NYC Opportunity Launches New Digital Portal Showcasing Integrated Workforce Data
The Mayor’s Office for Economic Opportunity (NYC Opportunity) has launched the New York City Workforce Data Portal, a public-facing online portal that will vastly improve the availability of data about City-administered workforce programs. The new portal is part of NYC Opportunity’s portfolio of integrated data projects that are designed to provide comprehensive, cross-agency views of residents, programs, and services. Through the use of standardized metrics and State wage data, the portal provides City agency staff, stakeholders, and the public with information that can be used to help New York improve the citywide landscape of services that help residents train for and obtain well-paying jobs with strong career prospects.
Standardizing Workforce Indicators: Common Metrics
The Workforce Data Portal provides access to data collected from a selection of City workforce programs and the New York State Department of Labor. It features an interactive dashboard of aggregated data across key data points, including a set of standardized indicators, or “common metrics.” These common metrics make it easier to make comparisons across programs and facilitate a variety of insights into New Yorkers’ experiences with the workforce system.
The inclusion of common metrics in the Workforce Data Portal is the culmination of a long-running effort to standardize workforce indicators used in different parts of City government. Agencies have long had different standards for what constitutes being employed (one agency might require 40 hours a week of work, while another might require retention in a role for a minimum number of months), which made cross-agency comparisons difficult. Responding to this challenge, NYC Opportunity, the Mayor’s Office for Workforce Development (WKDEV), and City agencies worked together to develop a set of 13 performance measures that provide standard terminology and definitions for outcomes commonly used in workforce programs (e.g. full-time job placement) and key milestones (e.g. enrollment in a skills-training program).
A Holistic View of the NYC’s Workforce Development
This integrated system de-silos City workforce data — with proper legal and privacy safeguards in place — providing a more holistic picture. The portal makes it possible for City workers and the public alike to get a full-system perspective on workforce development in the City, and to conduct cross-program and cross-agency comparisons and analysis. It also helps to ensure that when analyses are done, a single client is not counted more than once because they are enrolled in multiple programs.
The portal includes State quarterly wage data, which addresses another longstanding problem — the difficulty of tracking long-term job outcomes. When this data is incorporated into the Workforce Data Portal the system can show whether a client is employed 6 months, 1 year, 2 years, and more after completion of a workforce program.
The Workforce Data Portal is intended to be a resource for policy makers, agency staff, program staff, employers, employees, job seekers, and members of the public. In time, the data may help identify factors that lead to better job placement, retention, and growth, and help human services providers seamlessly meet the needs of New Yorkers seeking new or better employment.
