TEDA touts Terrebonne employment

Both traveling employment seekers and online job hunters are being encouraged to check out Terrebonne Parish, based on information introduced by a billboard along Interstate 10 and Interstate 55 in St. John the Baptist Parish, where, according to marketing experts, it gets more than 83,000 views per week..

Making use of approximately $10,000 in BP reimbursement funds, the Terrebonne Economic Development Authority secured the advertising spot to promote a new website called terrebonneishiringnow.org and has also linked access to the TEDA site on tpeda.org.

The billboard was unveiled Monday and as of that time terrebonneishiringnow.org already had a variety of employers posting open positions.

“We tried to figure out where we would park [the billboard] where we can pull in traffic,” TEDA Marketing Director Michelle Edwards Eroche said. “And since it is not a budgeted item we had planned for, we had to think of how to get the biggest bang for our buck. How we would get the most exposure and about where those bodies would be coming from when they come to Houma as quickly as possible to work. So we looked at an extended area from where they could drive, or drive and stay, then go home on the weekend.”

“One of our challenges in this community is the supply of skilled labor,” TEDA Business Retention and Expansion Director Katherine Gilbert said. “We have a lot of highly qualified people. A lot of them happen to be employed. So, there is not an over abundance of qualified skilled labor from within our community.”

Eroche and Gilbert said the intention of this job posting campaign is to expand the network of opportunity for Terrebonne Parish employers and attract people who might not normally think of going south of Interstate 10 to apply their skills and for employers to fill positions.

Based from business retention visits by TEDA staffers, employers offered a repetitive request for help in attracting skilled labor. That, in turn, motivated efforts that were launched Sept. 21, to offer a tool for employer and employee job connections.

“This was a strategy we came up with to meet that need,” Gilbert said. “We’ve got more than 300 jobs on the website right now. They are varying positions and a nice variety is building.”

Holding a six-month contract, TEDA officials and business owners want to see what kind of response the billboard offers. Even after the contract period ends, the website will remain available for both job hunters and employers.

Gilbert and Eroche said the billboard and website are both opportunities being offered to the public by TEDA.

Links on the website will direct job seekers to prospective employer websites for detailed information. Businesses wanting to participate in the terrebonneishiringnow.org website may register through the site as well.

“This is not about promoting TEDA,” Gilbert said. “This is about job opportunities in Terrebonne Parish.”