No one put Karl Fritz on the panel for Friday's leadership breakfast discussing the nontraditional workforce, but he would have fit right in.
Nontraditional, as defined by the folks at Peirce College, which hosted the breakfast, means the type of students who graduate from Peirce — older, city residents, often the first in their families to go to college, often minority.
David L. Cohen, senior executive vice president and chief diversity officer at Comcast Corp., told the audience of nearly 120 executives, educators, and human resources managers that the onus is on companies "to open our eyes and to recognize the talent that is out there."
The traditional model, Cohen said, is to look for the employee, perhaps a newly minted college graduate, who "comes out of the box with a ribbon tied" around a perfectly wrapped package.
Most people, though, "don't come as a perfectly wrapped package. There is some tweaking" required for companies to figure out how talented and highly motivated people who don't fit the normal pattern can be integrated into their organizations.
That's what happened to Fritz, 41, director of procurement at the Philadelphia Zoo and a guest at the breakfast. "I consider myself a little bit of a late bloomer."
Fritz enrolled at Community College of Philadelphia right out of high school and bombed out in one semester. "I wasn't quite mature enough for the experience," he said.
He went to work for his dad's painting business, and about five years later landed an entry-level warehouse job at the zoo.
Eventually, the zoo promoted him to purchasing agent, an entry-level management post. "They took a chance on me — a little bit of a risk. They were able to see the heart and the desire," said Fritz.
After the zoo promoted him, he realized he needed more strategic knowledge and leadership skills to advance in management, so he enrolled at Peirce and earned bachelor's and master's degrees.
As he gained degrees, Fritz also gained promotions and pay raises.
Fritz, who grew up in Port Richmond and now lives in Fishtown, is the first in his family to gain a college degree.
Cohen and Sharmain Matlock-Turner, president and chief executive of the Urban Affairs Coalition, stressed the importance of college-employer relationships in building a diverse workforce with skills to match employer needs. Matlock-Turner also serves as a Peirce trustee.
Cohen said it makes business sense to have a diverse staff that matches the customer base. "At the end of the day, our lifeblood is our customers and our customers are incredibly diverse," he said.
It's helpful, for example, to tap into the "instinctive reactions" of African American staffers when considering programming during Black History Month. "I don't want to have to hire a bunch of consultants to tell us that," he said.
Comcast learned the value of tapping into a non-traditional workforce when it hired more than 2,500 military veterans and members of their families, Cohen said. The company hired a retired general to run the program.
Comcast benefited from military skills and leadership, but had to create orientation programs to acclimate military folks to corporate life.
"Employers may have to do some things they wouldn't ordinarily do, but that's OK," he said, "because the payoff is so good."