Growing the Workforce One Badge at a Time

Last spring, we at the Indy Chamber made an active commitment to prepare young adults for employment in Indianapolis. Through Job Ready Indy, a partnership with the City of Indianapolis and EmployIndy, over thirty approved training partners providing employment services to youth successfully badged 855 young adults in the past year. Today Indianapolis employers can hire these young adults with full confidence in their work readiness and their ability to make a positive impact on the culture of their organization.

Many concerns about hiring young people come from the notion that they will be unprepared and lack basic soft skills. Job Ready Indy alleviates those concerns by enrolling young adults in thirty hours of work readiness training, broken up into six sections where they learn workplace and social skills, self-management, learning strategies, and having the appropriate mindset for the workplace. Making a thirty-hour course commitment, participants come out of Job Ready Indy with a new passion for employment.

Badges are earned upon mastery of competencies vetted by human resources experts from Indy Chamber member businesses. We are confident that these individuals have the skills needed to be a valuable asset to any team. BrightView Landscape Services is one of the many businesses that have already seen the benefits of this program, hiring Job Ready Indy graduates that have retained employment and made a positive impact on their organization. BrightView hired DaShawn Mitchell, a Job Ready Indy graduate through Fathers & Families Center, because of his impressive interview, desire to grow and strong communication skills. In addition, he stood out above all the other candidates as someone who would be a positive leader in their organization.

Nearly a third of youth under 18 years of age in Marion County are from families living below the poverty level. Economic and social inequities are strong powers for producing self-doubt and despair. Without self-confidence or the belief that life can be better, the value of education or employment isn’t clear. Developing and exercising job readiness and life skills begins to build assurance. As workers, laborers, or professionals, all productive members of the workforce, we can empathize with the self-reliance and empowerment that jobs and careers create for oneself. By taking the first step in offering “A job”, you are providing a pathway for these young people to succeed in the future.

What we ask of you is that, as a partner in the work we do, you will offer an interview to any participant that has completed all six of their Job Ready Indy badges.

Employer Champions like BrightView and many others are making a difference in Indianapolis while experiencing a return on their investment - and you have the opportunity to do the same.

Get started connecting to Job Ready Indy graduates today at jobreadyindy.org/employers.