Hartford Business Journal Special Editions

12 | DOING BUSINESS IN CONNECTICUT | 2018 2018 | DOING BUSINESS IN CONNECTICUT | 12 state's venture-capital fund, invested nearly $31 million in 60 high-tech early-stage businesses, but leveraged $97.5 million – more than a $3 to $1 ratio – from other investors including individual, venture-capital firms and angel investors. Smith sees growing tech talent as a significant workforce need in Connecticut since technology is an essential element of so many growth industries critical to Connecticut's economy, including manufacturing, healthcare and bioscience. "We cannot overinvest in technology talent," she said. Smith points to InsurTech Hartford, a platform for advancing the insurance industry through innovation, as a great example of public-private partnership. The InsurTech initiative was launched in 2017 with grant funding from CTNext – a subsidiary of the state's venture capital arm – and investment by local insurers, including The Hartford, Travelers and Cigna. David Griggs, the new president and CEO of the MetroHartford Alliance as of March, has been impressed with the commitment to partnership he has seen so far in this region. He sees similarities between Hartford and Minneapolis, where he most recently served as vice president of business investment and research at the Greater Minneapolis St. Paul Regional Economic Development Partnership. In that role, he conducted competitive analysis for the region, with a focus on growing employment. He is very impressed with the Hartford region and all it has to offer. "We have globally leading sectors of strength, sectors that offer high- paying, high-growth jobs and across multiple skill sets," Griggs said. "It's not just in the insurance and financial industries, but we have great manufacturing jobs too." And it's not just jobs that attract talent, Griggs said, but the vibrancy of the downtown core. "The future workforce is making decisions on where they want to live before they figure out where they want to work," he said. As the state seeks to keep more young-professional talent within its borders, providing connections to a community is critically important, Griggs said, and local chambers of commerce are fulfilling that goal. Chamber-housed young professional organizations like HYPE in Hartford and PULSE in New Haven – combined with expanded housing and amenities in Connecticut's urban areas – are enticing recent Connecticut graduates and young professionals to stay in The Nutmeg State. A growing number of businesses and young professionals are making New Haven their home, a city fueled by a bustling bioscience sector, eight colleges and universities, an active night life, mixed-use zoning and accelerator space for start-up enterprises. The city's Elm City Collaborative – a consortium of New Haven entrepreneurs and representatives from the city, the Economic Development Corporation of New Haven, Yale, and other area colleges – is set to receive $2 million from CTNext in 2018 to help the city become a high-tech hub, adding to a diversity of sectors thriving in New Haven. Innovative approaches to employee recruitment and retention are driving workforce development in Connecticut too. At United Technologies Corporation (UTC) – the multi-national giant that expects to hire more than 25,000 employees in the U.S. alone over the next three years – finding strong talent is a top concern. With its new ReEmpower Program, UTC is tapping into a largely unexplored source of talent: professionals who've been out of the workforce for an extended period. "As an organization, we understand that people take varying career paths," said Shanda Hinton, global diversity talent attraction leader at UTC. She noted that the participants in the program's first cohort had left the workforce to raise children, care for an elderly parent or do missionary work. "When we think of diversity, that includes diversity of experience and diversity of perspectives," she said. The 16-week program is designed to reacclimate people to the workforce and includes sessions with UTC's leadership team and personalized plans for employee success. Three of the full-time hires through the program's first group of participants were former UTC employees, Hinton said. "As a retention tool, [this program] sends a very strong message to our current workforce. We want employees to know if they need a career break, we're an employer that will welcome them back with open arms." And if UTC needs more employees, Cliff Thermer at Goodwin College may have 20 recent graduates with the skills for the job. A student at Goodwin College's CNC Metrology Lab. Catherine Smith, DECD commissioner [Photo by Paul Horton]

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