Goodwill North Central Texas Offers Free Career Coaching, Training and Job Placement
Before pandemic-related upheavals began in the world of work, a trend was quietly developing that threatened to topple any progress that was being made in getting people into gainful employment. This trend went from quiet to deafening when millions lost their employment in 2020. Today, jobs remain unfilled, and millions of unemployed or underemployed people lack the skills or credentials that would make it possible for them to fill those positions.
Consider this: According to a new research study commissioned by Goodwill®, an overwhelming 94% of respondents feel that it’s important for people to have access to job training and skills, and a majority of recent job seekers (57%) said they didn’t apply to at least one job due to concerns they lacked the required skills or training,
What’s more, the study revealed that this perceived lack of skills is over-indexed in minority job seekers , with 65% of Black women, 73% of Hispanic women and 66% of Asian American and Pacific Islander women not applying due to concerns with a lack of skills. This perspective was also more prevalent with low-income and less educated respondents, with 61% of those making less than $30k annually and 61% of those without college degrees saying they are not applying due to concerns regarding a lack of required skills.
These findings should give pause — particularly at a time when America has a record high of more than 11.5 million unfilled jobs.
This is where Goodwill comes in. As a leading nonprofit provider of job training and placement programs in North America, Goodwill is positioned to help close the opportunity gap. Supported by an ecosystem of partners, Goodwill offers free career coaching, training and job placement, along with deeper layers of support to meet the needs of 75% of unemployed workers who said they need additional services such as internet access and transportation.
In 2021, Goodwill launched a five-year initiative called Rising Together™, which was designed to empower more than one million individuals to connect with sustainable careers by 2025. With partners such as Google, Accenture, Coursera, Indeed and Comcast, among others, Rising Together™ is connecting job seekers to services that range from career coaching and skills training to credentialing and career placement.
Here in North Central Texas, we remain committed to offering a number of job training and workforce development programs drive an equitable economic recovery. We encourage people who are looking to gain new skills or get a fresh start to contact us to learn more about our programs or visit an area Job Resource Center to learn how Goodwill can help you get the skills you need to get the job you want.
Overcoming the opportunity gap is a strategic path to advancing equity and upward mobility, and to building the kind of talented, diverse workforce studies have shown leads to more innovative, creative and competitive organizations. Goodwill is proud to be doing its part in closing the opportunity gap and helping to reverse the current trend.