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During a recent visit to the White House, IBM CEO Ginni Rometty spoke with German Chancellor Angela Merkel and Ivanka Trump about the best way to address workforce development and build new-collar skills through apprenticeships.

On FOX Business Friday morning, Rometty gave us some insight into what they talked about and the three big things we can do to address the skills gap issue in our country.

One of those things is through a new form of education. In 2011, IBM launched Pathway to Technology (P-TECH) schools in close partnership with education and government leaders in New York City. The schools teach curriculum that businesses will hire, provide mentorship and internships, and give kids essentially an associate’s degree when they graduate in six years. The program will be in 100 schools by the end of the year affecting 50,000 kids, some of which IBM is already hiring.

“This has been a real focus and in my view very positive, practical steps that can be taken forward that will change the face of skills in this country,” Rometty said.

It’s that form of education and the push for apprenticeship and credentialing programs, Rometty adds that will really modernize the pathways to jobs in this country.

Corporations taking the initiative to put these kinds of programs in place is just one way this problem can be addressed. Another is through government policy.

When asked how the government can help, Rometty said supporting and passing legislation like the Perkins Act, which gives community colleges funding with the requirement that they are providing students with the curriculum that businesses will hire, is the best thing it can do to help scale the kinds of programs that are creating real change across the country.

You can watch this portion of Rometty’s interview below.

IBM CEO on improving job skills training

IBM CEO Ginni Rometty on efforts to close the job skills gap in America.

You can also see what Rometty had to say on artificial intelligence and the use of technology in how companies grow and reinvent themselves, here.

Dana Beth Ardi

Executive Committee

Dana Beth Ardi, PhD, Executive Committee, is a thought leader and expert in the fields of executive search, talent management, organizational design, assessment, leadership and coaching. As an innovator in the human capital movement, Ardi creates enhanced value in companies by matching the most sought after talent with the best opportunities. Ardi coaches boards and investors on the art and science of building high caliber management teams. She provides them with the necessary skills to seek out and attract top-level management, to design the ideal organizational architectures and to deploy people against strategy. Ardi unearths the way a business works and the most effective way for people to work in them.

Ardi is an experienced business executive and senior consultant who leverages business organizational transformation through talent strategies. She uses her knowledge and experience to develop talent strategies to enhance revenue and profit contributions. She has a deep expertise in change management and organizational effectiveness and has designed and built high performance cultures. Ardi has significant experience in mergers, acquisitions, divestitures, IPO’s and turnarounds.

Ardi is an expert on the multi-generational workforce. She understands the four intersecting generations of workers coming together in contemporary companies, each with their own mindsets, leadership and communications styles, values and motivations. Ardi is sought after to assist companies manage and thrive by bringing the generations together. Her book, Fall of the Alphas: How Beta Leaders Win Through Connection, Collaboration and Influence, will be published by St. Martin’s Press. The book reflects Ardi’s deep expertise in understanding organizations and our changing society. It focuses on building a winning culture, how companies must grow and evolve, and how talent influences and shapes communities of work. This is what she has coined “Corporate Anthropology.” It is a playbook on how modern companies must meet challenges – culturally, globally, digitally, across genders and generations.

Ardi is currently the Managing Director and Founder of Corporate Anthropology Advisors, LLC, a consulting company that provides human capital advisory and innovative solutions to companies building value through people. Corporate Anthropology works with organizations, their cultures, the way they grow and develop, and the people who are responsible for forming their communities of work.

Prior to her position at Corporate Anthropology Advisors, Ardi served as a Partner/Managing Director at the private equity firms CCMP Capital and JPMorgan Partners. She was a partner at Flatiron Partners, a venture capital firm working with early state companies where she pioneered the human capital role within an investment portfolio.

Ardi holds a BS from the State University of New York at Buffalo as well as a Masters degree and PhD from Boston College. She started her career as professor at the Graduate Center at Fordham University in New York.