Denise Rice, president and owner of Peak Performance Inc., has joined the Cleveland State OneSource Development and Continuing Education team to help advance the workforce assessment and training efforts among business and industry partners within the CSCC service area.
Ms. Rice is an operations executive with more than 25 years in manufacturing leadership. Prior to working with the CSCC OneSource team, she was director of Worldwide Manufacturing Effectiveness with Cormetech and before that, she served as plant manager, also with Cormetech.
“It has been very exciting working with Rick (Creasy) and the OneSource group because they are so innovative and forward thinking in trying to achieve what the industry in this area needs,” said Ms. Rice.
"Rice has a successful track record of leading organizations to deliver P&L results over expectations. Rice brings expertise implementing Lean Manufacturing and demonstrates competence in strategic business planning and execution training, development and risk management / performance metrics," officials said.
Ms. Rice will drive an operational excellence strategy with business and industry to achieve the following goals:
- Respond to local industry resource needs to help achieve operational excellence;
- Significantly expand OneSource training and consulting services;
- Establish long-term partnerships to replace ad-hoc training programs with
continuing follow-up and performance tracking;
- Work with schools, businesses and CSCC internal teams to provide internships
for Cleveland State and high school student; and
- Use her leadership experience and knowledge of industry to provide guidance to
our workforce team as we seek to grow, expand and innovate.
Ms. Rice said, “It really doesn’t matter if businesses are looking for grants, training for their incumbent workers, if they are hiring new people or doing assessment training or looking for someone who can do consulting on lean manufacturing—all of that is provided by OneSource now. It’s really for the manufacturers to be able to have all of their needs met by one area.”
“We are very fortunate to have someone with Denise’s experience and qualifications as part of our CSCC team,” said Rick Creasy, executive eirector of Workforce Development. “By having Denise here, we are following through on our commitment to offer technical training that advanced manufacturers have been asking for.”
According to Ms. Rice, "Unemployment is so low that manufacturers are struggling to fill positions. Baby boomers are starting to retire. There is a skills gap and in addition, there is an employment gap. The problem manufacturers are facing today is no longer going to be just hiring people because they don’t exist. They are really going to have to invest in their incumbent workers and give the workers the training and the skills they need.
“What makes OneSource so unique is because it is affiliated with CSCC, a lot of the training that is provided will come along with continuing education units and can be applied for prior learning awards. Any of the training employees are taking through OneSource and Cleveland State can be put towards a certificate or a degree program. Manufacturers spend a lot of time putting their employees in training, and to have that training be accredited and have that training be able to be applied to a degree to certificate program would be extremely beneficial.”
For more information on the OneSource Workforce Readiness Center, call 423-614-8763 or email onesource@clevelandstatecc.edu.