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sound management techniques, too long lacking in many business circles, in dealing with employment of the "hard-core". The challenge of meeting the NAB pledge to recruit, train and retain 175 hard-core unemployed, according to the company, raised a number of questions. Among these were considerations as to how the "hard-core" unemployed were different from other new employees, whether double standards would be established as to productivity and general work performance, and why referral agencies did not train and orient the "hard-core" before they were employed. The last question forced the company to seek its own answer. A training area away from the main plant was established by the company. A. O. Smith obtained a worksite in a warehouse location away from the plant, installed production equipment and selected some work. It spelled out goals for what was called, Job Preparation Training. It then prepared candidates for entrance to the main plart work force by giving individual consideration to each candidate's need to: a. establish habits of punctuality and regular attendance,

b. develop basic safe job knowledge and skills,

c. accept supervision and cooperate with fellow workmen,

d. improve academic levels,

e. achieve solutions of personal problems by individual counselling. The training consisted of approximately four to six weeks in the vestibule training center. Certificates were then presented and assignments made to regular jobs in the main plant. A plan for orientation education was estab lished, with speakers from the company as well as those from the community. A "buddy" system was instituted to assist in maintaining interest in the job. Turnover, of course, occurred; but, as of January 20, 1970, 64% of the 118 trainees hired in the first two years had been retained. The company is pleased with initial results, and is now undertaking a second program of hiring the disadvantaged in greater numbers.

We could go on in describing the many similar experiences of companies around the country who have undertaken projects as a part of the NAB program. Not all are successful. Some few attempt no new approaches to hiring this target group of people, and their retention rate in these cases is decidedly poor. Others fail to provide the supportive services that are so necessary in helping disadvantaged workers catch up with their fellow employees. Yet, in the main, the vast majority of businessmen and companies that have participated in the work of the Alliance have done a good job. And we have not talked to you today about the truly major programs undertaken by the very largest U.S. employers. Many of you already know of the good work being done by General Motors, Ford, Western Electric, DuPont, RCA, Alcoa and the other giants of American industry. In each of your states, NAB now has the support of major employers, who aim at aggressively improving the lot of the "hard-core". We are enclosing an attachment to our statement (Exhibit I) that reflects a general sampling of a variety of the 24,742 companies participating in our program. Many in this sampling are large, national corporations. The attachment reflects commitment of fifteen contract and non-contract companies, taken at random from our records as of March 31, 1970.

Since the beginning of this fiscal year, we presently have 1,303 JOBS contracts outstanding, covering 51,433 job slots. The Department of Labor has committed since July 1, 1969, 128.8 million dollars under the JOBS program. Of these contracts with employers 65% are for less than twenty trainees-indicating to De partment statisticians that the vast majority of new JOBS contracts are held by what they consider to be small employers.* That is, we think, indicative of our efforts to reach and involve the great middle group of American businesses. Consistent with this broadening of our base, NAB has seen positive develop‐ ments occur in our metro offices. When President Nixon took office in January of last year, he reviewed the work of the Alliance, and suggested an expansion of NAB offices to an additional 75 metropolitan areas. He also raised to 614,000, the total NAB "on board" goal to be reached by June 30, 1971. With this added mandate and reaffirmed presidential support, we proceeded to recruit more business executives to staff these new metro offices. On loan from their companies

A consortium JOBS contract was specifically devised to assist small and medium size employers to enter into a joint training effort of the disadvantaged. Generally, a single consortium leader provides classes in pre-OJT and supportive services to new hires at a centralized location. These classes help employers to integrate into their work force. employees who require additional input of services that many employers alone are unequipped to provide.

iods of up to one year or more, the more than 2,000 men and women who een loaned full-time by business are the backbone of the NAB concept of g business to businessmen". The "business" is, of course, jobs for the antaged. We have recruited approximately 30,000 executives to serve in s capacities in the NAB network since the start of the program. The re's managers and executives are borrowed for extended periods from nies, or from Government agencies, that continue to pay their salaries. Alliance has ten regional offices, each headed by a member of the NAB of Directors. Each regional office has a full-time executive supplied from, aid by, the regional chairman's company. The national and regional offices rimarily concerned with organization, planning, counselling and troubleng. But the real job is done in the local NAB offices in the country's 125 st metropolitan areas. In each of these 125 areas, a metropolitan chairman es his energy to opening employment doors in local industry to citizens e area's ghettos. He encourages industry to use its own resources and ivity to provide employment opportunities for people it would not ordinarily oy. Where this requires special effort and expense, he encourages the com. es to avail themselves of government support through a JOBS contract with Department of Labor. The local office, headed by our metro chairman, inably has looked for support from top business leaders in the community. chairman will represent NAB with this group and will in turn choose a ro director who oversees the day-to-day work for the NAB organization. Also he metro staff, a manager of job procurement and placement (JOBS MAN), ves as a loaned executive who assists the metro's pledge campaign; recruits needed loaned executive solicitors; and oversees their training. A manager recruitment and government programs (MAN MAN) represents the governnt arm of the Alliance partnership, and serves on loan from the state employnt service. He sees that job pledges are converted to specific job orders; proles the necessary outreach, screening and referral for hiring; and assists in oviding information on JOBS contracts. A team of industry job solicitors, ad a secretarial staff support this basic four man office nucleus. Recently, through a Department of Labor funded project, NAB was instruental in having five hundred state employment service employees trained to erve as JOBS contract service representatives (CSR). These new members of he local metro, now stand ready to assist employers who desire guidance in ntering into a training agreement with the Department. We believe this assignment of CSR's to our metro offices also brings state employment agencies into a urther involvement with the problems of the "hard-core" unemployed. Thus, he CSR, and all the businessmen and women involved in the NAB program, make direct contact with companies that provide the jobs, as well as with the organizations that supply the job recruits.

In every metropolitan area there are many groups-private, public, formal, informal, large and small-that are addressing the problems of poverty. It is not the intent of the National Alliance of Businessmen to supplant or obstruct any of these local organizations. It is the job of the National Alliance of Businessmen in every area to work constructively with all programs concerned with employment opportunities. If a basic task of the Alliance is to help bring people and jobs together, the Alliance role must be that of a catalyst, to maximize the effectiveness of already existing resources. We have included as an attachment (Exhibit II), an organization chart describing how the metro office functions, and the role it should play in helping coordinate community manpower efforts. In the NAB metro approach to solving employment problems of disadvantaged workers, a number of innovative developments have occurred. In Chicago, the NAB office produced a study entitled "Transportation and Employment of the Hard-Core" (Exhibit III). This report is considered by many to be an exceptional compendium of meaningful solutions to a major employment obstacle facing the urban poor. It has been distributed to thousands of employers.

In New York, the NAB metro (Coalition JOBS) developed an "Opportunity Rating System" aimed at encouraging employers to pledge "quality jobs" for the disadvantaged (Exhibit IV). The NAB objective is to develop good jobs, at reasonable wages, with valuable training and work experience, and an opportunity for advancement. Consequently the New York approach sorts out the dead-end type of job as an unacceptable pledge from an employer. Instead, the metro in that city aims at good jobs that provide meaningful employment to the "hard-core" new hire. Other NAB cities are beginning to follow this well-conceived lead.

In the great majority of NAB offices around the country, supervisory training workshops have been instituted on a regular basis. First line supervisors in cities like Philadelphia, Minneapolis, Atlanta, Buffalo, and San Diego, are thereby introduced to the unique problems of the disadvantaged worker. Pan! Kayser, past president of NAB, said last year that "long before you put a disadvantaged person to work in a job, you have to put yourself in his shoes, thing what he thinks, worry his worries, and look at yourself through his eyes" All too few supervisory personnel have ever undertaken this exercise. In mary cases, they had little reason to do so prior to their company's pledge and hire commitment to the Alliance. Now, NAB metros everywhere offer workshops to instruct the supervisor on new situations to be faced; the tools to be used in meeting them; and the empathy the new worker must receive in order to sueceed. These free workshops use a variety of training techniques to create maximum participant involvement. Included are color films, programmed instrtions, group discussions, problem solving sessions, and creative role playing. The idea is to focus on the supervisor's experience and not merely to subject him to another series of lectures of human relations. He is helped to experience the job situation as the strange environment it frequently is to the disadvantaged worker. And he is urged to come up with creative ways to assist the "hard-core" employee to become oriented and productive. Employers report that the workshops are proving successful and that new and more sophisticated supervisory control habits are far more frequently in evidence.

As a final selection from many of the fine efforts undertaken by NAB metres to involve area businessmen in solving the employment problems of the disadvantaged, we are enclosing a copy of a letter sent to all employment and personnel offices in the Bridgeport, Connecticut area by our metro there (Exhibit V). It is representative of similar correspondence sent to local company employment offices by other NAB offices across the nation. The message NAB attempts to bring to those charged with company hiring is perhaps commonplace to some employers. It is simply a need of sensitivity and awareness in interviewing referred "hard-core" job applicants. For many employers, however, this message is an informative, meaningful introduction to the responsibility of bringing into the work force the many potential employees who have been denied this right in the past. Not all employers follow our lead. But through means of letters such as this; advertising in local newspapers, on radio and T.V.; and speeches to Chambers of Commerce and other business organizations, we have reason to believe that the crucial first contract affirmative response by business to the disadvantaged job applicant, is developing.

We have discussed at some length particular undertakings by individual NAB companies, and local NAB metro offices in developing an employment climate receptive to hiring disadvantaged American workers. We believe these examples to be representative of the work of the Alliance nationwide over the past two years. It may now be appropriate to indicate to you how many disadvantaged or hard-core people have been reached by the Alliance since 1968. Recently, Arthur A. Fletcher, Assistant Secretary of Labor, after hearings in Washington, D.C. on employment of blacks and other minorities in the building trades, was quoted in the press as saying that “we're going to play a numbers game because numbers is what it's all about." Although we do not see "numbers" as the sine qua non of the success or failure of NAB's program, and in fact believe they are secondary to our major function of altering industry hiring patterns and attitudes, the mission originally given to NAB was phrased in terms of target goals. Obviously, it is easier to measure accomplishment if you simply look at figures.

Much harder is the task of determining whether an employer's posture has been truly changed as to the criterion he uses in hiring. Nevertheless, having received specifically assigned quotas from two Presidents, NAB instituted a procedure for keeping track of statistical progress. A tally system was instituted using a computer. We call this our Management Information System. For con

*The information is gathered on 5 types of cards:

1. The Pledge Card. The Pledge Card tells the National Alliance of Businessmen that a company has joined the program; the number of jobs the company has pledged; and whether the company is interested in the JOBS contract.

2. The Hiring Card. The Hiring Card identifies the characteristics of the trainee coming into the NAB/JOBS program.

3. Completion/Termination Card. The Completion/Termination card notifies the NAB that a trainee has completed contract training or has left employment.

4. Upgrading Card. The Upgrading Card tells us when an employee's skill-level is being improved for a better job.

5. Tally Cards.-The Tally Card reports hires, terminations and on-board figures. This card is submitted quarterly by both contraet and non-contract employers.

npanies, hire cards, completion/termination cards and upgrading bmitted at the end of the month to the Regional Manpower Adminng with a monthly report, and then the cards are forwarded to the arters. The hiring cards and completion/termination cards for nonpanies are mailed directly to the NAB headquarters.

em provides us with information on the number of pledges received, nd other pertinent data on each individual hired, and similar necesation if the new employee is terminated. The reporting of these facts completion of hire and termination cards is, in the majority of cases, responsibility of the pledging employers and as such it is an im

em.

ty of data in any reporting system is dependent upon the supplies We, at NAB, have found that larger employers who are experienced 1 reporting systems tend to be accurate and timely with the data à hiring, training, and retaining "hard-core unemployed." With the panies, we have experienced a number of problems. In many iny simply will not report, even though the NAB metro offices have iligent in attempting to secure tally reports from them on a monthly NAB headquarters is faced with a situation where our figures probneither all of the hires in the program nor all of the terminations. it in a volunteer program such as this, our reporting has been gen· effective when compared with other, similarly oriented programs rting was often tied directly to the payment of funds. Although t portion of the NAB program does permit enforcement of reporting ion for payment, no such inducement is present in the volunteer nd it must not be forgotten that approximately 70% of all persons the JOBS program come from volunteer companies. nteer aspect of reporting does not exist, of course, if the employer nment contract. The reporting then becomes mandatory. However, categories are imprecise as to what actually happens to a trainee. e, until very recently trainees who have completed training under d been assimilated into the employer's work force, were counted as 1," along with other trainees who had either dropped out of the been discharged from employment for some other reason. Also, of ees who did in fact drop out of the program, many went on to other military service, or back to school. Yet they were also listed as

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in data reporting should go some way to correct this impreciseness inations. Additionally, trainee's Social Security classifications will re detailed follow-up information on his or her employment progress. pling of 12,000 trainees done by NAB last year shows that such data e, be obtained (Exhibit VI). It also reflects that NAB trainees were affected by their involvement in the program, both as to mean earnincrease) and as to additional number of quarters in which they yed.

, interest exists in numbers of disadvantaged people placed in jobs, pecific record of maintaining employment. It should be first stated y and precisely that the overwhelming consensus of opinion from g NAB employers to date is that these so-called hard-core workers here indicating a desire to work and work hard. The vast majority, rise of not a few employers, are turning out to be dedicated, industriees. They have well justified the faith placed in them. Given the at last, they quickly put to rest the pernicious cliches reflecting nmitment to earn their place in the world of work. If we are justifiof the nearly 25,000 American business firms participating in NAB, 1 prouder of the disadvantaged trainees who proved so many things people, not the least of whom might be themselves. On March 31, lect the following statistics on these trainees:

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The above figures result in a retention rate of 48%, which we believe to we justify the business community's commitment to hire and train the "hard-core through NAB. Although many would claim retention on the job for a six mont period or better indicates successful assimilation into the economic mainstream, we have excluded these individuals from our on-board totals in calculating ou retention figure. Likewise, we have excluded, in determining a retention per centage, the approximately 10% of "terminated" trainees who have gone fr a NAB employer directly to other employment. Another 2% of this terminati category is attributable to individuals who have returned to school or entered the armed forces.* We have excluded these trainees in calculating our reter tion rates, but we cannot believe they are in any sense failures. At a conservative 48%, our "numbers" nonetheless stand as a not unrealistic reflection of the success of the NAB program and its people.

The Committee is aware, of course, that NAB trainees, unlike those in other federally sponsored manpower programs (except MDTA-OJT), begin with 1005 of their number in jobs. The problems of placement after training, or training for non-existent jobs, are thus obviated. We have stressed the necessity of the "hire first" concept to businessmen nationwide, as a means of attacking the root of the problem of "hard-core" unemployed. However, with this approach, many feared that employers would continue to screen out needy individuals who were ostersibly unattractive to employment interviewers-thus "creaming" the top laye of the so-called hard-core. Especially was this considered to be an unattractive possibility in the self certification, non-contract hire situation that comprises the bulk of the NAB program. But in the contract portion, where certification of disadvantaged trainees is done by the state employment service or C.E.P., and in the non-contract portion, profile characteristics of trainees vary only slightly, For instance, under contract, average family income is $2,367 compared to a non-contract average of $2,495. The JOBS contract trainee's average number of weeks unemployed is approximately 20, while non-contract trainees average 22 Both groups average a family size of slightly more than 3.5 persons, and both average only a little more than two years of high school education. Eighty-four per cent of trainees under a JOBS contract are members of a minority race whereas 77% non-contract trainees are minorities. Contract trainees average slightly over 25 years old, and non-contract about a year younger. In summary we believe we are reaching the target populations defined for us by President Johnson, and the Department of Labor.

We would be remiss if we failed to list for you some of the problem areas en countered by NAB in the course of expanding our operations to 125 metropolitan areas. We have mentioned difficulty in obtaining more precise information on new hires and termination; the reporting requirement being honored in the breach by many smaller employers; and the need for more complete tracking of individ uals once they complete the program. Other difficulties also exist. Although nearly 25,000 employers are presently part of NAB, over two million employers have ye to make an initial pledge. Most of those businesses are small. But in reviewing our responsibilities of opening job opportunities and modifying hiring attitudes of American employers we must find a way to more fully commit these companies to the task of hiring the "hard-core". In New York City alone, there are probably something like 250,000 employers. If each one hired a single disadvantaged worker, a sizeable dent in the problem of poverty in that city could be accom plished. The NAB office in that city (Coalition JOBS) has just completed a study on the impact of our program there. It details, in a thorough way, many of the difficulties encountered in implementing a JOBS contract, and thereby mounting meaningful attack in the employment problems of the poor. We recommend it to you for study (Exhibit VII).

Also, we are continually in need for more top quality business executives. Both in Washington and the field, we have relied on the efforts of a cadre of loaned businessmen who take substantial time from their careers to develop jobs for the disadvantaged. Turnover here is usually on an annual basis, and something

*These percentages as to "terminated" trainees who moved directly to new jobs, school, or the military, are based on a sampling of 169,000 NAB contract and non-contract trainees as of February 28, 1970.

Many non-contract employers have specifically requested that "hard-core" new hires be certified by the state employment service or C.E.P. before referral. Approximately 26% of non-contract referrals are so certified before reaching the employer.

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