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>> good morning, and welcome to mosaic. i'm rabbi eric wiesen, honored to be your host this morning. throughout the country, communities are taking a very deep work at issues of work and its economy and ways in which a community can contribute by working an economy to the common good. we are pleased to have in this conversation this morning, lisa countryman who works with jcs to talk about this important issue, lisa, so let's jump in and ask you what is jvs? >> we believe in the power of work to transform live. we're a non-profit, nonsectarian organization that's grounded in jewish values but serves the entire bay community. our mission is to open up opportunity for those who have been left behind. >> so it's a big beautiful mission statement and i want you to give a couple of examples of how does it actually find its way to the ground? of course.

yes, so we work closely with employers and sectors that are showing very strong growth, and particularly in sectors that have a large percentage of what we call middle skill, middle wage jobs. one of the things that has happened since the great recession has been kind of the hollowing out of the middle of the labor market and what that means is, the growth that has been happening has been happening in the highest paid, highest skilled jobs and unfortunately in the lowest skilled, lowest paid jobs with a shrinking pool in the middle. so we focus on making very deep connection was employers in the sectors that still do offer middle school, middle wage jobs and then building out career pathways, training programs in partnership with those employers and those sectors, and i'll just tell you a little bit more about what that looks like. >> please. >> it looks like connecting people with skill building

training, hard skills, technical skills and soft skills or communication skills, followed by a paid work experience in partnership with an employer. often it's paid by the employer and then a direct connection to employment with the goal of getting people into jobs, somewhere between 40 and $80,000 a year. >> communities throughout the country face this issue, and every community has a lot in common with every community at the same time, every community is unique, so i wonder if you could talk about how j vs understands our local bay community and what sectors it moves into to form partnerships and contribute to the economic life of the community at large. >> that's a great question and a really big question. a couple of things i would like to draw out of that are first of all, the bay area economy, in terms of the inequality that i was describing and the hollowing

out of the middle, the bay area economy is probably the most acute in the country and in that sense, it makes the work that we're doing here in partnership with employers, a really great testing ground for developing programs that can work, that can solve that problem, and we believe if it can work here, it should be able to work pretty much anywhere. i think other key factors to think about in thinking about the bay area economy are looking at sectors that still offer a high percentage of middle skill, middle wage jobs. so some examples of that are healthcare, but also utilities in the public sector. another piece of why those particular industries are still offering so many middle skill, middle wage jobs, are for the most part, those jobs cannot be off shored or in-shored, and they have to be done by people who are here. healthcare and the public sector also have the advantage of being

fairly recession proof. so that means those are good investments for us in terms of developing programming and partnership and developing sustainability. >> you used an interesting word. so i think that most people are familiar with the term offshore, which means that the job leaves the country and what is inshore? >> inshoring is a dynamic that we think about, in a city like san francisco, but the broader bay area, and we work across multiple counties across the broader bay area. many companies are in response to the increasing cost of living and also the increasing cost of course of doing business, moving jobs that can be moved to lower cost areas of the country. >> i see. so a job might leave the bay area for another part of california, another state. >> that's exactly right. >> interesting. so we're going to take a quick break, lisa and come back in just a moment on mosaic.

>> good morning, and welcome to mosaic, i'm rabbi eric wiesen, grateful to be your host. and we're having a conversation about jvs and the bay area

economy and contributing to the common g he would like to welcome back lisa countryman, and welcome becca, the director of healthcare problems and welcome back lisa and welcome becca, and let's just jump in and what are the healthcare programs at jvs? >> we have a diversified portfolio, and our programs in two different ways. we serve people who are already licensed or certificated in the field and people that don't have any healthcare experience but the to get their foot in the door. so we serve a wild range of okayuation. we work with medical assistance, and dental assistance, and lvns and rns and medical assistants and those are the occupations that are in high demand in the bay area, and have good entry level wages. so our refresher programs are designed for people who already have a certificate and already are licensed but maybe people have taken a little bit of time

off or gotten a license or certificate and weren't able to find work in that field. and we have targeted short-term trainings for those folks to refresh their clinical skills and to practice all of the soft skills that employers really want. and then they go into a work based learning experience, where they are learning a wage and practicing their skills again and supporting and finding a job afterward. our other training programs that are for folks that are not trained or certified already in our dental or medical assistant programs, and our medical assistant training as well, folks again are going through a clinical training program. and sometimes a partnership with a local training provider like san francisco state. and we're supplementing that training again targeting towards an employer, and practicing the skills and getting a lot of coaching and support and wrap around services and job support in the end. >> so lisa was talking about

jcv's commitment to finding out where a gap is, and filling it in the healthcare sector in context of the middle wage jobs and jobs as you described a dental assistant and cna and that sort of thing, so for anybody who wants a job, at a certain point where the rubber hits the road is getting the job. and i wonder if you could talk about that piece of the puzzle that i know jvs is involved with, so when somebody lands in a place, community to a job, getting a paycheck and how does that structure actually work at jvs? that's a really good question. we integrate that training and support throughout the program and before the programming spartans, talk with employers about what does a person need to be able to get in a job? hard skills, do they need to draw blood? and all the way down to what they should be saying in an interview and what kind of

attitude do they need to come in to say to land that job? so we have training throughout the programs that people learn alongside of the harder skills, and we also bring employers in to process every step of the way. so many of them are helps to select the participants in the program. the selection process and the diamonds of folks they're looking for, and the kind of skills that we're looking for. so we know once we bring people into a training program, they're well set up. because the employer has already bought into this group of people. throughout the training, we're providing things like networking, training and sitting down and a resume and how to apply online and once the program ends, many of our participants already have offers from employers, because they have already shown what they can do on the job of the a hiring manager can see that they're trained in this specific setting and they have already shown what

they can do on the job. for those that are still looking for work, they have access to a one-on-one job support system from the staff, group workshops and a whole slew of services around how to practice those skills and keep themselves current with volunteer opportunities, practicing mock interviews with our volunteers, and really everything that they need to land that job. and once they land the job, again touching base with folks to make sure that they're successful in the first 90 days and first work, they can always give us a call and that not only supports them with keeping the job. >> we have 1 minute left with our segment together. but i know that jvs is so intense in the spectrum of work, and so intense from a person who needs a job to a skill set, an employer who will hire and then the success of working. so i wonder if you could talk just a little bit about in a

concrete way, who are the employers that jvs works with? and then you maybe mention a program or two. >> sure, so we work with a lot of employers in the bay area, and some of the bigger names are kaiser permanente, and medical foundation, and those are some of our partners in the systems, but we also work with private practices and the clinics in the bay area, which are really successful. we want to make sure that our participants have a choice in where to work and how to choose the environment and workplaces that are right for them. so we try to have a real variety partnerships. >> believe it or not, we're going to take a quick break, and come back with more in just a moment.

>> good morning, and welcome back to mosaic, and we're in the middle of a wonderful conversation with jvs and we would like to reintroduce you to lisa countryman, and reintroduce you to tiesha quan, the medical administrator for san francisco medical center. and welcome back. >> thank you very much, i'm happy to be here. >> can you tell us about the partnership that kaiser permanente has with jvs. >> absolutely. we have been working together for probably 2 and a half years, and it started with a need that lisa identified, the hollowing out of the workforce and what we found was, we would have many medical assistants who would take a job in san francisco, but after 6 months or a year, they would transfer to a location that was closer to their home and that caused churn and you

know, churn results in people not being as effective at their jobs and it's also expensive because you're constantly training people. i met the chief executive officer for jvs and we started talking, and she told me that a refresher program, and in particular what i liked about it, we were able to help develop the curriculum and they work with us, and we could put pieces of it that are particular to kaiser permanente and i really appreciated it. and also, they were going to recruit around france and in the city of san francisco in particular. and the experiment was, if we could get people who lived nearby, would we be able to reduce that churn and help the community in so many ways by providing jobs, and also, healthcare, and other things that we can do by investing in the community. so it really was a win-win, and we are very happy and i think

that we're on the fourth round of medical assistants, and they are well train. they not only know the critical skills but the soft skills. customer service and we teach them about our computer systems and it's working very very well. >> kaiser permanente, i think a lot of people know, has its origins in worker health and community heat. and that value has stuck with cares, certainly in the bay area. so i'm wondering, in terms of how you look at what you call the churning and what lisa talked about, insuring, do you find if you tend to hire people who are in the community that that job keeps them anchored to the community? is that part of the vision of stability in the workforce and healthcare sector? >> so for, it has only been a couple of years, but we have

been tracking the numbers, and lower churn, people are staying, and i have to say that some of these well trained medical systems are some of our best medical assistants and we're very happy with it. >> lisa, can you talk when how if people come into a job that may or may not land at kaiser or someplace else, how you educate for expectations, what they're really being trained to do, and what the job expectation might be? >> of course. we do very targeted outreach for all of our career pathways programs and for a program like a partnership with kaiser, of course it helps immensely in our outreach that kaiser is such an attractive employer. people really want to work with kaiser and it has a great reputation of being a great place to work and very stable and i think that draws a lot of people. we get sometimes 200, 300

applications to be in a training cohort of 20. and there's a lot of interest, and people understand, and we set expectations from the beginning, that what they're stepping into is a robust training program, classroom training and work experience, but it's not a guarantee of employment at kaiser so they understand that they have the opportunity to kind of prove themselves at that moment and if they don't get an opportunity at kaiser immediately after their externship, they can apply, but we look at other opportunities with other fantastic employers. >> so if somebody is interested in the healthcare center they ay make themselves available to jvs? >> so they can go to our website and get connected to the healthcare programs through there. and they can submit an intake form. >> and gabe, what positions is, is kaiser actually looking for?

>> right now, we're particularly focused on the medical assistants. we're increasing the number of medical assistants that we have been hiring over the last couple of years, and find that it helps the physician in providing great care, and that's the one that we're working with jvs on. certainly, we have other positions and as lvns and rns and other areas as well as administration. >> thank you so much. so we're going to take another quick break and be back in just a moment.

>> good morning, and welcome back to mosaic, and i'm rabbi eric wiesen and we're talking about work and the economy in the bay area, with lisa countryman, strategic officer for jvs and we're joined by nuria rhea, with the professional program and so lisa, i know there are different ways with jvs, that they let the community know what they're doing, and i want you to talk more about how jvs lets the public knows how it works. >> so opportunities like this are occasion doos that. but really, the big event,

strictly business, the annual luncheon, the big fundraising event for the year, and it's really a celebration of the people who have benefited from our programs, and an opportunity also to showcase our fantastic employer partnerships. and nuria is going to be honored as one of our employees of the year this year in strictly business. >> congratulations, nuria. what graduate you to jvs? >> i was struggling to find jobs, and i had my medical job for a couple of years and when i tried to reapply for jobs, it was really hard for me to find jobs. the employers would see, oh, she's two years off of the job. and they won't call me, or said oh, we went in another directin and thank you for submitting your application, but they wouldn't call me. and i was in this program that

helps women who are singles on moms and they told me about jvs and i like that. i liked the opportunity that they were giving me to do the externship. which was one of the big catching parts of it. and also, they gave me the opportunity to refresh my skills. i was a medical assistant but this was giving me time to prep myself before i went to the job. but it became more than that. it became more than just a refreshment program, and then you go ahead and find your way. they help me from teaching me how to do an interview to how to dress up and how to do the interview, they gave me the opportunity to do the interview at case and are thankfully i got hired at caser. >> what is a medical assistant?

>> it's a person who helps the doctor in the back office. they -- like withholding the instruments and prepping for procedures, and with patients. most of the people that goes to the hospital, they have contact with the medical assistants. the first person, either they register them or grab them and put them in the rooms so the doctor can see them. >> the medical assistant, i'm going to jump n the medical assistant plays an important role for setting the tone for the whole patient experience and that's part of the reason why the employer partners we work with like kaiser have a concern with medical assistants and deep grounding with the patient communication and soft skills because they representative and stand in for the organization. >> it reminds me, nuria that

the healthcare system is so complex, and it could be the way that the patient arrives to the doctor's office, and they're waiting and the patient is called and they show up into the room and people are typically nervous and they don't know what to do, they're not doctor because they're well, but they have a concern, and i wonder from your years as a medical assistant, how do you understand the ways in which people need to calm down? are there ways in which people need to understand how to calm down so they're more cogent for the doctor, and they're able to listen to the doctor and hear what he says? how do you get people to get to a place of being calm once they're inside of the office? >> i don't know if calm will be -- >> fair enough. >> if they will not be calm. but j vs actually taught me if you calm yourself, if you

present yourself with a calm manner, they will immediately calm down, because most of the patients are not there. because they're not in the hospital because they want to be in the hospital. like somebody is going on, something in there. so they have to take time off of their job, and all of the things. and some of them are in pain. so i remember one of my coaches, my teachers taught me -- >> we have to stop, i'm so sorry, but in a sentence can you say -- >> just brief like if you are the medical assistant. breathe calmly. the patient is going to respond to you calmly. >> i think that's a wonderful way to end our conversation about health, just breathe and say centered. and thank you so much for being with us on mosaic and have a wonderful day.