New ways must be found to give modular credentials so that if workers are displaced and need to be retrained to do something else, credits previously earned could be used toward a new credential. Remarkably, there is very little political constituency for a system with such mobility. This is a peril to our nation. The country needs more firms that are creating high-performance work places and demanding high skills of their workers. They should try to influence how companies think about work organization, and in turn, how that affects the need for training.
Firms learn from each other.
In the natural course of things, firms talk directly to each other and are influenced considerably by their suppliers. A lot of learning happens through these supplier networks. Overlooking this fact of nature may have unintended consequences for educational institutions, particularly community colleges, who continue to court companies in an attempt to create customized training programs that may or may not be a good match for the firm's needs. For example, a state might give money to a consortium of companies organized around a common learning or training need. Some of the large temporary services companies have leveraged their training programs into a competitive advantage that highlights how colleges need to be thinking about training.