WDS 2: Community Partnerships
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The organization creates partnerships with local employers, community service providers, and educational institutions to provide workforce development services that are appropriate, accessible, coordinated, and comprehensive.
Program managers and supervisors facilitate regular contact and teamwork with relevant systems including, but not limited to:
- criminal and juvenile justice;
- health and mental health care;
- education;
- the local housing authority; and
- national, state, and local governments.
To ensure that services are coordinated and comprehensive, the organization establishes arrangements with local employers and community service providers, whenever possible, given geographic, administrative, and budgetary constraints.
Interpretation: Methods that the organization can use to facilitate regular contact among partnering service providers include:
- virtual networking;
- email/phone;
- co-location;
- satellite locations or roving vans; and
- referral or formal contracting.
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Research Note: Literature on workforce development services identifies multiple benefits of service coordination for job seekers, employers, the community, and the coordinating organizations themselves. Benefits include access to a wider array of services, reduction in barriers to service delivery, a simplified referral process, and the elimination of costly service duplication. However, coordinated service delivery should not be viewed as an end in and of itself. The primary goal of formal or informal arrangements between organizations is to achieve positive program outcomes by making services more accessible and effective. |
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To ensure effective and efficient service delivery, the organization maintains a comprehensive resource database of community service providers and potential employers that is accessible to direct service
personnel.