The question isn’t whether business and industry leaders should get involved with developing future generations of the state’s workforce. It’s whether they can afford not to, Blaise King, director of strategy and alignment for AccelerateMS, told the Rotary Club of Columbus.

Mississippi, and the Golden Triangle in particular, can compete on national and international levels when it comes to economic development, but doing so requires developing a talented workforce, King said.

“We’ve got to be a little bit more creative about what this pipeline looks like and how we’re building that pipeline,” King said during the Tuesday meeting at Lion Hills Center. “I would say talent is the constraint, but talent is also the opportunity that we have to really show where we can continue to compete.”

Created by the state legislature in 2020, AccelerateMS was officially launched as the statewide workforce development office in 2021. The office works with state agencies, educational institutions and businesses to develop and deploy strategies for building the statewide workforce.

One particular strategy that has been underway since 2022 is placing career coaches in public high schools throughout the state. Coaches work directly with students to identify career goals and then make feasible plans for achieving them.

King said all but three public high schools in the state now have a dedicated career coach. That reach has led to more opportunities for career coaches to specifically drive home “priority occupations,” he said.

“Those are jobs and fields that we know where the individual is going to have a living wage,” King told The Dispatch after the meeting. “They’re going to be able to provide for themselves, for their families. And then we’re seeing an uptick in community college enrollment and workforce enrollment and programs and pathways that we know lead to those occupations and those jobs.”

The next goal is to start workforce development efforts sooner. While career coaches previously worked with high school upperclassmen, King said AccelerateMS is now expanding those efforts to the middle school level.

Tapping into students’ career goals earlier ensures there’s no gap in the workforce pipeline, he said.

“When we talk about those middle school (students), it’s really about that exploration piece (and understanding) … the jobs that are there,” King told The Dispatch. “When we drive by a hospital, do you understand that all 16 career clusters actually have a job in the hospital?”

But business and industry have to also take part in the process, especially when it comes to outlining workforce needs. That can be a challenge as the businesses juggle day-to-day operations, but the pay off is worth it, King said.

“Really figuring out a way to get involved in the K-12 setting, community college setting, (institutions of higher learning) setting … it’s an early HR campaign to get the students to understand the opportunities that are available to them,” he said.

King encouraged business owners and industry leaders to reach out to career advisers about providing students with opportunities to earn hands-on experience.

“Not everybody in here is going to have that direct impact. They’re not going to necessarily have the finger on the pulse of the thing that is going to build that talent,” King told Rotarians. “But … they can influence the people that drive the things for our youth as we create that pipeline, and so … I want to encourage you and challenge you to open your doors, to reach out. … Open your doors to the individuals (like career coaches) that are there, allow them to experience the things that they may not even know about.”

McRae is a general assignment and education reporter for The Dispatch.