Leveraging Technology for Human-Centered One-Stop Workforce Service Delivery: Hawai'i

This report documents the creation of the Hawai‘i Career Acceleration Navigator (HI CAN) initiative to address the workforce exigencies generated by the pandemic. In the first phase of work, the HI CAN team focused on creating a seamless connection between the unemployment insurance system and the workforce development system. To streamline services between the two systems, the HI CAN team sought to improve the user experience by:

• Creating a user-friendly employment platform that enables users to fulfill their unemployment insurance work search requirement automatically by applying for jobs and tracking their work search activity through a live dashboard connected to the unemployment insurance system.
• Developing a system that provides customized job recommendations for each user based on their unique work and training history as well as information on career transitions that were successful for other users based on an analysis of historical unemployment insurance and wage records.
• Facilitating the creation of a no wrong door entry approach to HI CAN by linking to the site directly from the unemployment insurance weekly work search certification page.
• Establishing a single sign on connection between Hawai‘i Unemployment Insurance and HI CAN also enables users to access both platforms through one account, which could be expanded to include other state benefit service accounts.

(This report is 6 pages long)

(The study took place from 2021 to 2022.)

The researchers identified the following finding relative to the implementation of the user-friendly online service delivery hub:

• Providing personalized, data-driven career recommendations (based on each jobseeker’s background) in an easy to use and centralized web application is making it easy for jobseekers in Hawai‘i to connect with opportunities that best meet their needs.

The researchers proposed the following selected recommendations relative to their experiences in creating a user-friendly online service delivery hub:

• Embrace innovative cloud infrastructure to unlock data and create a seamless user experience. To power HI CAN, the researchers built a secure, cloud-based Research Data Lake environment, which securely houses administrative data from multiple sources including workforce development, unemployment insurance and wage records.
• Leverage innovative data science practices. Hawai‘i’s new cloud infrastructure enables the state to unlock valuable insights and leverage government data to its fullest potential.
• Foster strong leadership and deliberate collaboration. Even with the cloud infrastructure in place, the level of data sharing and integration Hawai‘i achieved was only possible through a clear vision set out by the Hawai’i Department of Labor and Industrial Relations leadership and committed buy-in from internal stakeholders and external vendors.
• Conduct extensive user research and product testing. As HI CAN was developed, the RIPL team conducted extensive user research to solicit feedback from jobseekers in Hawai‘i to ensure the tool is easy to use and provides great value for its intended audience.

• Last Updated:
• Created:
• Resource Publication Date: 2023
• Author(s): Angell, M.; Borgeson, J.; Rahn, M.; Morang, J.; Yager, S.
• Funding Source: National Governors Association (NGA), Center for Best Practices
• Resource Availability: Publicly available
• Posted by: Justin Venneri
• Posted in: Workforce System Strategies