Houston’s economy is growing, and so is the urgency to connect people to opportunity in smarter, faster, and more effective ways.
At a recent UpSkill Houston convening hosted by the Greater Houston Partnership, Ryan Hagedorn, CEO of Pathful, joined Rafa Alvarez, the Partnership’s SVP of Regional Workforce Development, for a fireside chat exploring what it takes to modernize career navigation and why Houston is uniquely positioned to lead.
Why This Matters
Today’s talent systems are strained. Students are asked to make life-defining choices using outdated tools and minimal informed mentorship. Employers struggle to find the skills they need. And too often, the bridge between education and employment is fragmented or missing altogether.
Houston’s answer is bold and business-led.
The Connectivity Platform is a new AI-powered system being developed by the Partnership in collaboration with Pathful. It will connect individuals to personalized career guidance, local credentials, real-world experiences, and job opportunities—across a single, shared infrastructure. This work is a key part of the Partnership’s Talent and Economic Mobility strategic imperative, which aims to expand access to quality careers and strengthen Houston’s workforce.
What Makes the Connectivity Platform Different
During the conversation, Hagedorn outlined what sets this system apart from traditional career tools.
- End-to-end experiences: Students and jobseekers won’t just explore careers, they’ll be guided through local work-based learning experiences, postsecondary options, wraparound services, recommended job postings, and long-term career planning and upskilling.
- Localized and personalized journeys: Built on real-time Houston labor market data and locally available experiences, programs, and wrap-around supports from Houston partners, the platform aligns with regional demand, leverages existing local resources, and reflects the diversity of users’ goals, strengths, and contexts.
- Supply-demand alignment: For the first time, schools, colleges, employers, and nonprofits will have access to a common platform that connects and strengthens their work.
Why Houston? Why Now?
Creating a platform like this demands long-term collaboration, responsible use of AI, and sustained alignment across sectors.
Hagedorn emphasized the difficulties of career navigation at scale and how Houston is uniquely positioned to make it a reality.
Traditional career assessments serve as static snapshots. Today’s workforce requires living systems that adapt as industries evolve and skills shift, meaning success depends on alignment across education, employers, and workforce organizations.
Houston is one of the few regions with the scale, coordination, and leadership to pull this off. As the region’s convening force for business, education, and civic stakeholders, the Partnership is uniquely positioned to bring these systems together—and keep them connected.
Pathful brings the technical foundation. The Partnership brings the regional connection, and the Houston community brings the capability. Together, we are co-designing a system built for Houston, by Houston.
Responsible AI, Built with Trust
Career guidance is high-stakes, and inaccurate data can misdirect lives. Hagedorn and Alvarez’s conversation emphasized responsible AI and rigorous data governance through:
- Guardrails to prevent hallucinations or inaccuracies
- Use of validated, viable datasets
- Automated retrieval systems to ground AI outputs
- Integration of trusted external data with proprietary insights
- Prompt design that includes what the system should not do
- Integrating testing to monitor for bias
AI’s unstructured nature must be paired with structured, trustworthy data when decisions affect education pathways, employment, and economic mobility.
The Bigger Workforce Reality
Globally, generative AI will displace an estimated 92 million jobs, while creating 172 million replacements. The winners of this transition will be regions that help people translate their capabilities across roles by defining careers in terms of durable, transferable skills.
Houston is positioning itself at the forefront of this shift, not by replacing what’s already working, but by connecting the dots between efforts, and accelerating progress for the region as a whole.
Get Involved
The Connectivity Platform is now in the design and development phase. Over the next year, the Partnership will invite stakeholders to:
- Participate in co-design workshops
- Test and provide feedback on early prototypes
- Participate in pilot programs
- Help shape a system that works for students, employers, and communities alike
Learn More About the Connectivity Platform and How to Get Involved