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OCR for page 34
CHAPTER 4
Recommended Future Initiatives
4.1 Overview
State DOTs are being forced to make significant adjustments as financial resources become
more limited, transportation infrastructure ages, traffic volumes increase, and technology reliance
increases. These changes are shifting the workforce landscape of state DOTs. While it is impossible
to accurately predict all future workforce needs, it seems likely that literature, practices, and other
resources will be updated and made available as progress is made in the industry. This protean
nature of needs and resources dictates the need for a similarly flexible toolkit.
The web site developed in this project as a demonstration of the Workforce Toolkit necessarily
will have a limited life. No financial support or other resources have been provided by NCHRP
or other sponsors to support the maintenance of the Toolkit or web site following completion
of the research project.
The future utility of the Workforce Toolkit depends on it remaining a current resource that
meets the changing needs of a dynamic audience. Resources will need regular updating, and
elements of the site (e.g., views, needs, and facets) may need to be refined as workforce challenges
continue to evolve. Fundamental to the success of this initiative is ownership by an entity that
hosts the site and engagement with the state DOT community that provides an ongoing sense of
specific agency needs.
4.2 Dynamic Resources
An important asset of this tool is the ease with which it can be modified and updated. The
views chosen for the prototype are based on research and input from the panel and the AASHTO
Subcommittee on Human Resources; however, views can be added, deleted, or modified. Resources
can be efficiently added or deleted by any authorized user through the password-protected
administration site. As information becomes available for the Geographic View, it can be added
to the existing tables by the Toolkit Web master for the site. An important feature of this view is
that it provides a foundation for displaying information from state DOT Geographic Information
Systems (GIS). As the Toolkit evolves, more sophisticated GIS querying and analysis capabilities
can be added to its functions.
The Toolkit Web master can also add new information, including studies from state and fed-
eral entities other than NCHRP, to the State Practices View. Any authorized user can edit facets
for existing or newly added resources; the technical administrator can change facet categories
by, for example, adding National Professional Associations as a source type, or even by adding
or deleting a facet category. This type of action should be done carefully since all of the reports
are designed using the existing set of facet categories. If changes to the facet lists are made, the
queries that determine the view outputs need to be adjusted.
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