage. We probably cannot serve all who wish to have staff-assisted services. The WD letter on all this is not yet out and TWC can’t say when it will be as it has to go before the Commission.
The Vet staff is already doing EP’s on these folks and this can be used by the centers but it must be keyed into WIT and can’t be older than 2 weeks which may be a problem for the centers using Vet EP’s. The centers and Vets must also have consistency.
The form on page 29 would not be for those receiving UI; the form on 27 would be. It was suggested that a statement be added to the self assessment such as “I need to try to get a job” or something to that effect. It could serve a dual purpose with Rapid Response. The LT discussed how all this would work concerning UI profiled and others. How do they get picked up? Can they opt out if not profiled? Case management would end when they are either non-responsive or they become employed.
The problem of inadequate space for case files was mentioned. It was suggested that maybe they could be scanned into the computer system. This question is still open.
Reality: what happens if staff is reduced? We should not make it worse than it has to be with numbers. Would all this really engage them in the process?
ACTION: look at the file storage problem. Determine how long the case management should be. How will the TVC system mesh with ours? Determine how we can keep touch with the non-UI or non-profiled group who want staff-assisted services. Layout of members by office as to who willaccomplish the work should be ready for the Greg Newton meeting.
Payables: Horace indicated that the activities involving payables are better due to actions by the supervisors. Fiscal is now catching up. The payables policy has been changed to reflect the due date of such items to fiscal no later than close of business Monday of each week to ensure mailing by Friday. Otherwise they will not go out until the next Friday. This policy was approved by the LT.
Expenditures: Horace asked that we look at the amounts being spent on such items as toner and paper to possibly cut back costs wherever possible.
Next Leadership Team Meeting:March 17, 2011, Killeen WFC.
Meeting Evaluation:
What was good?
IT report
It’s all good.
Jerry back with us
Terry’s update
Info
Good flow to the meeting.
Having Jerry back at the leadership team meetings
Good discussions
Appreciate the info to prepare for future climate/budget impacts
Lots of info-but necessary
Jerry looks great! Glad to have him.
Staying on track
What could we improve?
Nothing!
Not bringing snacks for PM meetings probably-not a lot of eating after lunch.
Now I know why morning meetings are better- I’m less apt to fall asleep in a morning meeting rather than in an afternoon meeting.
Maybe have a breakout group for “touchy” subjects such as file retention??
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