In an era where global challenges continue to shape our world, pursuing social good has emerged as an imperative that transcends borders and beliefs. As communities grapple with issues ranging from environmental sustainability to equitable access to education and healthcare, the concept of social good stands as a compass guiding individuals, organizations, and governments toward actions that uplift humanity.
A $20 million partnership between Goodwill and Google.org, the Goodwill Digital Career Accelerator is paying off for 387,000 job seekers with employment via more than 118 Goodwill members across North America.
“I wanted something different,” Kara Gooch, talent strategist analyst at Accenture and graduate of the Career Accelerator, states during a Zoom interview. “I wanted to make sure that my girls had a living example of what success could look like; if I could do that for my girls, then I was going to win. When I decided to go into tech, I knew that going back to school would not be an option. Having the three girls, and maintaining a job that was barely getting food on the table, had me choosing between keeping the lights on or keeping the internet on. All of those things were the genesis of ‘it’s time to get into tech.’”
In 2017, Hector Mujica, head of economic opportunity at Google.org, Americas, and his team launched Grow with Google to help Americans grow their skills, careers, and businesses. It provides training, tools, and expertise to help small business owners, veterans and military families, job seekers and students, educators, startups, and developers. Since Grow with Google’s inception, it has helped more than ten million Americans develop new skills.
Goodwill’s Career Accelerator is within Mujica’s $100 million grantmaking portfolio that supports interventions that aim to provide pathways to digital economy jobs for individuals with multiple barriers to employment.
“The college pathway has been the main path with gaining digital skills,” Mujica explains over a Google Meet conversation. “How do we ensure that we’re leaning into the opportunities that are created by technology, and how do we make those truly be available to everyone? How do we increase the number of on-ramps to the digital economy? We ultimately landed on working with organizations across the workforce development ecosystem, organizations like Goodwill, that ensure that job seekers have access to the right skills they need to be able to participate in the digital economy.”
Initially, Google.org invested $10 million into the Career Accelerator. Now, the program has reached over 1.7 million learners with digital skills. Participants receive Google certifications that can be applied to multiple companies across different industries.
“We often see more in people than they see in themselves,” comments Steven Preston, the president and CEO of Goodwill Industries International, over a phone interview. “Not unusual for somebody to come to the door and feel the weight of what their challenges have been. What we try to do is present to them what their possibilities are. What we’re able to do is once you get to the assessment process to say, ‘Let’s talk about what your goals are. But let’s also talk about what jobs are available in your market today based on the industries locally.’”
Enter WorkingNation, a nonprofit media company focused on the future of work. It recently released a short documentary film, Glory in Overcoming, directed by Melissa Panzer, highlighting three women of color, all single mothers, who completed the Career Accelerator. For Panzer, stepping into the director’s seat was more about the advancement of women creatives and telling a good story.
“I had been hoping to find a timely story to tell, and these women moved me so deeply that I was inspired to make a leap of my own and step into the director’s chair for the first time,” she states during a Zoom interview.
The documentary follows the stories of Gooch, Chelsea Rucker and Shaheera Alnatshia. Gooch worked a dead-end job that didn’t provide the basic necessities to feed her young daughters. As a single mother, she knew she had to make a pivot to better her circumstances.
Most people associate Goodwill with donation centers and thrift stores. The Career Accelerator breaks the stigma around a handout and is shifting the perception to a do-good, advanced one’s career perspective.
“In my own reflection time,” Gooch shares, “I went back to that objective of ‘you’re not giving someone a handout, you’re giving them a hand up.’ When I looked at it that way, being able to ask someone across the state from me to say, ‘Hey, I see that you did it. How can I do it too?’ I only survived and made it to that point because someone else helped me. I only made it to the Career Accelerator program because Chelsea [Rucker] helped me. I only made it to the apprenticeship program [at Accenture] because I first helped myself.”
Through the program and Goodwill’s partnership with Accenture, Gooch connected with a recruiter. She started off in the apprenticeship program out of Nashville and gradually worked her way to the talent strategist position mentoring others.
As Gooch continues to transition her career, she focuses on the following essential steps:
- Ask for help. You can only go so far doing something by yourself. There’s no shame in reaching out to others for guidance.
- Be the role model you wish you had growing up. Set intentions and exceed expectations.
- Build up your confidence. Rejection is part of the game; it’s not a reflection on your capabilities. Believe enough in your mission and keep going.
“The risk that you take of not choosing yourself, Gooch concludes, “my message to those that choose that, that choose not to take that risk, is you’re still needed. Regardless of how many people you see in front of you that are growing, thriving and excelling. You’re still needed, and there’s still space for you.”
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