Latest / Bloomberg Intelligence / Louisiana's Pierson: Developing Workforce with FastStart(Audio)

Transcript

Louisiana's Pierson: Developing Workforce with FastStart(Audio) · Bloomberg Intelligence

• 0:02
  Speaker 1: Global business news twenty four hours a day. If Bloomberg
• 0:05
  Speaker 1: dot Com the radio plus mobil and on your radio.
• 0:09
  Speaker 1: This is a Bloomberg Business Flash. Sharron, Bloomberg World Headquarters.
• 0:13
  Speaker 1: I'm Charlie. Tell it a little change for US stocks
• 0:16
  Speaker 1: holding close to records. The SMP five hundred index now unchanged,
• 0:21
  Speaker 1: eight town industrials down six little change there at eighteen
• 0:25
  Speaker 1: thousand five D twenty three. Nastack is up twelve points
• 0:29
  Speaker 1: to fifty two twenty six. The record for Nastack fifty
• 0:33
  Speaker 1: two twenty eight. So we're looking at a game right
• 0:35
  Speaker 1: now of two tens up one percent, the tenure of
• 0:38
  Speaker 1: fourteen thirty seconds, the yield one point five four percent,
• 0:42
  Speaker 1: Gold up five seventy the ounce the thirteen forty two,
• 0:44
  Speaker 1: a gain of four tents up one percent, and crude
• 0:47
  Speaker 1: oil down seven tens of one percent, falling twenty nine
• 0:50
  Speaker 1: cents of barrel forty two seventy two right now on
• 0:53
  Speaker 1: West Texas Intermediate Crude. I'm Charlie Palotan. That's of Bloomberg
• 0:58
  Speaker 1: Business Flash. This is taking stock with Pim Box and
• 1:02
  Speaker 1: Kathleen Hayes on Bloomberg Radio. When you think of Louisiana,
• 1:06
  Speaker 1: perhaps you think about Martin Gras and New Orleans, or
• 1:10
  Speaker 1: perhaps the oil and gas industry, or indeed even culinary
• 1:14
  Speaker 1: delights or a painting by Edward Dega about the Cotton Exchange.
• 1:19
  Speaker 1: But here to tell us more about Louisiana and its
• 1:21
  Speaker 1: economy is Don Pearson. He is the Secretary of Louisiana
• 1:25
  Speaker 1: Economic Development. They're based in the state's capital of Baton Rouge.
• 1:30
  Speaker 1: Don Pearson, thank you very much for being here. You're welcome,
• 1:32
  Speaker 1: pinned great to be here at Bloomberg Studios. What is
• 1:35
  Speaker 1: the state of Louisiana to you? Well, we're a diverse state,
• 1:41
  Speaker 1: one that is rapidly developing into a global energy hub,
• 1:47
  Speaker 1: and we've had a lot of success in oil and gas. Uh.
• 1:52
  Speaker 1: Certainly we're known for that commodity prices. It sounds like
• 1:55
  Speaker 1: there's an upward tick. They're glad to hear that as well.
• 1:59
  Speaker 1: But to day, there's an actual industrial revolution going on
• 2:04
  Speaker 1: around the chemical industry, and we have twenty five billion
• 2:09
  Speaker 1: dollars of announced projects in our state, with approximately sixty
• 2:14
  Speaker 1: five billion of that under engineering and permitting and and
• 2:20
  Speaker 1: perhaps the early stages of construction. So this low oil
• 2:25
  Speaker 1: price is a low feedstock price and a low energy
• 2:30
  Speaker 1: price to these major chemical corporations, and they're taking advantage
• 2:35
  Speaker 1: of that spot in the market in a state that's
• 2:38
  Speaker 1: rich with ports, pipelines, rail infrastructure, and the ability through
• 2:44
  Speaker 1: these ports to reach global markets. Well, the oil price
• 2:48
  Speaker 1: right now, sorry, not going your way. It's down about
• 2:50
  Speaker 1: half a percent right now, down about twenty four cents
• 2:53
  Speaker 1: on the n imax seventy eight cents for a barrel
• 2:56
  Speaker 1: of crude. Give us some examples of the company, for example, IBM,
• 3:02
  Speaker 1: perhaps and some of the initiatives that you have helped
• 3:05
  Speaker 1: put together that have encouraged IBM to come to Louisiana. Well,
• 3:10
  Speaker 1: thanks for bringing that up. We are strong in our
• 3:14
  Speaker 1: traditional oil and gas industry, agriculture, forestry, those types of programs,
• 3:20
  Speaker 1: but what we want to do is also position the
• 3:22
  Speaker 1: state in aerospace and aviation and I T and some
• 3:27
  Speaker 1: water management issues are also some things we have an
• 3:30
  Speaker 1: interest in. But through a great incentive program and through
• 3:35
  Speaker 1: a great workforce training program, we've had outstanding success with
• 3:39
  Speaker 1: companies like IBM, C s R, A, c g I,
• 3:44
  Speaker 1: and GE Capital where we're managing to bring the university
• 3:50
  Speaker 1: system and UH these programming and software solution companies together
• 3:57
  Speaker 1: and UH, with a very focused effort on workforce development,
• 4:02
  Speaker 1: provide to them the kinds of folks that they need
• 4:05
  Speaker 1: to be successful. And so we're experiencing great growth there.
• 4:09
  Speaker 1: What if let's say someone was the chief executive of
• 4:12
  Speaker 1: a technology company, or indeed even an oil and gas
• 4:16
  Speaker 1: company or some services business, and they were interested perhaps
• 4:20
  Speaker 1: in expanding. What would they learn from calling Don Pearson
• 4:24
  Speaker 1: at the Louisiana Economic Development Well, they learned that we
• 4:28
  Speaker 1: can provide to them a complete concier service to evaluate
• 4:32
  Speaker 1: market opportunities. Once we know listen and understand what their
• 4:38
  Speaker 1: goals are and what the specific nature of their company is,
• 4:42
  Speaker 1: we can message out to all sixty four of our
• 4:44
  Speaker 1: parishes you would call them counties and identify available sites.
• 4:50
  Speaker 1: We can demonstrate low energy costs, we can look into
• 4:53
  Speaker 1: all the logistics that are important into UH building this
• 4:56
  Speaker 1: kind of decision matrix and then make sure they're very
• 5:00
  Speaker 1: aware of our low tax environment and our ability to
• 5:04
  Speaker 1: deliver a world class workforce. We just got our seventh
• 5:08
  Speaker 1: Super Bowl trophy last week, UH, the award for the
• 5:12
  Speaker 1: number one workforce training program in America. We're quite proud
• 5:15
  Speaker 1: of it. Tell us how it works well. It's a
• 5:18
  Speaker 1: comprehensive solution. And that again, we'll listen to the needs
• 5:23
  Speaker 1: of the company. UH. That then we'll recruit, will screen
• 5:27
  Speaker 1: the people that we've recruited, looking for the right attributes,
• 5:31
  Speaker 1: the right attitudes, h a fit with the company's culture.
• 5:35
  Speaker 1: Will then give the company an opportunity to identify inside
• 5:39
  Speaker 1: that universe of people the folks that look right to
• 5:43
  Speaker 1: them to go forward with training. Will conduct pre employment training,
• 5:48
  Speaker 1: and we'll do that in a manner that's copyrighted to
• 5:50
  Speaker 1: the company, so all of their materials has kept confidential,
• 5:54
  Speaker 1: all the things that are proprietary and important to their process. UM.
• 5:58
  Speaker 1: On day one, we'll deliver that work force, and then
• 6:01
  Speaker 1: we will stay with the company over time, not to
• 6:04
  Speaker 1: just give you the people you need on day one,
• 6:07
  Speaker 1: but to have a steady pipeline of the skill sets,
• 6:11
  Speaker 1: the certificates, or the degrees that are are necessary to
• 6:15
  Speaker 1: be a successful employee in the company. Talk about success, Uh,
• 6:19
  Speaker 1: success with a seamless steel tube mill in Shreveport plus
• 6:24
  Speaker 1: an eleven billion dollar ethane cracker complex in in Lake Charles.
• 6:28
  Speaker 1: How did those come about? Um? Certainly we were in
• 6:31
  Speaker 1: a global competition and a stiff US competition for the
• 6:36
  Speaker 1: Bentler steel plant that's located at the port in uh
• 6:41
  Speaker 1: Catto Parish in the environment of street Port, Louisiana. UM.
• 6:45
  Speaker 1: One of the interesting things around that was to convince
• 6:49
  Speaker 1: a German company that we could deliver the workforce. You
• 6:52
  Speaker 1: have to appreciate that in Germany, uh the young people
• 6:55
  Speaker 1: start an apprentice program, probably in junior high school. So
• 6:59
  Speaker 1: when you look across to America and say, well, how
• 7:02
  Speaker 1: are you going to provide a workforce without those kinds
• 7:04
  Speaker 1: of programs, it really had them raising their eyebrows. We
• 7:08
  Speaker 1: were able to package a comprehensive solution with the construction
• 7:12
  Speaker 1: of a twenty million dollar training center on a community
• 7:15
  Speaker 1: college campus, dedicated to them for the short term and
• 7:18
  Speaker 1: to our industry in the long term. Thank you very
• 7:21
  Speaker 1: much for joining us and sharing this information. Don Pearson
• 7:24
  Speaker 1: is the Secretary of Louisiana Economic Development Program l E
• 7:29
  Speaker 1: ed Fast Start much appreciate it. He's based in the
• 7:33
  Speaker 1: state's capital of Baton Rouge. This is taking stock. I'm
• 7:37
  Speaker 1: pim Fox and this is Bloomberg coming up. Get ready
• 7:47
  Speaker 1: for some new satellites. We're gonna be speaking with the
• 7:50
  Speaker 1: chief executive of Iridium Communications and find out about a
• 7:54
  Speaker 1: new venture with SpaceX that's next