NOVAworks: Area Workforce Development Keeps Pace With Employment Needs

Headquartered in Sunnyvale, NOVAworks helps the recently unemployed upgrade their skills so they can get back to work quickly.

As the economy continues to retract, an area workforce developer is rolling out some new initiatives to help workers and employers navigate tough economic times.

NOVAworks Job Center is a federally funded job services program. It provides services to job seekers and employers. Headquartered in Sunnyvale, NOVAworks serves Los Altos, Palo Alto, Sunnyvale, Santa Clara, Cupertino, Mountain View.

For job seekers, NOVAworks offers services such as its roughly 25 workshops a month on topics ranging from LinkedIn and resume building to brushing up on interviewing skills. NOVAworks even assists with career counseling and helping job seekers find particular kinds of jobs, such as governmental or nonprofit roles.

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Marlena Sessions, director of NOVAworks, said anyone from a homeless person to an executive can benefit from the organization’s services. NOVAworks is always refining its services, she added.

“We are always testing them out with our customers … we are always keeping cutting-edge on that,” she said. “There are a lot of robust services.”

Additionally, NOVAworks offers employers access to its inventory of more than 1,300 workers as well as a slew of webinars. It advises employers on legal questions and connects them with workers that have skills they need. In some cases, NOVAworks will even pay for employees to gain additional workplace training.

The Worker Adjustment and Retraining Notification Act (WARN) requires employers planning to lay off 75 or more employees to notify NOVAworks. This notification allows NOVAworks to do damage control, putting workers in touch with union reps or assisting with unemployment filings.

Jaspreet Summan got laid off from his job as a network technician. Through NOVAworks, he was able to secure an IT job at Tesla.

“The course I took as part of this program, as well as the workshops, really helped me get this position,” he said. “It really provided a foundation for me … it was a very lonely time. NOVAworks gave me something to focus on.”

By becoming involved in NOVAworks workshops on a variety of topics, Summan was able to gain greater insight into what employers were looking for.

His career advisor suggested he lean into his skills by pursuing certifications that would better position him to get hired instead of pivoting toward another role.

Independent of helping bolster his hard skills, Summan said NOVAworks employees took the time to understand his need, saying he got a “very, very warm feeling” every time he interacted with them.

“It was really an answer to all my prayers,” Summan said. “I am very excited to go to work each day.”

In a report to the Sunnyvale City Council in April, Sessions detailed some new projects NOVAworks is getting underway.

The first of which is establishing a nonprofit designed to make NOVAworks more “nimble” in pursuing grants from philanthropic organizations.

Other initiatives underway include a semiconductor apprentice program, an airport partnership and its whole person project.

Embedded workforce at San Francisco International Airport improves workers’ access to jobs there. The paid apprentice program with San-Jose-based Western Digital bolsters the workforce, and the Whole Person Project examines and addresses barriers to employment.

“For too long, education and industry have operated in silos. Business is brought in at the end of the process, when curricula and degrees are already set – this leads to a skills mismatch,” according to a NOVAworks slideshow.

Sessions said NOVAworks is seeing employment issues on the edges of the age distribution. Excluding workers aged 18 to 24, which NOVAworks has a special program to assist, Sessions said 59% of the people NOVAworks serves are 55 or older.

Similar problems exist for young people; 40% of employers believe that recent college graduates are unprepared for the workforce, according to a survey from The Conference Board, a nonprofit business membership and research organization.

Regardless of age, it appears that no industry is exempt. Many tech workers work on short-term contracts, but Sessions said even those positions are feeling the squeeze.

“This area of the world has always seen a tech churn … we do see those job seekers coming in. What we are seeing is a longer and longer gap between those contracts,” Sessions said.

For more information on NOVAworks, visit novaworks.org.

Contact David Alexander at d.todd.alexander@gmail.com