Tarrant Business

Jobs on display at Fort Worth Chamber's Job Links Excelerator

Lots of jobs were on display at today’s Job Links Excelerator, the Fort Worth Chamber’s monthly invite-only get-together between employers that have job openings, and groups that have candidate pools.

• Prologistix, a staffing company for the warehouse industry, says it has 50 openings in the area, mostly 90 days temp for hire, starting at $9 per hour for entry level and going up to supervisory positions requiring college degrees. Jobs include forklift, general warehouse, and shipping. High school diploma or GED required, minimum six months experience, criminal background check. Misdemeanor backgrounds acceptable on a case by case basis. Apply at www.prologistix.com
• Creative Memories, independent consultant and team leaders for scrapbooking company. Info: Georgette Lopez-Aguado, georgette@dfwphotosolutions.com
• Greensheet. Openings for outside service rep in Fort Worth and Dallas, plus office service rep in Dallas. Outside rep pay: $32,500 salary base plus commissions, $55,000-$60,000 first year projected. “We’ve got some sales reps making $100,000,” a Greensheet rep told the Job Links crowd. Office rep pay: $30,000 base plus commissions. High school diploma/GED required and college preferred for both. Background check required. Apply: www.thegreensheet.com.
• Fort Worth Transportation Authority. Openings for bus and MITS van drivers. “We’ll teach you to drive,” a T rep told Job Links. Misdemeanor-friendly employer, although driving-related offenses such as DWI and DUI won’t help you. Apply: www.the-t.com.
• OmniAmerican Bank. Openings for branch manager, check card operations supervisor, loan closing administration, relationship managers, and tellers. Call center moving from White Settlement to Mercantile Center off of I-35 in April. Misdemeanor-friendly case by case, but theft-related offenses will work against you. Apply: kim.vincent@OmniAmerican.com
• Edward Jones Investments. “We’re targeting 15 locations in Fort Worth where we want to put an office,” adviser and recruiter Jake Richter told Job Links. “We can’t put an office there if we don’t have an adviser.” Edward Jones pays to train its selected adviser candidates for licenses, and pays for the adviser’s office and fulltime assistant. “Most of our advisers come from non-finance backgrounds,” Richter told Job Links. Info: www.edwardjones.com
• Goodwill Industries of Fort Worth. Has openings including retail store manager in Saginaw, staffing manager for Goodwill Temporary Services, job coach and employment specialist in Arlington, two assistant store managers in Denton and Lake Worth, nine materials handlers at six stores, lead material handler in River Oaks, lead merchandiser in Arlington, full and parttime cashiers, assisted donations attendant and custodian. Apply: In person at Goodwill, 4005 Campus Drive in Fort Worth, or HR fax, 817-536-0408.
• Ambit Energy, independent marketing consultants. High school diploma/GED required. Contact: Elizabeth Oliva, 817-925-5898, http://elizabetholiva.com
• Catholic Charities, Diocese of Fort Worth. Several openings including centralized transportation, a startup program focusing on clients’ short-term transportation needs. Bachelor’s degree in business or related field required, plus two years management experience. Also opening for PR director. Marketing degree and experience in PR required. Apply: www.CatholicCharitiesFortWorth.org
• Fort Worth Chamber of Commerce. Opening for executive assistant, general office, with committee, planning, and minute-taking duties. Five years experience, plus knowledge of Microsoft Office products and database. Also opening for administrative assistant, general office. info@fortworthchamber.com, include cover letter to Patricia Steelman.
• SafeHaven of Tarrant County. Several openings: Fulltime billing manager, Fort Worth, bachelor’s in finance, accounting, or related field or equivalent experience,  strong Excel skills and knowledge of general ledger work required; fulltime bilingual case manager, Arlington, bachelor’s in social work, related field, or equivalent experience, experience in working with family violence, bilingual English/Spanish required; parttime crisis interventionist, Fort Worth, bachelor’s in social work or equivalent background, experience in crisis intervention required; parttime relief client advocate, Arlington and Fort Worth, high school diploma or GED required, college degree preferred; fulltime vice president of finance, Fort Worth, bachelor’s degree in accounting, business or related field, 3-5 years finance experience, 3-5 years supervisory experience required, MBA, CPA, nonprofit accounting experience preferred. Apply: www.safehaventc.org
• Frac Tech. Private energy services company hiring for administrative, IT, accounting, engineering, field operations openings. Felony and misdemeanor-friendly, on case by case basis. Apply: humanresources@fractech.net
• Northwestern Mutual. Hiring 20 financial advisers and 20 interns in Fort Worth.

- Scott Nishimura, jobs and workplace reporter, Star-Telegram

Lots of jobs on display at Fort Worth Chamber's Job Links Excelerator

Attended today's monthly meeting of the Fort Worth Chamber of Commerce's Job Links Excelerator, an invite-only meetup between employers who have job openings, and organizations that have pools of job candidates. If you caught any of DFW JobLog's tweets (JScottNishimura is my Twitter feed), you know there were some interesting opportunities on display:

* Omni Fort Worth Hotel, the AFC hotel for the Super Bowl, is filling a lot of positions heading into the Super Bowl and next year.

* CLC, Inc., clcinc.org, has secured a grant to help train war veterans (Persian Gulf to more recent) in jobs.

* The Fort Worth Housing Authority is holding a job fair, 10 a.m.-1 p.m., Nov. 19 at the authority's Administration Building. You don't have to be on housing assistance to attend; 75 percent of participants at this Spring's fair were not on assistance, a housing authority representative told the Job Links group. The authority was expecting 500 participants this Spring, and got 900.

* JPS Health Network says it has a "couple hundred jobs" that are open, ranging from entry level posts that require a high school diploma or GED, plus some computer proficiency such as in Microsoft Word, to others such as nurses.

* The Alliance Opportunity Center in the Alliance Corridor says it has posted openings for BNSF, Motorola, Kroger, Wells Fargo, and a food distributor, among others.

* The Stockyards Championship Rodeo, which runs rodeos Friday and Saturday nights, is looking for concessions workers. And because the weekend and night work leads to a lot of turnover, the rodeo doesn't do background checks or drug tests. It's looking for people who like interacting with others, and prefers a high school diploma or GED. Perks: Free rodeo shirt and laundering, all the tickets to Billy Bob's Texas events you want, and an opportunity for extra hours with special events and the Super Bowl coming up. All you need's a pair of blue jeans. Applications available at the coliseum office. The rodeo also is looking for bartenders and will pay to get the appropriate certifications for its chosen candidates.

* Others promoting job openings: American National Bank of Texas (customer service), Aflac (district sales coordinator), Air Rite (sales reps, someone to do "heavy bookkeeping"), Buehler Cos. of Texas (sales rep, laborers), Bell Brothers Moving (laborers, packers, drivers), Creative Memories (independent consultants), Edward Jones Investments (50 agents in the DFW region), Farmers Insurance (independent agents), Goodwill Industries (retail workers, including staff for a soon-to-open Lake Worth store), MillerCoors (team leaders, plant sanitation, microbiologist, parttime chemist), SafeHaven of Tarrant County (billing/accounts receivable manager, case managers, client advocate, shelter cook), and Wells Fargo (Westlake call center staff).

 - Scott Nishimura, jobs and workplace reporter, Star-Telegram

Felony/misdemeanor job fair draws hundreds of jobseekers, few employers

Organizers of Tarrant County’s third annual Felony and/or Misdemeanor Friendly Community Career Fair succeeded in getting more than 700 jobseekers to clear all the necessary hurdles to score invites to the fair. About 400 attended the fair, held Friday at a church at Texas Wesleyan University in Fort Worth.

 

Getting employers there was another challenge. Ten employers signed up to exhibit at the job fair. Six showed up, representing sales, general labor, highway and other construction, and call center jobs.

Victor Pratt, one of the job fair organizers, said the employers agreed to allow their contact information to be emailed to the jobseekers.

 

“When we’re in the vein of building esteem and challenging jobseekers to be empowered, I’d qualify it as a success,” Pratt said. “All the guys are wearing neckties. All the women are dressed conservatively.”

 

With employers, he said, “we didn’t quite close the deal.”

 

The organizers _ led by the Tarrant County Reentry Initiative _ congratulated the jobseekers on helping further the reentry mission.

 

“We’re all ambassadors for re-entry,” Angel Ilarraza, coordinator for Reentry Initiative, told the jobseekers before the fair started.

 

- Scott Nishimura, jobs and workplace reporter, Star-Telegram 

Felony/misdemeanor job fair working to stay on track

Organizers of Tarrant County’s third annual Felony and/or Misdemeanor-Friendly Community Career Fair are still trying to piece together enough employers for the July 30 fair.

 

Right now, as many as seven have signed up to exhibit at the fair, said Victor Pratt, one of the organizers and principal in criminalbackgroundjobhelp.com, a state contractor that helps place people with criminal backgrounds in jobs.

 

The goal: 10.

 

“If we don’t get 10, we’ll postpone it a few weeks,” Pratt said.

 

Organizers will decide Monday whether to go ahead with the job fair on schedule, he said.

 

It’s the same problem the organizers, headed by the Tarrant County Re-Entry Initiative, encountered last year in the middle of the recession. The fair went off as scheduled, with 10 exhibitors and 170 job applicants in attendance.

 

This year, 2,500 people registered to attend the job fair by this summer’s deadline. Pratt said 700 of those cleared the necessary obstacles, including attending a two-hour orientation and completing a number of assignments, and will be invited to attend. The rest didn’t complete the process and won’t be allowed in, Pratt said.

 

The fair’s location will be disclosed on short notice, and only to invitees, Pratt said.

 

Job openings so far including construction, tax preparation, car hops and food servers, mortgage collector, personal care attendant, home health, and telemarketing, Pratt said.

 

Employers who sign up to exhibit agree to accept applicants who have misdemeanor or felony backgrounds, on a case by case basis. Some have formal matrices that set forth the situations in which they’ll employ people with criminal backgrounds.

 

Pratt emphasizes to employers that the job fair gets buy-in from jobseekers it invites. “100 percent have resumes, and 100 percent are professionally dressed,” he said. “You don’t see that at any other job fair.”

 

Pratt also stresses that many of the jobseekers have never been to prison or jail, and agreed to deferred adjucation to discharge their cases if they complete necessary terms. Employers can still sign up at mysecondchance.us

 

- Scott Nishimura, jobs and workplace reporter, Star-Telegram 

Tarrant County felony/misdemeanor job fair back for third year

Last summer, despite a drop in the number of interested employers in the middle of the recession, organizers pulled off Tarrant County’s second annual career fair for jobseekers with criminal backgrounds. They’re back for the 3rd Annual Felony or Misdemeanor-Friendly Community Career Fair, scheduled for July 30.

 

The Mid-Cities Human Resource Association, Tarrant County Re-Entry Initiative, jobing.com,  and criminalbackgroundjobhelp.com are the co-sponsors. As is tradition, the sponsors aren’t identifying the location publicly, and will only identify it late in the game to jobseekers they’ve screened and approved to attend the fair.

 

Interested jobseekers must register at http://mysecondchance.us/, beginning April 1. Deadline to register is July 15. Registration for employers, volunteers, sponsors, and other community exhibitors is open now. Employers that attend the fairs have agreed in advance to consider jobseekers who have misdemeanors in their backgrounds, or felonies, or both.

 

- Scott Nishimura, jobs and workplace reporter, Star-Telegram

Disabled jobseekers look for a break

Here's our Monday story on the job market for people who have disabilities.

- Scott Nishimura, jobs and workplace reporter, Star-Telegram

 

 

(Photos: Left, Greg Williams serves customers at Cowboys-San Diego game; below, Joe Ramos on the job at Goodwill.)

 

 

Tarrant County felony/misdemeanor job fair comes off on schedule

Here's Saturday's story about the second annual Felony and/or Misdemeanor Friendly Community Career Fair, which went off as scheduled Friday at Tarrant County College South.

- Scott Nishimura, jobs and workplace reporter, Star-Telegram

(Photo: Jobseekers who attended Friday's fair. Courtesy of Victor Pratt, criminalbackgroundjobhelp.com)

Ex-cons having a tough time finding jobs...

Here's today's print story in the Star-Telegram on ex-offenders' difficulties in finding jobs. Scroll down to the bottom of the story to find information on local resources. Here's the accompanying second story on a couple of ex-offenders who are making it.

- Scott Nishimura, jobs and workplace reporter, Star-Telegram 

 

(Photos: Jobseekers Eric Nevins, left; and John Mwakitwile, right, with girlfriend Alexandra Riise)

Felony/misdemeanor job fair organizers may postpone event

Organizers of Tarrant County's second annual Felony and/or Misdemeanor Friendly Community Career Fair may postpone the event to give employers more time to sign up.

Fewer than 10 employers have signed up thus far for the Sept. 25 fair, says Angel Ilarraza, the county's Re-Entry Initiative Coordinator. At last year's hiring fair, 40 employers signed up.

"We are to the point of of maybe postponing - postponing, not cancelling - the job fair," Ilarraza said today in an interview.

Some prospective employers are waiting to learn more about the impact of federal stimulus money on local projects before they commit to recruiting employees at the felony/misdemeanor fair, Ilarraza said.

"Worst case, we postpone it 30-60 days," he said.

More than 600 jobseekers have signed up to attend the invitation-only fair, and about 175 have completed the required pre-event workshop Ilarraza said.

"We will be able to announce the job fair on a very short notice," Ilarraza said. "They're basically ready. It's just a matter of assembling enough employers to make it worthwhile."

The fair's organizers have pared the cost for employers to participate to $25. The fee is $75 for exhibitors and other service providers.

Here's our original post from July 8.

Scott Nishimura, jobs and workplace reporter, Star-Telegram

Looking for steam: Tarrant County felony/misdemeanor-friendly job fair

It’s no surprise that workers who have criminal backgrounds are having a hard time finding work these days, given the economy.

 

One sign that it’s not getting any easier: Very few employers have signed up for the county’s second annual Felony and/or Misdemeanor Friendly Community Career Fair in September.

 

“I’ve got a handful,” says Angel Ilarraza, the county’s Re-Entry Initiative coordinator. “That’s encouraging, but at this point, we don’t know we’re going to have the job fair.”

 

The fair is scheduled for noon-4 p.m. Sept. 25. The location will be disclosed to invited jobseekers as the date approaches, to avoid being swamped.

 

Last year, more than 800 jobseekers with felonies or misdemeanors on their records were invited to the fair - held at UT-Arlington (photo left) - and pitched themselves to nearly 40 employers. So far, Ilarraza (photo below) says just three employers have confirmed for this year’s fair.

 

He's not saying how many employers it will take to put on the fair. "As many as we can get," he says.

 

More than 400 jobseekers have signed up to be considered for the fair. "I'm anticipating at least 500 that we'll invite," Ilarraza says.

 

Victor Pratt, a contractor for the Texas Department of Assistive and Rehabilitative Services who is screening potential jobseekers for the fair, is optimistic about the fair’s chances.

 

"We're going to pull it off," said Pratt, whose company, criminalbackgroundjobhelp.com, also serves individual jobseekers who aren't referred to it by the state.

 

The Tarrant County Re-Entry Initiative, jobing.com, Tarrant County College, State of Texas,  Mid-Cities HR Association, Tarrant County, and criminalbackgroundjobhelp.com are partners on the event. The Re-Entry Initiative is an outgrowth of the Tarrant County Re-Entry Council, which County Commissioners approved in 2005. The Initiative's job is to help develop strategy for "reintegrating" ex-offenders into the community. Besides job help, the Initiative also assists ex-offenders in finding housing and getting substance abuse treatment.

 

In selling the job fair to employers, Ilarraza and Pratt point to a a $2,400 federal tax credit available under the Work Opportunity Tax Credit program, administered by the Texas Workforce Commission. No-cost bonding service also is available to protect employers against a dishonest worker. Ilarraza also says workers with criminal backgrounds may prove to be highly motivated people who stick around. "These people have something to prove in the workplace," he says.

 

Jobseekers must clear several hurdles before the fair organizers "invite" them to attend. They must first register at http://mysecondchance.us/, and then attend a "readiness" workshop, stay in touch with the organizers, and complete several assignments. "It's not in our interests to put everybody in front of the employers," Ilarraza says. "It's in our interests to put the most motivated, the best prepared, people, in front of them."

 

The fair is free to jobseekers. Fees for employers were $150 to first-timers, and $75 for returning employers. But the fair organizers have slashed those in the last week and a half to $50 and $25, respectively. Employers can also register to exhibit at the fair at http://mysecondchance.us/

 

Once inside the fair, employers' tables with yellow decorations signify "misdemeanor friendly" on case by case basis. Green signifies felony-friendly, case by case. "That just avoids a lot of wasted time," Ilarraza says.

 

The fair organizers didn't collect data on outcomes from last year's fair, but Ilarraza says the organizers plan to seek more feedback from the jobseekers this year.

 

Scott Nishimura, jobs and workplace reporter, Star-Telegram