Dallas HR outlines upskilling plan for city employees, highlights Workday Learning rollout

The City of Dallas Workforce, Education and Equity Committee received an update on the city's upskilling program and next steps from Human Resources on a presentation that emphasized career ladders, cohort-based training and new tracking tools.

The update, presented at a committee meeting by Nina Arias, HR director, Sonia Batts, senior HR manager, and Heather Wood, training and development manager, focused on employees who earn below a $46,000 annual wage threshold and described program features intended to increase internal mobility and retention.

Arias said the city used a framework developed through a leadership program to focus on promoting and retaining employees and that the upskilling initiative intentionally centers on staff who earn under $46,000. Sonia Batts told the committee the team identified about 1,500 employees across 10 departments who fall within the target salary band and began listening sessions with both employees and managers to identify barriers to promotion.

"We have identified our first three cohorts'soft skills, technical skills and leadership skills'and those groups will come together to identify resources to address those gaps," Batts said. She described intervention strategies that include mentorship, job shadowing and revised career ladders targeted at specific job families.

A milestone the presentation highlighted was a completed career series for security officers. Batts said salary recommendations and job-mapping for that series have been completed and submitted to leadership and are "awaiting review and approval," after which adjustments will be made for affected employees.

Heather Wood described the city's new learning architecture: Workday Learning went live to the organization on April 17 and is being integrated with Precipio Skillsoft content. "Employee training will now be in one place," Wood said, adding the system links learning with talent management to support career pathing, succession planning and internal mobility.

Committee members pressed for measurable progress. Vice Chair Janie Schultz said she had expected to see clearer outcome data after several years of work and asked for specifics beyond the security-officer series. Assistant City Manager Lycidio Pereira and HR staff responded that the presentation was intended as an update on next steps, noted progress on career ladders across multiple trades (electricians, plumbers and others), and said citywide measurement and data-tracking are being expanded.

HR explained the metrics it plans to track: program participation rates, internal mobility and hiring impacts, certifications and licenses earned, and participant feedback. Staff said those measures will be used to compare promotion and retention rates for participants versus eligible employees who do not participate.

HR also described a new talent review and succession-planning process to be conducted in Workday, where managers will assess employee potential, risk of loss, and readiness for promotion. Employees are being asked to update career profiles in Workday so managers can use the system for talent reviews and to document career progression.

The committee did not take formal action on the upskilling program at the meeting; staff said they will provide additional progress measures and follow-up reports to the committee on request.

Ending

HR staff said they will continue implementing cohort training, collect comparative promotion and retention data, and bring additional progress metrics to the Workforce, Education and Equity Committee. Committee members urged acceleration of timeline and clearer outcome reporting for the broader employee population beyond the initial pilot cohorts.