The Mackinac Policy Conference kicked off this week at the Grand Hotel, where each year more than 1,500 of the state’s leading business, legislative and community leaders attend to positionMichigan as a national economic leader.
Below are key programs MEDC is highlighting at the Mackinac Policy Conference.
Pure Michigan Business Connect
Pure Michigan Business Connect is a turnkey resource for Michigan companies to find new procurement opportunities and pro-bono services. Its dynamic online marketplace, PureMichiganB2B.com, has more than 20,000 searchable company profiles in its database.
The initiative has facilitated more than $1.7 billion in revenue to Michigan businesses and accumulated more than 30,000 pro-bono hours from more than 40 Michigan service partners, like Google, Varnum andRehmann.
Through matchmaking summits, nearly 2,400 unique meetings have been setup between global purchasers and qualified Michigan businesses. These purchasers include Ford, General Electric, Boeing, DTE Energy, Consumers Energy, Meijer, Whole Foods, Chrysler, BAE Systems and many more.
Export Assistance
Michigan’s investment in exporting Michigan-made products, and helping businesses export products and services, is paying off. Year-over-year export sales increased 524 percent since 2012. Last year, the export team assisted nearly 500 companies, including 179 from southeast Michigan. MEDC established four foreign offices through partnerships with the Council of Great Lakes Governors: China, Brazil, Canada and Mexico.
Community Ventures
Community Ventures is an economic development initiative to promote employment and social enterprise. The program’s mission is to alleviate poverty and promote public safety in four distressed communities – Detroit, Pontiac, Flint and Saginaw. In the program’s first year, more than 1,000 “structurally unemployed” residents were placed into full time, long-term employment.
By promoting economic growth and creating jobs for at-risk youth, ex-offenders, and other structurally unemployed residents, Community Ventures is providing individuals a career pathway out of poverty and ultimately promoting safer and more vibrant communities.
The program has doubled its goal of placing 1,000 participants, with more than 2,100 earning an average of $11.64/hour.
Talent Attraction and Retention
Pure Michigan Talent connect is the state of Michigan’s official labor exchange website. It is a no-cost, online talent and job marketplace that helps both talent of all skill and education levels find employment and employers find qualified talent. Mitalent.org prominently features a job board, which currently boasts more than 75,000 jobs. The site also encourages job seekers to create an account to actively search for employment and be found by great Michigan employers. Michigan employers have the benefit not only of getting a response form their job postings, but also reaching out to active job seekers directly through the system. Bulk uploading of jobs through an automatic feed makes using mitalent.org easy for Michigan employers to post jobs and access talent.
Since its launch in October 2012, the Pure Michigan Talent Connect has generated more than 4,620,000 visitors. Nearly 1,250,000 positions have been posted, with nearly 460,000 new jobseeker profiles created and 17,000 new employer accounts established since the site’s launch.
