Business-led Approaches to Solving the Talent Crisis

Susko cautioned that collaboration alone won’t solve the crisis, and that thinking outside of the box is equally necessary.

One innovative approach is looking at different communities of workers that often face unique barriers to the workforce, such as returning citizens and immigrants.

There are more than 33,000 international students attending a higher education institution in Michigan at any one time, according to Handel, and most are concentrated in STEM fields.

“There are opportunities for employers to tap into that population now. There’s the OPT (Optical Practical Training) program that allows those students to work without an additional visa for a year. In some instances, that can be extended as far as three years,” he said.

Handel also acknowledged many employers’ hesitancies to go that route due to visa requirements and other red tape, but he emphasized how resources such as Global Detroit can make the option manageable.

Another innovative approach many employers that partner with the Chamber, like Henry Ford Health, are beginning to explore is apprenticeships. These create new pathways into professions previously inaccessible to individuals without degrees.

“I’m so pleased to be able to work … for real career development into jobs and positions that many people didn’t know about before they entered, and really starting younger and earlier or sooner in a career progression than we ever have before,” Susko said.

In addition to apprenticeships, Henry Ford Health also provides high school partnerships and collaborates with career and technical education programs, such as its Nursing Assistant to Bachelor of Science Nursing program with Michigan State University.

Regardless of the approach, all three panelists had a similar vision for what the future will look like once the talent crisis is addressed with a focus on the health care system.

“[It will be a place where] we have deeper relationships with pipelining for those that have criminal convictions … that require accommodations … who are veterans. Where we have solid pipelining within the careers, within health care,” Harrington-Davis said. “Also, that our communities are vibrant and thriving, and Michigan is the best place to come live and work, and we have the ability to recruit people from outside of Michigan into Michigan to live within our communities. At the same step, we have also targeted that half a million … and we’ve engaged them into health care, and we’ve been able sell to them that this is a great place to work … and most of all, on top of that, that we have healthier communities.”