Leadership
As a young organization with forward-thinking strategies and targeted resources, the WIB enjoys the freedom to innovative and fill gaps with workforce and regional transformation initiatives never before attempted in the four-states area. Business and community leaders that have engaged in the WIB find the organization overall to be well-positioned and headed in the right direction to make an impact on the regional economy. Check out the links below for specific leadership products and services as well as the article that continues below on unique leadership benefits of the WIB.
- Strategic Planning for Development Projects
- Workforce System Leadership and Awareness
- Technical Assistance and Leadership for Regional Prosperity Initiatives
Culture of Innovation
In a constantly-changing economy, the WIB must be on the cutting edge in its field. The WIB deploys creative approaches, advances in technology, and customized best practices (those designed and adapted from other areas) to gain better results. Southwest Missouri’s WIB is well-known for piloting new initiatives for the state, such as the Alchemy Training SISTEM, Virtual Video Interviews, advanced market data systems, network weaving, etc.
Local, state, and national recognition of our innovation is a positive measure of the WIB’s success. The Board seizes opportunities to showcase its accomplishments and best practices at workforce/economic development conferences. The SW MO WIB leverages it research and development resources to the fullest to discover new ways to blend best practices and emerging innovations to create new economic development solutions for the region.
Connected Networks
In the 2007 book Breakthrough Creativity and the Science of New Ideas, author Richard Ogle proclaims that creativity originates from networking in an extended “idea space.” One such venue is the WIB’s participation in the New Innovators Learning Network through the Corporation for a Skilled Workforce. Southwest Missouri is represented with some of the best and brightest WIBs across the U.S. in this invitation-only collaborative.
The WIB enjoys deep relationships with Chambers of Commerce and economic development organizations across the region, sharing many common stakeholder members and projects of mutual benefit. Emerging partnerships of businesses within targeted industry sector position the WIB with an accurate understanding as well as a razor-sharp focus on business needs and economic trends.
Members of the Board and its task force affiliations are targeted for their strategic, big-picture nature, unique talents, leadership experience, and targeted sector representation. This well-designed mix of leadership assets further enhances the WIB’s reach and impact.
Authoritative Market Intelligence
As described in the products and services of the business plan, many business and community leaders along with the news media consider the WIB a premiere source of market data intelligence for the region. These data assets make the WIB attractive to business decision-makers as well as other development organizations that share common goals and strategies with the WIB.
As sited earlier in the business plan and in the WIB Quality Benchmarking research, The key indicator for the Critical Success Factor #3 shows that quality WIBs assesses factors of community success that are greater than the board’s span of control.
“The measures are used to raises awareness of others. The board uses its influence to move the community toward solutions, and evaluates its success in doing so. Community report cards or other types of reports are repeated regularly to assess whether the community is becoming more competitive or falling behind,” according to the benchmarking study.
Conduit for Regional Transformation
The SW MO WIB fills the convener and coordinator role to launch the Quad-States Regional Transformation initiative. The $250,000 Regional Innovation Grant awarded to the WIB that runs through 2008-2009 steps up the pace for projects and strategies that have been prominent in the WIB’s vision for the past three years. The grants make possible the implementation of the WIRED framework. Workforce Innovation in Regional Economic Development, or WIRED for short, can be easily described as an “extreme makeover” for a region’s economy. WIRED is the recipe that blends the critical role of human capital and talent development with effective economic development strategies to drive the future of the Four-States toward global competiveness and economic prosperity.
QSRT’s Core Leadership Team manages six-step WIRED framework spanning the Spring of 2008 through Fall of 2009. Deliverables include an all-inclusive inventory of the region’s competitive assets, new coalitions to cultivate growth within industry sectors, recovery for depressed local economies, and upgrades for key workforce pipelines. The ultimate convergence of leadership, assets, and strategies is the Regional Transformation Plan. This powerful accord commits the resources needed to invest in the future of the Four States.