People are our most valuable resource

Virginia Manufacturing Region’s labor force totals over 380,000 qualified individuals. This pool is fed by over 14 higher education institutions, with multiple universities ranked highest in the world. These institutions are complemented by a workforce training partner that works with employers to customize training programs for their unique needs.

Community College Workforce Alliance (CCWA):
CCWA specializes in custom training for corporations located in the area. Companies can enroll employees in courses to achieve specific training or certification needs, or utilize CCWA resources and expertise from peer companies in the region to create new, custom courses. Training can be conducted anywhere as needed, from a standard classroom to right on the factory floor.

Over the past four years alone, CCWA has:

  • Conferred 7,000+ Career Readiness Certificates, certifying workers’ preparedness for trainability and effectiveness, completed job profiling for 30 companies, which maximizes efficiency for matching employees to jobs
  • Created 150+ custom courses for companies with more than 1,600 students and participants

Other Key Strengths of CCWA:

  • Organizational Assessment and Development
  • Leadership Development
  • Project Management, Sales and Customer Service Improvement
  • Productivity and Efficiency Enhancement
  • Six Sigma, Lean Six Sigma, Quality Assurance
  • Strategic Planning
  • Communication Skills
  • Human Resource Systems
  • E-Learning Curriculum
  • Design and Training Professional Meeting Facilitation Skills
  • Seaports, airports, railroads, and a population of 1.3 million are all inside the workforce area
  • Proximity to Port of Virginia for international shipping
  • 41 percent of the U.S. population is within a day’s drive
  • Shovel-ready sites and existing high-bay distribution space with direct interstate access and rail siding are available
  • There are over 100 trucking companies with more than 21,000 trucks based in the metropolitan area
  • Norfolk Southern and CSX operate intersecting Class 1 rail services locally, with half of Virginia’s total truck-railcar intermodal facilities
  • UPS, FedEx and the U.S. Postal Service operate major hubs in the area and provide third-party logistics (3PL) services, along with expertise concentrated at the UPS Freight national headquarters
  • U.S. military logistics training and operations cluster includes Army Logistics University at Fort Lee and the Defense Supply Center Richmond, concentrating much of the Army’s logistics and contracting personnel and expertise in the area
  • Foreign trade zone status in many parts of the region lowers import/export cost
  • Customize your workforce training program with the Community College Workforce Alliance

  • Public-private research partnership (Commonwealth Center for Advanced Manufacturing) makes the region a focal point for the manufacturing research expertise of Virginia’s top universities and the top corporate innovators