Meet the woman hired to lure workers to Cedar Rapids area

Jodi Schafer racked up frequent flyer miles traveling to Chicago, New York and California to lure former University of Iowa students who left the state back to Iowa to help advance their career, increase their earning potential, climb the corporate ladder or launch their own ventures by enrolling in the UI’s MBA program.

Now, she’s looking to lure former residents who left for economic or lifestyle reasons back to the Hawkeye State to build a life in a place they know and where they have connections.

Schafer started in January as the new talent attraction director hired by the Collaborative Growth Initiative — a partnership of the cities of Cedar Rapids, Hiawatha and Marion and the Cedar Rapids Metro Economic Alliance launched in 2023 to grow the local labor force and address worker shortages.

She comes with nearly 20 years of combined experience in career counseling and development, worker recruitment and retention, strategic planning and leadership training.

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She worked and led teams at the UI’s MBA department for more than 10 years, and gained further experience as the director of talent management at CIVCO Medical Solutions in Kalona, before becoming senior director of the Berry Career Institute and special assistant to the provost at Cornell College in Mount Vernon.

At the UI, she reshaped the MBA admissions landscape and established sustainable recruiting practices that aided in enrollment growth and improved the reputation of the program.

Schafer said students who left Iowa often said they left to explore different areas and larger cities with more amenities. However, they often took for granted the local resources, such as the UI and educational opportunities.

“But you know, now, these individuals have families. They have kids, and they're looking at, ‘OK, do we have affordable housing options? Do we have good educational systems? Do we have things to do?’” Schafer told The Gazette.

“… The cities have done so much to kind of improve the landscape in the last 10 years. So there's so many revitalization efforts that have been going on (in downtown Cedar Rapids, Uptown Marion and the Czech Village) that I really felt like the time was now to step into this position,” she said.

The Cedar Rapids metro area has added new libraries, YMCAs and a wide range of housing options. The educational system increasingly supports career pathway programs, with students able to explore career tracks in the trades, medical sciences, engineering and more. And a network of bike trails connects cities, she added.

“So there's a lot of lot of things that are very appealing to those individuals that are expanding in their career and they have different interests” in their 30s and 40s than they did when they left in their 20s, Schafer said.

To attract more workforce talent, messaging could focus on “livability and career-related factors,” including housing availability, cost of living, jobs and salaries, according to a marketing strategy to attract talent to the region funded by Cedar Rapids metro communities.

The market research firm identified five areas with potential workforce talent from which the Cedar Rapids metro could draw: Wisconsin, the Chicago area, the Twin Cities in Minnesota, Denver-Aurora-Lakewood in Colorado and Southern California, including Los Angeles.

Schafer said she’s spent the past two months meeting with local business leaders, employers, community organizations and higher education professionals to better understand existing workforce recruitment efforts, challenges and opportunities.

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She’s also been coordinating with the “This is Iowa” statewide growth initiative, which has been providing “leads when they have somebody that fits our community that's expressed interest in moving to Iowa,” and has been convening a new Workforce Innovation Council of area stakeholders to help bring public, private and non-sector expertise to the local effort.

About 20 individuals have signed on already to be a part of the council that will kick off next month, she said.

Next on agenda is putting together a targeted marketing and recruitment campaign for hard to fill, high-demand jobs in health care and advanced manufacturing, in addition to launching a talent attraction website

“We have to do a better job telling our story. You know, we need to make sure that when we have people looking at the area, there's one place they can go to really see all of the open positions that are available,” Schafer said. “It's going to take developing some programs where maybe we have community champions that are helping people that are looking (to move) understand what the options are for employment, as well as kind of those community things that they're looking for in their next move.”

Cedar Rapids Bank & Trust President James Klein serves on the Cedar Rapids Metro Economic Alliance’s policy board.

Klein said the collaboration between the mayors of three cities highlights the importance of workforce attraction and retention. Schafer’s high-level perspective and experience working with workers, students, businesses and universities will help bring new initiatives, strategies and best practices from other communities to this area.

“She's uniquely qualified to help us come up with attraction and recruitment strategies for people of every age, understanding their generational differences,” he said.

Cedar Rapids Mayor Tiffany O’Donnell echoed Klein’s comments.

O’Donnell said Schafer’s higher education background is crucial for attracting “boomerang” residents back to the area.

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She said Schafer’s role is a significant step in leveraging the metro area's growth.

“This is the first time that we have had such a powerful story to tell, and that we recognize it and that we're acting on it,” O’Donnell said. “I've often said my challenges as mayor is really leveraging the moment — leveraging this opportunity in time where Cedar Rapids and the metro area is really experiencing tremendous growth. How do we leverage that opportunity? And Jodi is one way that we do that.”

Comments: (319) 398-8499; tom.barton@thegazette.com