ETHOS works with business and industry leaders, educators, and workforce professionals to specify, define and validate the competencies for each industry.

A recent trend in workforce development is to implement changes aimed at making the workforce system more “demand-driven” — in other words, to focus on reforming the way the workforce system meets the needs of employers, as a way of improving outcomes both for employers and job seekers. Workforce development strategies are based on a thorough understanding of a region’s labor dynamics. Regional workforce analysis provides insights for program planning by including information on the regional skill needs of predominant industries; potential skill needs of industries targeted for economic development efforts; and assessments of the skills possessed by the existing and incoming labor force.

What we do

ETHOS is committed to the development and unification of a demand-driven workforce system that will attract and grow businesses and the regional economy. To accomplish this we:

• Bring together policy makers, business, government agencies, education entities, economic development agencies, and the public to better understand workforce needs and to identify solutions.
• Develop and implement comprehensive regional strategies to meet the education and job training needs of the workforce.
• Collect and analyze labor market information to identify employment trends, skills gaps and education and training needs and disseminate the information to policy makers, educators, businesses, workforce partners, and job seekers.
• Promote strategies to improve education levels and basic workplace skills needed to meet the needs of companies and improve their competitiveness in today’s marketplace.
• Support strategies that encourage life-long learning and continuous improvement of workplace skills.
• Advocate for the importance of workforce policy and provide perspective about the need for a skilled workforce.