MAX Technical Training, the Cincinnati-based IT training company, launched its new Java Developer Apprenticeship program, aiming to address employment and talent issues in the region.
The program, created by MAX founder Denise Bartick, is an innovative approach to retraining unemployed or underemployed people and addresses two interrelated business/economic/job sector issues: primarily, the issue of the rising number of trained professionals unable to find jobs in their field, and the simultaneous rise in unfilled demand for trained IT professionals due to a lack of talent.
“In recent years, our clients, who are mainly Fortune 1000 companies, have been saying, ‘We need more IT people, we need more software developers,’ but not many people have thought to look within for these positions,” Bartick says. “In many cases, companies are just poaching from each other out of the same, limited talent pool.”
Bartick’s program can handle everything from recruiting, assessing and selecting candidates to training them and, ultimately, placing them into new IT careers. Students in the program are trained to use JAVA, HTML, .NET and CSS, and are taught several other important skills in order to increase their marketability. Last year, MAX worked with Great American Insurance Group to successfully train and transition 10 people into JAVA Developer roles.
“MAX Technical Training’s approach to sourcing new IT Developer talent has been a huge success for us,” says Piyush Singh, VP and CIO at
Great American Insurance Group, Property & Casualty Information Technology. “Recruiting JAVA developers has been a challenge for us over the past five years, and we were facing the same recruiting challenges as our peers in our industry. We needed something different and long-term. Collaborating with MAX to strengthen our team of JAVA developers has proven to be a rewarding investment.”
So far, the training program has been rolled out on a small scale; two classes of students have graduated the program as either .NET or JAVA developers and Bartick is opening the door for businesses looking to fill similar needs.
“We’re looking for creative, open-minded businesses and individuals,” Bartick says. “This is the right thing to do. We’ve got to invest in our region and our economy now.
By Mike Sarason
If you're looking for an IT job, check out Soapbox Media's Jobs Available section.
Enjoy this story?
Sign up for free solutions-based reporting in your inbox each week.