• Status
• The Mission
• The Vision
• Design
• The Program
• Conference Format
• Champions
• Champions' Capstone Conference
• The Principals
• Community Relations and Contracts
• Tomorrow's Workforce Kit
• Schedule

The Mission
The Tomorrow's Workforce Tour will visit over 50 cities across the United States–at least one in every state–to raise awareness of deficiencies in the preparation of America's citizens for the jobs of the future. During these visits, we will facilitate collaborative efforts to improve workforce readiness and performance in the host communities. Using a national public relations outreach, we will draw attention to the need–and opportunity–to improve workforce preparedness. The year-long tour is scheduled to begin in March 2007.

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The Vision
With serious, focused, committed collaboration, the business, education, non-profit, and government sectors of America's communities can apply dedicated resources to dramatically raise the achievement level of our public schools, training programs, community colleges, and universities, to produce a more competent, prepared workforce to support our country's future economic health.

The Tomorrow's Workforce Tour will educate, equip, and inspire citizens in each host community to take deliberate steps to measurably improve education and training. Initiatives stimulated during action-oriented day-long conferences will be supported for a year on national basis to encourage achievement of results that make a positive difference in each community served.

This non-partisan grass roots movement will demonstrate that local communities can raise the effectiveness of education and training to prepare America's future workforce. In a capstone conference, representatives of participating communities will report success and share their needs, opportunities, and dreams with national leaders.

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Design
In each community visited, we will produce a one-day conference titled Tomorrow's Workforce: Preparation for Performance. Participants will be local leaders representing the business, education, government, and not-for-profit segments of the community. Invited without fee, these people will learn about the need for improvement in workforce preparedness, gain considerable information about resources and approaches to achieve significantly stronger results, and be guided in the development of initial action plans for their community's improvement. The conferences will include an inspiration component to motivate and encourage participants to play an active role in making a difference.

An ongoing relationship will be developed with each participating community, managed and reinforced through a Champions Program. In the second quarter of 2009, a capstone conference will be held in the Washington, DC, area to bring together community representatives from around the country. This gathering will give local activists an opportunity to share their successes, challenges, and concerns–with each other and with people and organizations who can help.

Elected and appointed federal and state government officials will be invited–to listen, not to speak–along with leaders of organizations involved with the improvement of education and training in the United States. A report of the outcomes of the Tomorrow's Workforce Tour will be produced.

The Tomorrow's Workforce project is designed to reach local communities with needs, interest, but not necessarily resources and access to guide and support improvement in education and training. Successful community efforts will produce role models that can be followed by other locales around the country. Through an active public relations campaign, the Tour will generate increased attention toward grass roots action, since education is a local responsibility.

Standard operating procedures, consistent programs in each community, and high levels of coordination–combined with a passionate dedication to the mission–will assure the success of this project.

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The Program
Roger Herman and Joyce Gioia, noted workforce futurists, authors, consultants, and professional speakers, will facilitate community-based one-day conferences on the development of tomorrow's workforce in each city they visit on the tour. The conferences will all follow the same format, so the standardization will enable ease of logistics, planning, and outcomes.

Two days will be spent in each community. During the first day, the consultants will meet with community leaders individually and in groups to stimulate and facilitate receptivity, planning, and implementation efforts to achieve measurable results. They will meet with local and state media representatives to describe and discuss the project, the causal problems, and the desired outcomes.

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Conference Format
In each community, Roger and Joyce will facilitate a day-long conference to educate and inspire participants, leading them into problem-solving and action-oriented workshops.

In many cases, the event itself will be preceded by a dinner the night before with hosts of the conference–the local organizers and conveners and of course, the sponsors, if they are from different organizations. In some communities, this dinner will be a restaurant-based activity; in others the gathering may occur in a private home or country club.

Participants include leaders from business, government, non-profits, and education

• Continental breakfast hosted by community
• Energetic high content opening multi-media presentation by Roger and/or Joyce
• Distribution of research, educational, and training materials
• Structured breakout sessions focused on exploring the problems of having an inadequately-prepared workforce and various impacts on the community's health
• Lunch–with a speaker, usually a local leader who is respected by the business, government, and education communities. If such a person can not be identified, or local circumstances suggest that it would be better to have a speaker from outside the community, the Tomorrow' Workforce Team will arrange for a suitable presenter. Alternatively, there will be no speaker at lunch.
• Afternoon Workshops concentrating on developing solutions, assignment of responsibility and accountability, and anticipated outcomes. Initial action plans will be developed using the structured flow developed by the Tour
• Closing inspirational keynote by Roger and/or Joyce summarizing the day, exploring next-steps, and encouraging long-term participant commitment.

The entire day's program will be guided by a structured process designed to focus attention on problems and achievable solutions. The deliverable at the end of the day will be a first draft of an action plan to move the community forward. This plan will be used as a primary tool by the Champions to build momentum and grow the process toward measurable results in the community.

Roger and Joyce will schedule additional time in each community, beyond the one-day conference, to meet with influential groups and individuals and/or local media. Actual events and involvement will vary from city to city, based on needs and opportunities in the community.

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Champions
Two key leaders from each of the sectors–business and industry, government, not-for-profit, faith-based organizations, and education–will be identified and recruited to serve as "champions" in each community. Each community follow-through team will be comprised of at least eight dedicated people. Their role will be to continue the process after the Tomorrow's Workforce Tour has moved on to the next city, sharing problems and ideas with other champions in cities visited by the tour. Extra time will be devoted to coordinating their future work.

The champions will be trained by Roger and/or Joyce during the community visit, on the day before the conference is held. They will be linked to champions from other tour cities under the coordination of an Organizational Development specialist. The champions will be connected by Internet, conference calls, and other means. Over the period of the tour, a community of over 400 local champions will be developed. Many of the results they share will be posted on the tour's website.

Through the Champions program, every community will be connected to all the others in this exciting national experience. Tremendous resources will be available to share ideas and solutions that will give every participating community opportunities to apply best practices to make a significant local difference.

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Champions' Capstone Conference
After the tour is completed, in the to during second quarter 2009, a National Capstone Conference of Champions will be held in Washington, D. C. The 400+ champions representing the visited communities (8 champions X 52 cities) will form the core group, with open invitations extended to all interested parties. During the conference, participants will share success stories, plans, and challenges. Our tour partners will be on-hand to represent their various interests in support of the preparation of tomorrow's workforce.

Government officials will be invited–to listen. To hear the challenges, experiences, and accomplishmentsand needs–of this grassroots movement to improve the development of the workforce America will need tomorrow. Personal invitations will be extended to the United States Secretaries of Education, Labor, and Commerce, as well as their counterparts in every state of the country.

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The Principals
Roger and Joyce, owners and principal professionals for Tomorrow's Workforce Tour, Inc, are nationally recognized thought leaders in workforce/workplace trends and the preparation of the American workforce. They operate The Herman Group, a management consulting firm making forecasts and providing advice to corporate clients on workforce issues. The Herman Group has been in practice since 1980.

Both Roger and Joyce are Certified Management Consultants, so designated by the Institute of Management Consultants. Roger is one of 36 people to be honored as a Fellow of the Institute. They are both recognized by the National Speakers Association as Certified Speaking Professionals.

Both principals are Founding Members of the Association of Professional Futurists and are Professional Members of the World Future Society. Roger serves as Contributing Editor for workforce and workplace trends for The Futurist magazine. Roger and Joyce have served as featured speakers at futures conferences in the United States, Mexico, and Brazil.

Roger has written 11 books, five of them co-authored with Joyce. Additional books are in the writing stage. Between them, they have published over 1,000 magazine and journal articles. Each week since February 1998, Roger and Joyce have published the Herman Trend Alert, an e-advisory sent to over 25,000 direct subscribers in 72 countries in four languages. They are frequently quoted in the news media. Both have been interviewed on broadcast outlets including CNBC, CBS, National Public Radio, MSNBC, and numerous local stations. Print media exposure includes The Wall Street Journal, Christian Science Monitor, Washington Post, Business Week, Inc, Fast Company, Entrepreneur, Chicago Tribune, Los Angeles Times, and a wide range of trade journals and local newspapers.

Roger holds a BA (Sociology) from Hiram College and a MA in Public Administration from The Ohio State University. Joyce earned a BA in Languages from the University of Denver and an MBA from Fordham University. She subsequently earned a Masters in Theology and a Masters in Spiritual Counseling from The New Seminary in New York.

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Community Relations and Contracts
Selling and documenting agreements with participating local communities will be the responsibility of The Tiller Group, headed by Rich Tiller. 317-873-9797.

Each participating community will contribute a fee to cover professional services, on-site support, and the year-long continuing relationship designed to make a significant difference. Early commitment from communities is essential for the long-term planning involved with the Tomorrow's Workforce Tour, so timely decisions are necessary. A deposit on the community investment will be required. Each community can determine how local funds will be generated.

Written agreements will detail local responsibilities and the obligation to collaborate with The Odyssey Group. Once the agreements are confirmed, community coordinators will be contacted by Odyssey to establish a working relationship. At this point, when collections are complete, The Tiller Group's responsibility for contracting is complete.

It is noted that The Tiller Group manages the professional speaking practices of the principals. During the period that the Tour is operational, speaking engagements and calendar management will be closely coordinated by and with The Tiller Group.

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Tomorrow's Workforce Kit
The Tomorrow's Workforce Tour will visit 53 cities out of the entire country. Thousands of other communities have the same need and many of their leaders may become interested in pursing a process similar to what the participating communities will experience.

To meet this opportunity, Tomorrow's Workforce Tour, Inc., may create, produce, and sell a community kit to enable cities to embark on the journey without Roger and Joyce. Kits would include full instructions, materials, and access to the national support system. Everything will be included except Roger and Joyce's personal participation.

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Schedule
The Tour is scheduled to launch during April 2007 and continue until July 2008. In most cases, the Tour will concentrate on one city each week, with blackout dates around Independence Day, Thanksgiving, and the Christmas-New Year's weeks. The Tour will cover approximately 15,000 miles across the lower 48 states, with flights and local ground transportation added to reach Hawaii and Alaska.

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