In mid-January, we gathered in Indianapolis to launch the third cohort of the Education and Career Mobility Fellowship. Though it was just the first session, there was a clear energy and sense of direction from this new group of fellows.

It was clear they are a group of leaders eager to build on their work of organizational transformation for America’s workforce. The scale of potential impact here is staggering. This group represents a combined workforce of over 3 million Americans, meaning that these leaders have influence over millions of people’s livelihoods and career trajectories. The Fellows are working to solve an important business priority – the complex puzzle of workforce development. For some, the priority  is deeply rooted in organizational values and the lived reality of their workers. For others, the priority is tied to a strategic business necessity. The magic happens where those two perspectives meet and are explored together. The exploration helps create organizations that are more successful precisely because they are better places for people to grow.

Getting Into the Weeds

One particular quote from our time together has stuck with me since our time in Indianapolis:

“Until you get in the weeds, you expect grass.”

It’s a witty but profound reminder of the disconnect that often exists between executive-level expectations and operational reality. From a distance, a career mobility strategy looks like a lush, uniform lawn—simple and self-sustaining. But we spent a significant amount of time discussing the “friction” of program maintenance. It is one thing to design a beautiful program on a whiteboard; it is quite another to build the infrastructure that allows a frontline worker to balance a shift, a family, and a credential.

To move beyond surface-level expectations, our Fellows engaged in deep dives on two key topics:

• Education and Employer Alignment: Identifying where current mobility programs are failing the very people they are meant to serve due to lack of coordination between academic institutions and employers.
• Business Alignment: Learning how to design programming that isn’t just a benefit, but a strategic solution to the specific talent shortages and skill gaps within their businesses.

From Insight to Action

Knowledge is power, but in the world of workforce development, applied skill is the true currency. Through facilitated peer-to-peer conversations and expert-led workshops, these leaders translated insight into action and began the work of building new skills.

While a fuller set of practices will come with time, our Fellows walked away from this first convening with the essential foundations for:

• Human-Centered Design: Starting to reshape programs to meet the actual, daily needs of their unique workforces.
• Data-Driven Advocacy: Gaining the language to articulate the impact of mobility to C-suite stakeholders who might still be looking at the workforce from the “edge of the field” rather than “in the weeds.”
• Strategic Networking: Tapping into a nationwide brain trust of peers who are navigating these same obstacles.

These leaders are returning to their organizations ready to ask the right questions and committed to the “weed-pulling” required to cultivate a stronger workforce. I am eager to witness what this cohort yields over the next eight months of our journey together and know that the next time we’re together they will be ready to dig into the weeds, focused on the right questions, and committed to cultivating a stronger workforce.