Zapoint and Commonwealth Compact Announce New Tool to Enable Employer Diversity Initiatives

CAMBRIDGE, Mass., Dec. 8, 2011 /PRNewswire/ -- Zapoint, the leader in career management solutions, and UMass Boston's Commonwealth Compact are taking their partnership to a new level in 2012.

Launched in 2008, Commonwealth Compact is a Massachusetts statewide diversity initiative housed at the McCormack Graduate School of Policy and Global Studies at the University of Massachusetts Boston. Companies, colleges and universities, health-care providers and nonprofits are among those invited to sign the Compact and measure their diversity. To date, 230 member organizations have signed on. In April 2010, Zapoint and Commonwealth Compact launched the Talent Network, a database of diverse talent, employment openings, board and commission opportunities, networking, event information, and more.

"It's all been leading up to this," said Chris Twyman, CEO and founder of Zapoint. "We've been proud to provide the technology that drives Commonwealth Compact's revolutionary approach to diversity since day one. We're now excited to be offering, along with Commonwealth Compact, our analytical and career management technology for in-house use by their member organizations."

The Commonwealth Compact signers, including such familiar names as Staples, Comcast, Walmart, and Harvard University, employ approximately 280,000 people, or just over 10 percent of the state's workforce. This new tool will extract employee data from the HR system of record from each participating company. Skills and competency data will then be added to the basic HR information.

"Participating companies will have access to a full-functioning dashboard for analyzing internal talent based on both diversity needs and skills gaps," said Georgianna Melendez, co-director of the Commonwealth Compact. "This will support better hiring decisions across the board, helping the member companies to find the best candidates according to all of their key criteria, including diversity."

The solution will initially be offered to a select group of key signatory organizations within the Commonwealth Compact, with the goal of making it available to all member organizations by the end of 2012.

"We're thrilled to be able to offer such crucial capability along with our technology partner, Zapoint," Melendez continued. "This offering will transform our existing Talent Network into a one-of-a-kind, comprehensive Talent Ecosystem."

About Zapoint

Zapoint career management solutions empower people to take ownership of their future by giving them the tools to analyze and plan their career path in order to make these plans a reality. Incorporating Zapoint solutions into the workplace empowers people to create a clear development path within an enterprise-wide social network. This constructs a sustainable, accountable and transparent approach to the internal talent culture by identifying, rewarding and inspiring employees to expand and hone their professional talents. Zapoint solutions can deploy stand-alone, or can integrate with any HRMS and Talent Management system. For more information visit http://www.zapoint.com.

About the Commonwealth Compact

Commonwealth Compact is committed to make Greater Boston a desired destination for people of color, immigrants, and women in the belief that their contributions will be vital to the region's social and economic future. For more information visit http://www.commonwealthcompact.umb.edu/

SOURCE Zapoint