Targeting Employment Services

The Workforce Investment Act (WIA) of 1998 emphasizes the inte-gration and coordination of employment services. Central to achieving this aim is the federal requirement that local areas receiving WIA fund-ing must establish one-stop centers, where providers of various em-ployment services within a local labor market are assembled in one lo-cation. This arrangement is expected to coordinate and streamline the delivery of employment-related programs and to meet the needs of both job seekers and employers more effectively than did the previous arrangement. Successful implementation of the one-stop system requires new management tools and techniques to help staff meet the challenges pre-sented by the one-stop environment. A major challenge is the large vol-ume of customers expected to use the system. Increased use of services is expected because of a reduced emphasis on program eligibility as a condition for participation in the workforce investment system. None