Workforce and Talent Development

Build Your Skills and Launch Your Career

The City of Somerville's Workforce and Talent Development Department offers a wide range of training program to help job seekers get training for new careers or upgrade their skills as they look for new career opportunities. Explore the programs listed below. 

• AACA Boston's Careers in Banking and Finance and Building Energy Efficient Maintenance Skills (BEEMS) trainings support and prepare residents as they work toward careers in banking and finance or in building maintenance.  
• FabVille, is a free digital fabrication lab located at Somerville High School that is open to the community on weeknights Monday through Thursday during the school year. Visit the link to learn more about upcoming classes, events, and open shop hours.  
• Franklin Cummings Tech's learn and earn program provides financial assistance to Somerville residents as they work toward a degree or certificate in Clean Energy or Information Technology. 
• Just A Start Biomedical and IT Careers programs train adults for sustainable life sciences and information technology careers with a pipeline to local, high-demand employment opportunities.  
• Per Scholas Greater Boston offers free hands-on information technology training to students throughout Greater Boston. 
• Mass CultivatED's workforce development program provides free legal services, education, and externships preparing residents for careers in the cannabis industry.  
• SCALE, the Somerville Center for Adult Learning Experiences offers English Language Learning classes and adult basic education classes to prepare residents for the HiSET exam, entering college, or advancing their career.  
• Somerville Community Corporation's First Source Jobs Program helps residents gain the skills needed to grow their careers. SCC also administers a scholarship for residents seeking financial assistance to pursue job training opportunities. 

Quality Jobs For Somerville 

Workforce and Talent Development is committed to creating quality jobs, which improve employee and company performance. Management can make choices that empower and value their employees. 

The City of Somerville prides itself as a national leader in creating quality jobs. Quality Jobs practices are outlined in the Talent Equity Playbook, including: 

• Predictive Scheduling: Companies and employees should build schedules that set upfront expectations for work and allow employees to plan. 
• Cross-training: Enabling employees to be familiar with full scope of products, stay busy with multiple company roles, and understand their personal contribution to company performance are crucial components of Quality Jobs. 
• De-standardizing Tasks: Promoting opportunities for employees to participate in continuous improvement tasks to improve customer experience and service. 
• Supervisory Training: Working with supervisors to support career choices and training among front-line employees 
• Retention Services: Hiring and training workers is expensive. Companies can improve employee retention by establishing employee assistance programs that help navigate workplace conflict, address employee health and wellness, and offer child care, transportation and financial literacy solutions. 
• Skills and Benefits: Finding creative ways to promote employee access to and participation in credential attainment (tuition assistance, workplace sponsored learning) and benefits that build employee security (living wage, healthcare, family leave) 
   

Talent Equity Playbook

The City of Somerville’s Talent Equity Playbook helps Somerville residents thrive in the ever-changing workplace. Check out this presentation to learn more about the City’s community-developed workforce development strategic plan, the Talent Equity Playbook. You can also view the TEP embedded below, or click here to download a PDF version. 

Job Creation and Retention Trust

The Job Creation and Retention Trust (JCRT) Board of Trustees' responsibilities include managing the "jobs linkage" funding, working with OSPCD staff to implement workforce development strategies outlined in the Talent Equity Playbook, targeting industry sectors and resident demographics of interest for job training programs, soliciting project proposals, and funding workforce development training programs.

The JCRT Board of Trustees is comprised of the following representatives:

• Mayor of Somerville or designee;
• Board of Aldermen President or designee;
• Superintendent of Schools or designee.
• Representatives of two workforce development non-profits for a period of three years;
• Two Somerville residents for a period of three years, with a preference that such residents have participated in workforce development programs in the City of Somerville;
• Representatives of two local businesses for a period of three years

The formation of the Job Creation and Retention Trust is the result of the City’s 2016 approved home-rule petition to institute a workforce development linkage fee to support additional training programs to prepare residents for and connect them to new job opportunities.

After an extensive evaluation of the commercial development landscape, incoming industry sectors, and resident educational and skill attainment, as well as exploration to further conceptualize the future JCRT Board of Trustees structure, the Somerville Board of Aldermen voted in December 2017 to approve a zoning amendment creating the JCRT fund and setting the jobs linkage fee at $2.46 a square foot on commercial development projects of more than 15,000 square feet.

See below for the 2017 Nexus Study detailing jobs linkage calculations.

2017 Somerville Nexus Final Report