WIRED completes management team
The new WIRED workforce training initiative is going into operation this month with the completion of its management team and a guiding committee ready to meet.
The Piedmont Triad Partnership, which administers the WIRED program, said today that it has hired Mary Anne Forehand as its new vice president of workforce development and James (Jim) Donnelly as vice president of innovation and outreach.
In addition, WIRED, a $15 million federal workforce initiative, will hold the first meeting of its action committee on Jan. 18.
The WIRED project will help train workers in the region’s high-growth, high-wage industry clusters. Its goal is to establish the Piedmont Triad as a national model for a regional approach to economic development, workforce development, education, and entrepreneurship.
Forehand will work with regional employers, educators and other workforce development professionals to assist the creation of partnerships. Before joining the Piedmont Triad Partnership, Forehand had been working with the region’s JobLink Career Centers in serving underemployed youth and adults and helping dislocated workers through the state’s Rapid Response Service, which provides immediate aid to workers affected by announcements of plant closings and large layoffs.
Donnelly will focus his efforts on identifying and implementing workforce development and entrepreneurial programs that include the entire Piedmont Triad, with particular emphasis given to full participation by the region’s rural counties and minority populations. Most recently, Donnelly was vice president of the East Market Street Development Corporation.