19-08 Target Industries and Occupations - Change 1

Purpose

Update the Gulf Coast Workforce Board’s latest guidance on key regional industries and demand occupations.  This issuance replaces WS 19-08.

Background

The Gulf Coast Workforce Board targets the resources it controls - and influences those controlled by its partners in the regional workforce system - with its strategic plan and a series of supporting lists:

• Targeted Industries
• High-Skill, High-Growth Jobs
• Where the Jobs Are

We use these lists to guide not only the Board's strategic investments, but also to help our residents build careers in industries and occupations with good prospects and higher wages.

Because the labor market changes, we continually update our labor market information. This current update uses the most recently available data from the 2016-2026 employment projections.

We have developed several resources to help businesses, individuals, staff and community organizations better understand high-skill, high-growth careers in the Gulf Coast region. We make these resources available on our website at www.wrksolutions.com/careerexploration. We are in the process of updating our materials to reflect the new projection data.

Using the Lists

Targeted Industries (List)
We use this list to help guide strategic investments of money and resources in our key regional industries. We also use this list to help guide actions of the Employer Service Division.

High-Skill, High-Growth Occupations (List)
This is our demand occupations list. We use it as the basis for our system's career information and guidance work. The occupations on this list represent good careers with higher than average wages, skill levels and employment opportunities for the next 10 years. We work to promote these occupations to our customers and the general public throughout the region.

We also use the High-Skill, High-Growth Occupations list to guide our offers of Workforce Solutions' financial aid to customers. Workforce Solutions will provide scholarship support to any occupation on the High-Skill, High-Growth list, provided the vendor is in the Eligible Training Provider List.

Where the Jobs Are (List)
This is our "hot jobs" list showing those occupations that are growing. We don't use wage or other kinds of criteria to refine the list; it consists entirely of those jobs in which we expect to see openings over the next 10 years. We also use this in providing career information and guidance to customers.

Highlights

• This updated High-Skill, High-Growth list includes 103 occupations
• The 32 occupations noted below are new to the High-Skill, High-Growth list

Career Exploration Resources

Customers, staff and community organizations frequently use Workforce Solutions' career exploration tools to make informed employment and training decisions. In addition to our lists, we provide a variety of career planning resources at www.wrksolutions.com/careerexploration. We are in the process of updating our materials to reflect the 2016-2026 projection data.

Education & Training Vendors

Our education and training vendor network is currently open to vendors to submit applications to provide basic skills education, career training or career advancement training. Vendors may visit our Become A Vendor page for more information.

Action

• Make sure all staff members at every level are aware of updated High-Skill, High-Growth Occupations list.

• Make sure all staff use the resources in this issuance to provide career information and guidance to help customers build their careers.

• Make sure all staff working with customers interested in scholarship support are utilizing the Eligible Training Provider List to identify training programs supported by Workforce Solutions.

Questions

Staff should first ask questions of their managers or supervisors. Direct questions for Board staff through the Issuance Q&A.