workforce development

Transportation agencies are facing rapid technological change—from artificial intelligence and machine learning to connected and automated vehicles, data governance, cybersecurity, advanced communications, and emerging analytical tools. These technologies are transforming how transportation systems are planned, operated, and maintained, while simultaneously reshaping workforce needs. This guide from the National Cooperative Highway Research Program offers practical strategies and resources to recruit, develop, and retain a workforce capable of adopting and leveraging emerging technologies.

Industry Challenges

As new technologies proliferate, agencies struggle with a number of overlapping challenges.

Outdated organizational structures and siloed departments
Skill gaps in advanced technical areas
Difficulty competing with private-sector salaries
Limited awareness of transportation tech careers among students
Pipeline shortages due to retirements and evolving skill demands

The guide categorizes these challenges into three core areas: Institutional Agility, Staffing Adaptability, and Workforce Pipeline.

1. Institutional Agility

Agencies must evolve organizational flexibility to integrate new technologies into their existing practices. There are a number of steps they can take to help with this.

Build multidisciplinary teams to break down silos and improve collaboration across planning, operations, IT, and field staff.
Modernize organizational structures and culture, including job rotations, co-location, communities of practice, refreshed licensure requirements, and skills-based management.
Develop business cases for new positions, such as data analysts, AI specialists, cybersecurity roles, and system engineers.
Enhance benefits packages beyond salary—highlight flexibility, professional development, hybrid schedules, innovation opportunities, and mentorship.

2. Staffing Adaptability

While the agency must modernize its processes, it must also provide a way for staff to develop the required skills to navigate new requirements. Should they hire, contract, or provide development channels for existing staff? The report has some suggestions.

Identify and formalize emerging positions across traffic operations, data analysis, IT/OT, hardware maintenance, policy/innovation, and design/construction.
Use a decision tool to determine whether to upskill current staff, hire new staff, or outsource work based on urgency, core function, and internal capacity.
Develop and promote new career paths that incorporate technical and soft skills, including leadership, communication, and innovation.
Leverage vendor contracts to include staff training, system handoff support, and access to vendor training sessions.
Recruit from adjacent industries with transferable skills—IT, telecommunications, military, emergency management, gaming, and manufacturing.
Connect staff to professional organizations and national training programs to keep technology skills current.

3. Long-term Workforce Pipeline

In addition to responding to immediate needs in the organization, the agency should look at strengthening the long-term talent pipeline with education partners.

Build partnerships with K–12, community colleges, trade programs, and universities through advisory committees, career fairs, mentorship, and public awareness campaigns.
Expand internships, apprenticeships, faculty exchanges, and hands-on training opportunities in emerging technology areas.
Collaborate on curriculum modernization, integrating interdisciplinary programs that blend engineering, IT, data science, and policy.
Invest in or share technology labs, equipment, and research opportunities to expose learners to real-world systems.
Support research initiatives that incorporate workforce development, outreach, and student engagement.

Conclusion

Emerging technologies offer transformative benefits for transportation systems but realizing those benefits hinges on the workforce. Agencies must take proactive, structured steps to evolve their organizations, strengthen recruitment and retention strategies, and build sustainable talent pipelines. This guide provides a flexible, practical framework to help you look at your organization and think about how some of these ideas apply to it, and how they may help you develop your own strategy for improving how you prepare for emerging technologies.

Read the complete report:

NCHRP Research Report 1174 (website or PDF)

Additional resources

While some interns spend their days making copies and coffee runs, Caitlin Johnson spent her summer internship working on a research project exploring ways to improve safety in work zones.

Johnson, a fifth-year civil engineering student, is one of eight undergrads from the University of Minnesota who participated in this year’s Summer Transportation Internship Program.

Interns worked at MnDOT for 10 weeks and gained valuable transportation-related experience in areas ranging from designing roadways to measuring pavement movement. The program, offered jointly by CTS and MnDOT, is now in its fourth year.

This year’s participants included the following students, working in these MnDOT offices:

Caitlin Johnson, Office of Traffic, Safety and Technology
Mamadou Mbengue, Office of Environmental Stewardship
Ellie Lee, Office of Design
Luke Horsager, Bridge & Hydraulics Office
Sheue Torng Lee, Materials & Pavement Office
Trenton Pray, Materials & Concrete Office
Colleen Tamara Maluda, Environmental & Vegetation Office
Lucas Karri, Bridge Office

Johnson says her internship at MnDOT gave her the opportunity to study a topic that hasn’t been explored in-depth in the past and present those findings to industry professionals, including staff from the Federal Highway Administration. Luke Horsager, a civil engineering senior, spent his internship with the Bridge & Hydraulics Office equipping MnDOT boats with new GPS and Bluetooth software used for river mapping and monitoring bridge scour. He says he enjoyed gaining hands-on experience with the technology.

Heidi Gray, a MnDOT Metro District designer who supervised intern Ellie Lee in the Office of Design, says the internship program is valuable not only for the students, but also for the supervisors and MnDOT as a whole. While the interns gained important hands-on work experience and made valuable professional connections, MnDOT supervisors were introduced to talented young professionals.

“It’s really good to get young people in here and teach them what MnDOT is all about,” Gray says. “I personally have enjoyed the opportunity to teach and pass along what I know. It’s a good refresher.”

Application materials for the 2016 Summer Transportation Internship Program will be available on the CTS website in early November.

For more information, read the full article in the September issue of Catalyst or visit the internship program web page.