March 2017 | Business View Magazine

114 115 Palm Bay, Florida our young, upcoming workforce.” “Harris has about 3,500 high-paying tech jobs in a brand new building that does nearly a billion dollars a year in research and devel- opment projects,” says Marshal. “So, if you’re going to build out amenities for a targeted workforce, you have to first find out what that workforce wants.With that goal in mind, we set up interviews and surveys with Harris Corpora- tion and their employees and we found out the type of features their workforce is looking for. Millennials represent about 22 percent of their workforce, today, and in ten years, it will be 75 percent.When we reviewed the data, we found that they wanted a more modern ‘vibe’. They want a downtown, so we are working to create this urban ‘burb’ near their campus. It really gets down to a ‘live here, play here, work here’ en- vironment that’s walkable and vibrant. All the numbers and concepts look great and we are really excited about the project. “All of these efforts are about being able to entice a young and in-demand workforce to come here.We want Palm Bay to be their home. If we can accomplish that goal, we will help our local high-tech employers to become more competitive in a global economy by lowering their acquisition costs for talent. It’s going to lower their turnover and their human resources costs, which makes their contracts more com- petitive. It’s a win-win for our community and our commercial sector.” “Under Florida statute, we have a tool called a Business Development District,” says Ander- son. “It will have defined boundaries in the east side of Palm Bay, including all of our high-tech