Dion Willis has spent years working with communities to help create economic opportunity, and to open up access to financial literacy and job trainings. 

“I want you to get a job, but I want you to get the job you want – in the right way.” 

Now, as a new Program Manager for the national nonprofit organization CareerWork$, Dion serves as a key support liaison to new and existing CareerWork$ community-based training partners, providing curriculum and instructional support, as well as representing the program across the country to constituents while supporting the team in achieving its national expansion. 

“This opportunity with CareerWork$ gives me a chance to bring my energy every day to pay it forward to other Instructors, Career Navigators, our students and their communities.” 

In his new role with CareerWork$, Dion – a native Chicagoan and longtime resident of Seattle – brings a unique perspective: He has served as a Career Navigator for all three CareerWork$ – BankWork$®, CareerWork$ Medical® and CareerWork$® Ready programs with our partners YWCA Seattle | King | Snohomish. Over his seven years at the YWCA, Dion taught various job readiness workshops, life skills curricula and has assisted numerous participants in starting their career journey while providing motivation to become the best version of themselves. 

Dion first joined YWCA as an intern, but quickly joined the organization full-time. Before long, he became a job training instructor with the YWCA Community Jobs program, mainly focusing on assisting participants receiving benefits from DSHS. When CareerWork$ Medical launched with YWCA as a training partner, Dion was its first Career Navigator. Later, he was asked to become YWCA’s Career Navigator for the BankWork$ program. 

And then came the COVID pandemic. When CareerWork$ launched Work$Ready, a free, online job readiness training to support those displaced by the pandemic in seeking new employment, Dion helped extend its impact as a navigator and back-up training instructor. 

In the early days of the pandemic, Dion spearheaded virtual job search workshops and computer skills training. Soon, he developed the concept for a virtual job fair, which grew steadily in Fall 2020 into a series of successful events. 

Now, Dion is drawing on that perspective as a Career Navigator for all three programs to grow their impact. 

“This role gives me the chance to help our Instructors and Career Navigators be successful in leading classes, to pick their brain on what works, and how we can grow our impact. Being able to do that every day? That’s absolutely awesome.” 

In his spare time, Dion enjoys listening to and creating music. He is an avid Seattle Seahawks fan and takes pride in giving back to his culture. 

RadNet, a national leader in outpatient imaging with 334 locations, has approximately 8,600 employees nationwide. As the largest provider of comprehensive imaging services in the country, it has critical recruiting needs in areas like patient services.  

Career Work$Medical and its graduates are helping “genuinely meet our need,” says Ruth Wilson, RadNet’s Senior Vice President for Human Resources. “As CareerWork$ Medical has grown, it’s become a pipeline for us.”  

Since forming a partnership in 2019 with our Los Angeles-based Training Partner, JVS SoCal, RadNet has already hired 15 CareerWork$ Medical graduates into roles with career potential – and nearly all remain with RadNet after their first year of employment.  

Those graduates bring hard and soft skills from the comprehensive, eight-week training program for non-clinical roles that CareerWork$ Medical offers and was co-developed by employers and community-serving organizations to ensure success. 

“CareerWork$ Medical gives people the tools that make them successful in the transition to companies like ours,” added Ruth. “They succeed because they come prepared. They have a level of confidence in their training and have exemplified commitment to completing a program. They have the hard and soft skills they need. They are prepared for a real-world experience – and that’s what we offer.”  

For Elise Levine, Associate Director of JVS SoCal’s Healthcare Programs, who draws on her more than 30 years of experience in health care administration, a key way to help employer partners like RadNet meet their organizational goals is “constantly asking our partners like Ruth what they are focused on and looking for. We like to think of ourselves as being a recruiter without a commission. We’re always thinking about where our students could be placed. We help our students identify their strengths, and we really try and job match. Our role is to make our students successful.”  

What sets CareerWork$ Medical apart beyond its training focused on both hard and soft skills needed for non-clinical careers in healthcare is that it attracts students who “want to work for a place where they can make a difference,” says Ruth. “We want people who have that intrinsic motivation, commitment, and genuine empathy. As an employer, I can do anything with that. So, we’d be foolish not to consider CareerWork$ Medical a resource for finding  great employees.”  

As a large employer in the healthcare field, what’s Ruth’s advice to people considering participating in the CareerWork$ Medical program?  

“Find not just a job, but a chance to empathize with people. Working at RadNet offers students a chance to make a difference for our patients and something to be passionate about. If you are about people, then this is the program for you.” 

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Over the past 18 months, organizations across the country navigated the rapid changes of the pandemic. CareerWork$ worked closely with partners around the country to adapt, pivot, and pivot again—and as a result, we’re still marking milestones like graduations and job placements among our graduates.  

Here are three ways we adapted and continued our impact during the pandemic: 

A New Program: CareerWork$ Ready: Early in the pandemic, we launched a new job readiness program, CareerWork$® Ready, a condensed, three-week program designed for individuals seeking their first job, as well as those who are looking to re-enter the workforce., in a broad range of industries. We provide community organizations with the curricula they need to offer virtual or in-person training for job seekers in underserved communities. The program leverages the curricula from our proven BankWork$® and CareerWork$® Medical programs and includes one-on-one sessions and group trainings with a job coach, creating a personalized experience in real time, and standing out from many other pre-recorded programs. 

Making Classes Digital: As we launched CareerWork$ Ready online, we also digitized our BankWork$ and CareerWork$ Medical® curricula, making it possible for our training partners to offer courses through hybrid models while complying with public health guidelines. Moving the curriculum content online meant students also gained digital skills and practiced holding virtual meetings and online collaboration tools—skills and experience necessary in the “new normal” for many careers. 

Making Graduations and Job Fairs Digital: Ask any graduate, or any employer—our graduations and job fairs, where each graduate interviews with each employer partner, is part of what makes CareerWork$ so impactful. We celebrate the hard work and dedication of participants, and they receive far more personal attention than they might during a standard job fair or online application process. During the pandemic, we adapted to ensure we could continue our graduations and jobs fairs by pivoting to a virtual model; immediately following the virtual graduation events, our graduates met 1:1 virtually with employers in their region for job interviews. As we look to the future, we are hopeful and energized for what’s next – especially as we recently hit an important milestone: 4,000 graduates placed into jobs with career growth potential.   

Thanks to these steps and collaboration with our training partners around the country, CareerWork$ is poised for our next phase of growth— expanding with new partners, new staff, potential for new training programs, and new ideas for the future. Our work has never felt more vital, and as the pandemic has highlighted the long-standing inequities for BIPOC community members, the need for our last-mile training programs has never been so clear. 

After immigrating to the United States with her family, Minh (Emily) Duong’s career path was unclear.  

For a while, she worked part-time in retail. But Emily wanted a more meaningful career.  

“After I came to the US with my family, I had no direction,” she recalls. “I did not know to build a career plan. In the darkest time, I came across the BankWork$ program.” 

Emily had found the BankWork$ program with our Bay Area partners, Fremont Adult and Continuing Education. 

“It was the opportunity I was looking for, so I could not let it slip away.” 

In April 2018, Emily began our free, eight-week BankWork$ training program. It was the first all-female class BankWork$ class in the history of the Bay Area program, “a circle of support, friendship and sisterhood to rely on,”as Emily describes it. 

Emily experienced our program that provides the hard and soft skills they need for entry-level roles in banking, a curriculum that was co-developed by employers and community-serving organizations to ensure success. Emily graduated from the BankWork$ program that June. The youngest in her class, her peers chose her to be the class graduation speaker.  

After graduating, Emily interviewed for open roles with our partner banks partners. She soon received two offers, and she accepted a position with Bank of America as a part-time teller. Within the first six weeks, Emily was promoted to a full-time teller role. She was also recognized for her excellent customer service skills.  

In 2019, Emily was promoted to a Lead Teller role and continues to receive accolades for her top performance in her new career with Bank of America.   

“Regardless of which banking positions you would like to apply to later, after completing this short-term program, you are well equipped with the most powerful tool, customer service skills, which helps differentiate you from the crowd,” says Emily. “I was so grateful for every lesson from the BankWork$ program.” 

Today, nearly two years into her career in financial services, Emily’s advice to her fellow BankWork$ students is simple: 

“Be confident in your abilities and do not give up…If I can do it, then, yes, you can make it through as well.” 

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CAREERWORK$ MEDICAL^® FREE JOB TRAINING PROGRAM CONTINUES WEST COAST EXPANSION TO LOS ANGELES AND PORTLAND, OR

CAREERWORK$ MEDICAL ACCELERATES SUCCESS BY CONNECTING YOUNG ADULTS FROM TRADITIONALLY UNDERREPRESENTED COMMUNITIES TO ENTRY-LEVEL, NON-CLINICAL CAREERS IN HEALTHCARE

Seattle, WA, September 25, 2019 – CareerWork$, Inc. announced today that it has partnered with JVS So-Cal and Worksystems, ­­­Inc to expand its CareerWork$ Medical job training program to Los Angeles and the greater Portland area beginning on September 23 and October 15, respectively.  This innovative healthcare career job program offers free, eight-week training, placement assistance, and ongoing coaching to provide the support young adults need for not only getting the job, but advancing in a career.  Launched in 2017, the program operates in Seattle through a new partnership with Seattle Goodwill Industries.

This effort is a priority of the Sheri and Les Biller Family Foundation.  CareerWork$ Medical connects students who have the attitude and aptitude for success but lack the access to meaningful employment, with employers who are looking for qualified, diverse talent. Participants graduate ready for their first day on the job in the healthcare field and have an opportunity to interview with industry partners during a personalized job fair.  Employers are hiring for in-demand, entry-level roles with career potential, such as patient service coordinator, family support specialist, and numerous medical office roles.

“We are thrilled to be able to grow CareerWork$ Medical throughout the West Coast.  We see a tremendous opportunity to work in communities where we can have the greatest impact and to enable employers to identify talented, diverse hires that reflect their patient populations”, says CareerWork$ President, Sherry Cromett.

CareerWork$, a division of the Sheri and Les Biller Family Foundation, has partnered with community-based organizations across the US to launch over 2,600 new banking and healthcare careers. Their original program, BankWork$^®, began in Los Angeles in 2006 with JVS-SoCal and has since grown to 14 cities including Portland in 2016 with Worksystems, Inc.

“The need for talented people in the healthcare community is great”, says Sheri Biller, founder.  “We have tremendous confidence in our training partners to build lasting success for employees and healthcare employers in the communities they serve”.

CareerWork$ Medical is a free eight-week healthcare services job training program that serves individuals with barriers to employment. For more information, visit www.careerworksmedical.org.

The Sheri and Les Biller Family Foundation is committed to a collaborative approach to philanthropy in its focus areas of career pathways development, public education, supportive care, and social impact theatre. For more information, visit www.billerfamilyfoundation.org.