By Amber Rogers
Northeastern regional cohort focuses on workforce
Since January, the North Carolina Leadership Forum (NCLF) has convened two of four planned meetings with 37 policymakers from Wilson, Halifax, Edgecombe, and Nash counties to discuss: “How do we ensure an adequate workforce in a changing economy in Northeastern North Carolina?”
The goals of the forum are:
- To build authentic relationships based on trust and understanding through frank, civil, and constructive discourse
- To significantly deepen understanding of a specific issue and the underlying values and concerns of others without diminishing one’s own or another person’s point of view
Deciding on four focus areas
Leaders spent the first meeting getting to know one another and building trust by sharing personal stories. Through deep engagement across a variety of differences, including sector, political ideology, county, race, and gender, participants identified several concerns with respect to the topic, ultimately narrowing down to four to focus their discussions on:
- There is a skills and expectations gap between the region’s labor market and industry needs.
- Incentives favor large and/or foreign businesses over long-term, smaller, and locally-owned companies.
- The breakdown of the nuclear family leads to poverty, violence, crime, and community decay.
- Poverty and systemic racism limit opportunities.
Understanding the role personal values play
At the second meeting, participants prioritized values and engaged in an activity to better understand why they might consider one more important than another. Access to high-quality education, the availability of good-paying jobs, an invested community, inclusive planning, and a healthy workplace culture were all important to the group.
The session helped participants appreciate and respect how others can hold the same value for different reasons and weigh it differently. This process is often an insightful exercise for forum participants, and this time was no different.
Developing a shared understanding of the issue
Participants were presented with background data and information to help establish a shared understanding of the issue and its challenges. The NC Rural Center’s Patrick Woodie and myFutureNC’s Cecelia Holden provided county-specific and statewide data regarding economic and demographic trends and facts related to making progress on the goal of reaching 2 million 25-44-year-olds with high-quality credentials or postsecondary degrees by 2030. By the end of this meeting, the group was able to brainstorm and decide on actions to deliberate at the next meeting in April.
Primed to productively disagree and chart paths forward
At the final meeting in May, the cohort will take a bus tour of sites in Edgecombe County including the Kingsboro megasite, Edgecombe Community College’s Tarboro campus, downtown Tarboro, and Princeville. Participants will spend time discussing actions for which there are strong disagreements to better understand each other’s perspective. For actions they agree on, the group may think about action planning and next steps, leveraging the relationships they’ve built through the program.
The final meeting will occur at Barnhill-Jenkins Center for Innovation on Edgecombe Community College’s campus. Previous meetings have been held at Halifax Community College and Wilson Community College.
