State playing catch-up in job training game

Up-to-date job training is the top priority that businesses look for in a region and Montana is playing catch-up in that game.

That message wove through a Montana Economic Development Association conference Wednesday in Whitefish.

And that message reflected the top concerns in a survey of Flathead Countys largest and fastest-growing businesses. The survey was released earlier this week.

Leslie Parks, an economic development consultant from San Jose, Calif., told about 70 conference-goers that businesses relocate more frequently than in the past, targeting areas that fit their needs. And the targeted areas have the right job skills or the training to quickly produce those skills, she said.

She noted that Toyota has an auto plant in Alabama a state which offered the manufacturer huge financial incentives to build an additional plant there.

But Toyota chose to build a new plant in Ontario, Canada, because that provinces work force was much better trained than Alabamas, she said.

Parks noted that needed job skills keep evolving, and there is a universal problem of people keeping up with acquiring those skills.

She cited a study that concluded 60 percent of all jobs require skills possessed by only 20 percent of the current work force. Almost all jobs require computer skills, including jobs that didnt use computers a few years ago.

Technological advances are trimming the nations manufacturing jobs while increasing productivity, which creates unemployed people without the necessary skills to find new work, she said.

Adaptability is a key for workers to survive in this changing economic picture.

People are reluctant to embrace change, Parks said. Youve got to unlearn what you know and learn something different.

Montana was the last state in the nation to allocate state money to job training efforts, doing so for the first time in 2003, said Evan Barrett, chief business development officer for Montana.

The state has roughly $5 million saved up for job training efforts, ranging from basic resume help to high-tech courses. The rule of thumb is $3,000 translates to a person being trained, said Keith Kelly, labor commissioner with the state Department of Labor and Industry.

Under that formula, $5 million would cover training help for slightly less than 1,700 people.

The federal government used to provide $15 million annually for Montana job training efforts, but that has dropped to $7 million, Barrett said. Under the $3,000-per-person formula, $7 million would help slightly more than 2,300 people.

There is an overall statewide problem of having available people with the right skills for the jobs out there, Barrett said.

Major shortages which dont appear to be going away are in health care, particularly nurses, and in skilled crafts such as plumbers and electricians.

These workers are getting older and retiring with few replacements in sight, Barrett said.