Biz Talk: New year, new career — Arlington Talent Pilot Program

This article was written by Arlington Economic Development.

This past fall, Arlington Economic Development introduced the Arlington Talent Pilot Program, a program that provides selected Arlington residents paid, on-the-job learning opportunities to launch a new career in software development while helping businesses modernize their IT codebase infrastructure.

The innovative program is a partnership between Arlington Economic Development (AED) and Arlington-based software consultancy Exelaration and is a new way to address the ongoing challenges of finding tech workers to fill open jobs in the region. The program is now into its second cohort of learners and is already proving to be a success.

From Learners to Coders 

The Arlington Talent Pilot Program graduated its first cohort of learners in January. These learners, all of whom are Arlington residents with an interest in the tech field but no traditional tech education, completed more than 1,450 hours of experiential learning on real-world projects under expert mentorship and earned relevant industry certifications (e.g., Certified Scrum Master, Certified Scrum Product Owner) and experience in high-demand programming languages (e.g., HTML/CSS, JavaScript, Ruby, Ruby on Rails, Angular, and NodeJS). Several learners also landed client projects for an additional six months with Exelaration.

“The Arlington Talent Pilot Program offered me a great opportunity to enter the field with no formal and relevant background in IT, in addition to stellar mentorship on real-world projects to gain both experience and theoretical knowledge,” said participant, Liam Cespedes, who was part of the first cohort and is continuing work on client projects.

AED and Exelaration designed this program to allow local residents to enter the tech workforce without college degree or prior tech experience requirements. The competitive pilot program accepted applications from dozens of individuals for each cohort, many of whom were people who showed promise in the tech field but who lacked those traditional resume credentials to find work.

AED and Exelaration are proud to have collaborated with partners at Capital Youth Empowerment Program, Bridges to Independence, Alexandria-Arlington Regional Workforce Council, and Virginia Values Veterans to advertise this program and ensure this unique opportunity reached underrepresented and underserved communities.

Opportunities for Businesses

Companies needing IT modernization and custom software solutions also benefit from the Arlington Talent Pilot Program. Companies receive quality work products led by experienced software developers and can have significant cost savings with the blended billable rate by including learners on projects.

Arlington-based Agile technology firm Excella recently partnered with the program to expand one of its federal modernization projects. The Exelaration team works closely with the larger Excella team to upgrade enterprise software within a Ruby on Rails environment. In addition to the modernized software, Excella has the option of hiring the learners who are now skilled engineers fully trained in their environment. “Competing for talent is hard, and this program gives us a proven way to add trained professionals to our teams, who then help us meet the mission for our clients” says Excella’s National Security Director Allison Harvey.

The spring 2023 cohort adds more software engineering capacity to take on new company partners. “We especially love to work with Arlington companies, but we’re happy to work with organizations across the country looking to modernize their technology,” says Exelaration CEO Steve Cooper, who adds that the program is looking for additional client companies who could benefit from the work of these budding engineers.

Companies can connect with the program in other ways too. Arlington Community Federal Credit Union hosted a lunch for the fall team inside their technology shop. This gave the emerging engineers a “day-in-the-life” view of what it’s like to have a tech job. Over kabobs and tacos, Credit Union CIO David Martinez and his team answered questions about the rewards and challenges of IT careers.

Companies looking to partner with the program can learn more here.