“I don’t know anybody who doesn’t love to learn about themselves and grow in that way."”

Business Development and Campus Manager at CVTC Melissa Wilson

Chippewa Valley Technical College of River Falls and TCLAD Inc. of Prescott have developed a collaboration, with CVTC helping TCLAD enact a training program.

Dan Lytle, the vice president of the Pierce County Economic Development Corporation (PCEDC) board and director of economic development and regional campus management for CVTC, said the PCEDC pursues business retention and expansion, and that sparked the collaboration.

“Those are very targeted visits that we make throughout the county to ensure that companies that are in the county are getting all the resources that they need,” Lytle said. “And if they don’t, we want to be a resource network to get them connected.”

These resources are not always city, county or village resources, but in some situations, it is through collaboration with other organizations. Lytle said the PCEDC was looking to work with more Prescott businesses, and TCLAD was right at the top of the list.

TCLAD is a thermal management material company that specializes in and is a world leader in circuit boards. TCLAD Managing Director John Hauschild said the trainings allowed the staff to be more trained and comfortable in their positions, but also to be cross-trained throughout the company.

Lytle said a focus of CVTC is to engage with local businesses to find customized training solutions for them.

During a meeting with TCLAD, the PCEDC learned TCLAD had been awarded a Wisconsin Fast Forward grant when building a training program. When they had the grant, it was the execution of the training that became the issue, and that is where CVTC came in. CVTC then became a “training servicer” for TCLAD to help come up with a training strategy and act on it.

CVTC placed a trainer from the college at TCLAD. The trainees took a self-assessment to gain self-awareness on their strengths and learn how to leverage them.

“I don’t know anybody who doesn’t love to learn about themselves and grow in that way,” Business Development and Campus Manager at CVTC Melissa Wilson said.

TCLAD also underwent project management training. Wilson said this training allowed people in all different roles at the company see a project from its initiation to the final product.

Wilson said CVTC has a faculty member with a master’s degree in project management who developed the course for TCLAD to go through. CVTC is also bringing leadership training and mechatronics training to TCLAD.

“It was pretty perfect timing,” Hauschild said. “[The trainings were] three kind of elements that we would have had to go outside to do.”

The training has given TCLAD valuable tools in the workplace, but the effect has also translated to the mental side of the workplace.

“It helps with the company culture as well as employee engagement,” Hauschild said. “It’s been very good for our morale here.”

Lytle said the customization and hands-on training is what CVTC does best, and it has allowed them to collaborate with organizations with more ease.

“We try to stay, as much as possible, kind of out of the hypothetical or the theoretical world,” Lytle said. “Actually take real projects that they’re working on and insert them into our curriculum.”

Collaborating with other community members and organizations is something CVTC does not take lightly, as they feel they are one with the community.

“Local partnership is everything for us,” Lytle said. “Being a technical college that has some of our funding driven from property tax levies, we really look at our communities as a constituency.”

Lytle said the relationship with the community does not have to be a transactional one, but they value benefiting the community any way they can.

“We want to see our downtowns flourish, we want to see our parks and our waterways and all of the amenities that people come to west-central Wisconsin for,” Lytle said.

Businesses and organizations interested in collaboration with CVTC can contact Wilson at 715-426-8244 or mwilson65@cvtc.edu.