What employers say publicly and how they hire specifically are often very different. Work from the specifics of a job, not the public pronouncements of the organization.

EMP Inc. began working with Oregon's Office of Vocational Rehabilitation Services (OVRS) in 2005 by responding to our request for an organizational assessment. Senior management's goal was to create a proactive organization and wanted to know if their work could benefit or improve from ideas and techniques already known to others who share some of the same challenges and goals. The results of this assesment were later used to create a pilot project that we called Enhancing Employment Outcomes (EEO) that was implemented in 2006-2007. Development of the EEO project's work plan and schedule, training, progress reports and final evaluation were also provided by EMP Inc. during this year-long pilot.

The objectives for the pilot project were to see if Oregon could benefit from building a service delivery system that had, at its core, the following:

• Counselors and managers who could assess for motivation to work and could successfully implement work motivation intervention strategies when motivation is a barrier to employment.
• Counselors and thier managers who had an advanced and practical way of conducting thier relationships with employers to the betterment  of their clients
• Counselors and managers with an enahnced expertise in job development methodology that would positively impact their relationship with those who contract job development services, known in Oregon as CRPs

The results of Oregon's implementing the EMP "Model", which we called Enhancing Employment Outcomes Pilot project (EEOP) exceeded our expectations. Participating staff became rejuvenated and had a new sense of empowerment based on a whole "tool-box" of techniques provided to them by EMP. Staff's new found knowledge and enthusiasm produced an additional 113 job placements within the first year of work on this project, even while we included only forty volunteer pilot participants.

The need for a greater statewide implementation of the EEOP has been acknowledged by OVRS. We consider the pilot project to have been a stepping-stone and learning experience for the larger implementation. 

OVRS believes in the EMP "Model" and as such we are dedicating the next two years to a statewide initiative to increase the quality and quantity of employment outcomes while meeting the workforce needs of Oregon employers. We are ready to proceed in a new direction that differs from the way in which buisness has been done in the past. From the forty pilot participants thirty three have evolved to form an advisory group to OVRS senior managers for our statewide implementation with a roll-out beginning early in 2008 and running through to 2010. Goals for a statewide implementation of the "Model" currently include:

• Providing OVRS field staff with the tools they need to take more control of the job development and employer outreach process, as it is crucial to the success of all OVRS's work.
• Providing OVRS field staff with the tools to link employment outcome goals to a candidate profile system
• Providing OVRS field staff with the tools to produce motivated, reliable and dependable candidates.

Why did we work with EMP Inc.? We worked with EMP Inc. primarily becassue of the unique service they are able to provide vocational rehabilitation programs. As an example, EMP understands that agencies are working with more clients with increasingly complex issues and offers us strategies that result in positive vocational outcomes. It is extremely beneficial that they also have working knowledge of how public vocational rehabilitation programs are organized, which is critical to designing programs that can actually be applied.

It cannot go without saying that the customer service that Allen provides is always above and beyond. He makes himself available to his customers and is always professional no matter how big or how small the task at hand is. Allen's trainings are educational, informative and FUN! Staff related to Allen and trusted him as an expert in his field; they simply could not get enough of him!! Oregon is looking forward to our continued work with EMP Inc. over the next couple of years. We are excited by the prospects of a more statewide implementation. We are convinced that EMP will lead us to our stated goal in 2005 i.e. to lead a dynamic proactive organization effecting ongoing success. 

Kris Kennedy, MA, CRC, Project Manager, State of Oregon, Office of Vocational Rehabilitation Services