Daniel Bustillo, Healthcare Career Advancement Program (H-CAP): Advancing Job Quality and Racial Equity in Healthcare

If you want proof of how the pandemic has taken a toll on the healthcare workforce, look no further than a recent national poll showing that nearly 30% of nurses, doctors, and allied
professionals might leave their profession within the next year. Daniel Bustillo, whose work as executive director of the Healthcare Career Advancement Program (H-CAP) gives him a national perspective, thinks that number might even go higher. This sobering reality makes organizations like his, which promote innovation and quality in healthcare career education, more important than ever. “Our work is really focused at the intersection of skills attainment, racial and gender equity, and job quality,” says Bustillo. Key to that work is creating opportunities for career mobility, which, as he explains to Futuro Health CEO Van Ton-Quinlivan, can be achieved through a blend of apprenticeships, effective mentorship, and robust supportive services. Check out this illuminating conversation to learn more about reimagining workforce development, a historic opportunity to fund home and community-based services, and H-CAP’s new Center for Advancing Racial Equity and Job Quality in Long-Term Care.

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Rachael Stephens, National Governors Association: State Innovations to Meet Unique Labor Market Challenges

The nation’s governors have their hands full navigating an uneven economic recovery and turbulent labor market.  Fortunately, they can draw on the National Governors Association Center for Best Practices to help guide their decision making. “Governors are focused on getting people safely back to work and filling jobs that are open right now and looking for ways to get people quickly skilled up for new jobs if that’s what they need. They’re also looking at how they can build on existing efforts to develop career pathways that lead to good jobs in the longer term,” says Rachael Stephens, director of the Center’s Workforce Development and Economic Policy Program. Those efforts include the NGA’s Workforce Innovation Network which, as Stephens tells Futuro Health CEO Van Ton-Quinlivan, is sparking creative solutions in states from Vermont to Alabama. Check out this episode for an informative scan of innovative approaches to today’s complex economic challenges that include supporting a growing on-demand workforce and improving hiring practices to create a more equitable job market.  

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Wayne Skipper, CEO of Concentric Sky: Future-Proofing with Digital Badges

As more and more people acquire skills and credentials outside of structured degree programs, employers are looking for credible ways to assess what potential employees have learned.  One increasingly popular and agile approach to meeting this need is digital badging, and in this episode of WorkforceRx you can learn all about it from one of the pioneers in the space, Wayne Skipper, the founder and CEO of Concentric Sky, makers of Badgr (http://www.badgr.com). Skipper likens digital badges to mini-transcripts with supporting evidence that is independently verifiable by third parties. “Digital badges allow institutions, which are now measuring student success through the lens of job placement, do a better job of helping employers understand what is meant by a credential and what proficiencies a learner who goes through their program can demonstrate.” As co-founder of the Open Skills Network, Skipper is also behind efforts to provide meaningful tools to reduce the bias that can result if only machine learning is involved in assessing proficiencies. Join host Van Ton-Quinlivan for this fascinating discussion about the potential threats and opportunities for educational institutions and employers as the shift to skills-based hiring continues to gain momentum. 

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