Mt. Pleasant Chamber hosts Building a Talent Pipeline

The Mt. Pleasant Area Chamber Alliance wants to build a pipeline of talent.

Executive Vice President Kristi Ray knows local businesses have positons to fill and she wants area students to know they have a future in Henry County after gradution. On Friday, Sept. 21, the organization held The Building a Talent Pipeline event was held at Iowa Wesleyan (IW) on Friday, Sept. 21, for chamber members to hear about the benefits of hiring interns and ways to use their assistance. A panel of local businesses that have interns spoke and explained what their interns' job duties entail, how often they work and why they feel the opportunity is important. Among the small panel was Henry County Sheriff Rich McNamee who said interns are not only valuable to the business, but offering an internship is valuable to the student as well.

McNamee said that when the internship is completed, the student can put the work experience on their resume. He said he has personally been contacted after students have completed the internship program because employers are seeking to follow up on the quality of work the intern provided. He feels that offering these kinds of opportunities allows for growth within the business and also for the student who is learning on the job and taking away necessary information.

Denise Hill, Human Relations Manager at Continental, was also on the panel and said her organization currently has one intern but is looking to add more. She feels that interns bring a fresh perspective and new ideas the business may have yet to use. '(We're) seeing an organization through a younger generation's eyes,” she said. 'I hope they get a valuable opportunity to put on their resume and take with them throughout their career.”

Next a panel of four current IW students spoke about the internships they worked. Two of them completed their internship in Henry County. Of the four, three of them plan to stay with their company full time after graduation despite only two of the four students having a paid internship. They all worked in setting related to their fields and felt that the office experience, multiple job duties and opportunity to further themselves was a valuable experience that will help further them.

LaShawnda Roberts is a senior at IW studying business with a music emphasis. She completed her Summer internship at the University of Missouri concert series. Roberts said that despite her internship not being paid monetarily, she felt she was paid in the experiences she gained. Roberts took on a variety of roles including house managing, customer service and working directly with artists and their agents. 'They made me feel like the work I was doing was important,” she said.

Kat Evans, Director of Career Development and Internships at IW, said the university requires all students to complete an internship before graduation because they feel that their value is essential to helping them succeed. 'The value that they add, (is that) they're bringing in fresh new ideas, they're honing in on their new ideas, and they're developing their oral and written communication skills,” she said. 'The value to the employer is they're getting a talented student who's coming in excited and can look at something from a new perspective.”

After a short lunch break, the group of 30 gathered back at their tables to hear from Beth Townsend, Director of Iowa Workforce Development. Her presentation was about the Future Ready Iowa plan, whose mission is to build a talent pipeline and help workers reach the next step up in the workforce. Townsend said that internships are crucial to developing new leaders in the workplace because it offers a hands-on experience they are unable to achieve elsewhere.

'When you're an employer and you're hiring people, you just kind of hire them and bring them and hope it works out,” she explained. 'With an internship, that's for a finite period of time and probably a specific project so it's a win-win for everybody.”

Mt. Pleasant Chamber President Krist Ray was very pleased with the turnout and the information presented at Friday's event. She said she hopes this inspires employers to take on interns and that those interns take full-time jobs and stay in the area to help grow the future of Mt. Pleasant. She explained that 62 percent of interns stay with their company as full-time employees and that number could be great for the future of Mt. Pleasant. 'It was good for our members to hear,” she said. 'We are in such dire need (of new employees) and if we can get them started doing an internship, then hopefully they'll stay and make this their home.”