CEO Case Study
THE CHALLENGE
How might we design and pilot a digital literacy and workforce development curriculum for formerly incarcerated men and women?
This case study is a part of a broader partnership with Salesforce, where Salesforce employees volunteer their time and skills to improve the operations and capacity of nonprofit organizations.
One such nonprofit is Center for Employment Opportunities (CEO), an organization that provides paid employment opportunities, skills training, and ongoing career support to men and women aged 18-65 recently released from prison.
PARTNER CONTEXT
The Center for Employment Opportunities (CEO) offers individuals, who have been recently released from prison, the ongoing support necessary to build career capital and financial stability. CEO believes that everyone, regardless of their past, deserves the chance to work toward a stronger future for themselves, their families, and their communities. As the largest reentry employment provider in the country, CEO is using their scale, experience, and data – backed by their participants’ feedback on what works – to change the way the government invests in criminal justice and workforce development.
CEO’s model for reducing recidivism and increasing employment:
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Job Readiness Training: CEO’s program begins with a weeklong class, Pathway to Employment (P2E), which prepares individuals to enter or reenter the workforce. These interactive sessions cover crucial workplace practices and explore the connections between thoughts, feelings, and actions. -
Transitional Employment: Participants work four days per week on transitional work crews and receive on-the-job training and coaching from their site supervisors. At the end of every shift, participants are paid and given feedback using CEO’s digital assessment tool, Passport to Success (PTS). -
Job Coaching & Placement: Each participant is matched with a job coach who assists them with mock interviews, creates resumes, provides guidance throughout the job search process, and refers them to additional support services. Once Job-Start Ready, a CEO business account manager refers CEO participants to employers for interviews. These referrals are based on both the employer needs and the participants' skills that were identified by their job coaches during an assessment. -
Retention Services: Once a participant finds a job they begin receiving personalized job-retention services from CEO staff including workplace counseling, crisis management, and career planning.
You can learn more at https://ceoworks.org/
THE INNOVATION
Salesforce employees got involved with this project as skilled volunteers, contributing a variety of important skills including using their training and technical expertise to design a digital literacy pilot program for CEO participants . The collaboration with Braven was facilitated virtually as the employees who volunteered spanned multiple regions across the country, including: New York, Florida, Atlanta, San Francisco, and Seattle.
Throughout the engagement, volunteers:
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Conducted discovery sessions with CEO Oakland staff to understand the current state of their digital literacy curriculum and needs - Developed a Digital Literacy & Job Application Preparation curriculum
- Facilitated training sessions for the CEO staff alongside the newly developed curriculum
- Piloted the new curriculum with participants from one CEO cohort
Volunteer Recommendations & Prototypes
From our Partner
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CEO staff have noticed that those who are lifers (15+ years in prison) are the ones who have no digital skills at all, but they are paying a lot of attention and are eager to learn! After one of the recent digital literacy skills classes, one of the job coaches leading the training heard the participants say that they found the training helpful, fun, and enjoyable!
CEOCenter for Employment Opportunities 
CEO indicated that it feels empowered by the tools and technology needed to make the recommendations provided as part of this engagement.
SALESFORCE EMPLOYEE FEEDBACK
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BY THE NUMBERS…
- $8,000- $10,000 in savings is estimated by CEO staff to have been achieved by receiving this curriculum as part of a skills-based volunteer effort from Salesforce employees.
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40-80 hours is estimated by CEO staff to have been saved by receiving this curriculum as part of a skills-based volunteer effort from Salesforce employees. -
100% of employees indicated that they were either satisfied or extremely satisfied with how the project used their skills. -
100% of respondents indicated that they felt it was likely or extremely likely that their volunteer efforts had a positive impact on CEO - 100% of respondents reported that the project positively impacted their view of Salesforce as an employer.