Interview with President and CEO of Jobs For The Future, Maria Flynn

Today we’re talking with President and CEO of Jobs For The Future (JFF), Maria Flynn.  JFF is a national non-profit that drives transformation between higher education and the workforce.  Maria says JFF is called upon by foundations looking for a non-profit to lead or manage major initiatives.  The federal government utilizes them also, and they’re now hearing from more and more corporations.  Maria says the space is becoming increasingly important and changing rapidly.

Oftentimes, people will get too insular, talking only to the people in their corner of the ecosystem.  Maria believes to get the impact and transformation we want, we need to start connecting dots in different ways.  She says the skills that the workforce needs and that higher ed isn’t focusing on enough are decisiveness and confidence.  Higher ed does a great job around critical thinking and problem-solving, but how are they preparing them to be decisive leaders? We have to teach these skills through applied learning, taking the concepts and putting them into practice.

Maria was part of the leadership team at JFF for nine years before she became CEO five years ago.  They’ve been able to scale the nonprofit into an organization that’s having a global impact.  They knew in order for them to scale and have the impact they want, they need to be relevant to this moment and the moments in the future.  Furthermore, they looked closely at what the skills and competencies were in order to meet the needs of the companies coming to them for help.  Maria says you also have to focus on raising money and investing it into the systems you use.  She feels many nonprofits don’t know how to emphasize the importance of unrestricted, or flexible, dollars.  You have to be intentional about how you’re operating in the market.