BusinessReport.com

As the new secretary of the Department of Labor, Tim Barfield says he’s focused on providing the needed skilled labor to help Louisiana take full advantage of its economic opportunities.

Nearly a month on the job, Barfield brings extensive management experience to the position having worked his way up to president and chief operating officer in his 13 years with Baton Rouge-based The Shaw Group. Prior, he was a corporate attorney for Vinson & Elkins in Dallas. He earned his bachelor’s in business administration and a law degree at LSU, and also graduated from the Kellogg School of Management’s Executive Development Program at Northwestern University in Evanston, Ill.

Barfield sat down with Business Report to outline his efforts toward addressing the state’s labor shortage as part of Jindal’s new administration.

Question: What initiatives do you plan to implement this year?

There are a number of initiatives we’re looking at closely. No. 1 is workforce development with a comprehensive, systematic redesign of our workforce delivery system, and that’s a significant challenge in that it takes considerable agency coordination. Basically, the system has some good components and can be improved with major stakeholders like the Louisiana Community and Technical College System [LCTCS], state Department of Education and Board of Regents, and Louisiana Economic Development [LED]. You have other stakeholders like the state Department of Public Safety and Corrections, where you have the ability to, hopefully, help the re-entry of prisoners into society and give them some stability so they can avoid going back to prison. We also really have to work closely with the Department of Social Services because so many of the people who need job placement services have so many other social needs, particularly childcare.

Q: What are Louisiana’s most critical labor needs?

The good news is we’re blessed with an economy doing fairly well so in just about every sector we have needs. We’ve had a tremendous number of vacancies at 95,397 statewide [20,035 in the Baton Rouge area] as of mid-2007. This is particularly true in health care [10,000 vacancies], which are typically better paying jobs. There is also significant need in engineering, construction, food preparation and office and administrative support. Some of this is driven by the rebuilding efforts of Katrina and Rita, particularly in New Orleans. You’re having to find people to return to New Orleans. Even before Katrina, the refining and petrochemical industry had significant projects on the books so if you look in general at the industrial power, refining and petrochemical market, all post-Katrina, all positively impacting our economy, but it’s been a challenge to fill those jobs. And more recently, the oil and gas industry, with oil prices rising to the $100-a-barrel level, you see more activity there and more of them having difficulty finding crews. Overall, Gov. Bobby Jindal and the LED secretary both talk about taking care of existing businesses and a great example is filling those jobs.

The one concern that many people have and, the one I have, is you have opportunities with a strong economy and we can’t take full advantage of them because we don’t have enough workers. My goal is to help our state, individuals and employers take advantage of it as much as we can. Long term, we know there will be change with different sectors cycling in and out, and it’s Gov. Jindal’s ambition to diversify our economy. A great example is Pennington Biomedical Research Center with a world-class center that will spin off technology and attract millions in research projects, and bring the best and brightest to live in the Baton Rouge community. Midterm and long term, it will spin off companies that can further help build the community. We’d like to continue growing the health care center. Hurricane Katrina has had a devastating impact on health care in New Orleans, but, on the flipside, Baton Rouge seems to have a health care industry that’s growing and becoming a regional medical center. There are opportunities to develop in biotech and industries growing from technology at our universities. We have these opportunities with our economy, but we need to have the type of employees they need to be successful. Our challenge is, as industries change, to provide the programs to help them gravitate to higher income opportunities. A big part of the challenge is to help job seekers enter the system and make sure they have the opportunity to maintain and develop skill sets that keep them competitive in the workforce, and, on a collective basis, also keep Louisiana competitive on a national and international level.

Individuals have to understand that our education doesn’t stop⎯it continues⎯especially in today’s world of economic challenges that change steadily with retraining and re-education. From the state’s economic development standpoint, we need to grow jobs for long-term careers and income growth for the citizens of our state. We have to develop an environment of not “who you know” but “what you know.”

Q: What is Louisiana’s No. 1 labor need? How are you addressing it?

Our No. 1 need is to mobilize workers as quickly as we can, and that includes some entry-level type training. The short-term opportunities are engineering and construction sectors. That’s a real priority. I think there are opportunities in cyclical industries like oil and gas that need to be addressed, and then working on long-term opportunities.

Q: What initiatives are you implementing to improve relations between the state Department of Labor and business?

If you look at the way the system is set up now, with the [federal] Workforce Investment Act of 1998 that funds a lot of our programs, that act contemplates workforce investment boards appointed by the highest ranking local official, typically the mayor. These boards are typically made up of business representatives so the act sets up a pretty good framework. We want to strengthen the boards and engage the business community, addressing their needs now and help project what their needs will be in three to five years. We need to specifically define an entry-level worker, turnover, skills and level of experience needed. A big part of this is how we can connect the dots. At the same time, the business community also needs to be engaged and make an investment in the system, sometimes in dollars, but in real quality time so the workforce investment boards become an effective conduit in addressing those needs. It’s just listening to business and getting it engaged and invested in the workforce investment board in their region. It also means having our career solutions centers become more customer friendly and service oriented so we can establish dialogue and use it to connect workers with training programs.

Q: What’s your labor forecast for 2008?

I expect these opportunities to continue this year. We’ll see cycles, but for the most part we expect growth in workforce demand into 2010 and beyond. We expect it to continue to grow. The last two months we’ve had over two million people statewide in the workforce, putting us at pre-Katrina employment levels.

Q: Is skilled labor the state’s greatest need? If so, how are you dealing with it?

This is one of the core needs. After Katrina and Rita, there was even more need for construction workers. You have almost a generation of workers who didn’t see those skilled labor jobs as long-term career opportunities and then you had people who were in those building trades reaching retirement age and now you have a rebirth of industrial expansion from power plants to petrochemical plants. And there are numerous other projects out there so you have a real need for the traditional skilled craftsmen. Until recently, you had a robust housing market and that’s slowed down, but you’ll still have a need for housing. In Louisiana, I think you will still see some long-term growth in housing. I think it’s a temporary lull. You also have plant operator jobs that have become more high-tech, moving from the field to control room type environments that is very much computer controlled and assisted. You also have a workforce, particularly in the chemical industry with 10,000 workers reaching retirement age in the next 10 years so there’s a tremendous need for entry-level workers in those areas. These are jobs, in many cases, that a high school education isn’t enough anymore. You need some enhanced skills to be an entry-level worker there and we want to assist businesses in finding the employees and assist the individual in getting programs like the process technology programs in our technical colleges.

Q: What do you like best about your job?

I’ve always liked challenges. I consider myself a jack-of-all-trades and master of none. There are so many interesting challenges. There are a lot of moving parts. We’re one significant piece of the puzzle. I think the challenge of working with other governmental agencies and businesses, developing the cooperation and integration of services is a big challenge … getting people to work together for a common goal. I want to look back and say we improved the level of business out there and we helped Louisiana take advantage of these economic opportunities. There are a myriad of good people in the state who also have this passion and this will help us address some of our core issues.

Family: Married with four children (ages 5, 7, 10, 12)

Education: LSU (bachelor’s, business administration); LSU School of Law (juris doctorate); Northwestern University (Kellogg School of Management Executive Development Program).

Professional experience: Secretary, Louisiana Department of Labor [2008-present]; former president/COO, The Shaw Group [2003-06]; president, Shaw Environmental and Infrastructure [2002-03]; senior vice president for special projects, Shaw Group, [2000-02]; president, Shaw APP [1999-2000]; managing director, Shaw Group U.K., [1997-98]; secretary and general counsel, Shaw Group, [1994-99]; corporate attorney, Vinson & Elkins, Dallas [1990-94]; law clerk, U.S. District Court Judge Frank J. Polozola, Middle District, Louisiana [1989-90].