In my upcoming book, Social Capital Smart: How Connections Create Opportunities That Education and Skills Alone Can’t, I argue that if workforce development is truly about creating economic mobility, then social capital building must be a central strategy—not an afterthought. Maryland’s workforce system, like many across the United States, has focused heavily on skills training, credential attainment, and short-term mentorship programs. While these are valuable, they leave out the most essential driver of mobility: the ability to leverage connections.
This work is especially relevant to me as part of the Maryland Innovation Center, where the mission is to drive new approaches that spark economic opportunity. Innovation doesn’t just happen in technology or entrepreneurship—it also happens when we rethink how we prepare people for the workforce. And if innovation is about anything, it’s about building and strengthening networks. That’s why it’s both fitting and necessary to highlight Maryland as a proving ground for the next generation of workforce development strategies.
For years, programs have tried to address inequity by assigning navigators or mentors to help participants move through the system. But giving someone a navigator is not the same as teaching them to read the map. Without the skills to identify, strengthen, and sustain their own connections, individuals remain dependent rather than empowered. Social capital building equips people to chart distance, analyze the flow of information, and spot opportunity fields within their networks— an essential skill that has been missing from workforce development strategies for far too long.
The data makes it clear why this matters. According to the Burning Glass / Strada Institute report Talent Disrupted, 52 % of college graduates are underemployed one year after graduation. Even worse, 73 % of those who start out underemployed remain so 10 years later. This is not simply a higher education problem,it reflects a national workforce system that produces skilled individuals but too often leaves them disconnected from opportunity.
Moreover, according to the March 2023 report “Navigating Public Job Training” published by the Harvard Kennedy School Project on Workforce, more than 40% of participants in WIOA (Workforce Innovation and Opportunity Act) training programs earn less than $25,000 annually after program completion. The median annual earnings for WIOA program completers is $29,388, which is lower than the median for U.S. high school graduates with no college degree ($38,792 in 2019).
Research from Nicholas Christakis and James Fowler in Connected reinforces this truth: network centrality — where someone sits in the web of ties — profoundly shapes access to information, influence, and opportunity. In other words, skills and degrees alone don’t guarantee mobility. How well someone is connected determines whether those credentials translate into lasting advancement.
If Maryland — and workforce systems everywhere — truly want to drive economic mobility, they must integrate social capital building into their core. Otherwise, they risk producing people who are trained but sidelined, credentialed but underemployed, and ultimately disconnected from the opportunities they deserve.
References
Burning Glass Institute & Strada Education Foundation. Talent Disrupted: College Graduates, Underemployment, and the Persistent Trap. February 2024.
https://www.burningglassinstitute.org/reports/talent-disrupted
Deming, David, Alexis Gable, Rachel Lipson, & Arkadijs Zvaigzne. Navigating Public Job Training. Project on Workforce, Harvard Kennedy School. March 2023.
https://www.pw.hks.harvard.edu/post/publicjobtraining