Bryan Schmutz is really busy these days as part of the marketing team at the Jewish Community Center. He’s happy in his position of marketing coordinator/webmaster — one that Jewish Employment Services helped him to land. Schmutz gives much credit to JES helping him land the JCC job.
“They knew what I was looking for and knew if something would be a good fit,” Schmutz said. “It was very helpful and very relevant.”
The JCC has been pleased, too.
“Bryan has been a very good hire for us,” said Stu Goldstein, JCC marketing director. “Bryan has established a great working relationship with the teams we support and has quickly developed a reputation for delivering high quality work. He’s become a significant asset to my department,” Goldstein added.
Schmutz is one of many success stories connected with JES. Now entering its third year, Jewish Employment Services continues to meet its mission of helping members of the community find employment.
Since its inception in 2010, 226 job seekers landed a job with the help of JES. More than 500 job seekers have enrolled in the program that currently has 210 actively enrolled.
JES is a joint program of Jewish Family Services and Jewish Vocational Service. It was the brainchild of a handful of local Jewish business leaders who saw a need to expand the services that were being provided to members of the Jewish community who had lost their jobs.
JES is funded by the Jewish Federation of Greater Kansas City, the Jewish Heritage Foundation, the Lowenstein Brothers Foundation, the Morgan Family Foundation and the Sosland Foundation.
In putting the program together in Kansas City, Director Gayl Reinsch looked at similar programs in Baltimore, San Francisco and East Orange, N.J.
Job seekers work closely with JES career coaches Cari Boasberg, Joan Kopelson and Anne Mullin as well as Reinsch, who helps clients in the actual job search.
JES offers a monthly job club, a weekly JumpStart class and individualized coaching sessions that involve intensive work on resume development, creating a 30-second commercial, a “reason for leaving (last job) statement” and other components to assist job seekers in their job search.
The new Monday morning Kaffee Klatsch is a weekly social hour designed to motivate job seekers and provide a venue for mutual support. Led by a coach, this has proven to be a great way to start off the week.
“Over the two years, JES has developed a great process that gets job seekers into a new job faster,” Reinsch said. An effective resume, mock interviewing, and numerous networking tools such as the Networking Score Card, are part of what sets JES job seekers apart.
Employers who have hired JES clients have been positive about the program.
“Jewish Employment Services helped us fill several key positions in short order,” said Miles Kaufman of Bullseye Media. “Within just a few days they presented us with several qualified candidates to choose from.”
JES funders are also pleased with the program’s success.
"We were proud to be a part of the inception of Jewish Employment Services, as together, we were able to quickly respond to the rapidly growing unemployment rate within the Jewish community,” said Todd Stettner, Federation executive vice president and CEO.
The JES team continues to work hard to help job seekers; those wishing to connect directly with JES should email , attaching a resume, if they have one. For more information about the program in general, visit www.jfskc.org/JES or www.jvskc.org.