The Department of Employment and Economic Development (DEED) today announced that Lorrie Janatopoulos has been hired as Director of CareerForce.

Led by a network of private, public and nonprofit partners throughout Minnesota, CareerForce guides people toward rewarding careers, connects individuals to employment opportunities, and provides valuable economic and employment development information to employers. Within DEED, the CareerForce team manages and executes the direct services efforts of our workforce development work, in contrast to our grant-making team that deploys capital to partners for workforce development.

In this role, Janatopoulos will manage the physical and digital CareerForce resources at DEED that are focused on providing direct services to job seekers in Minnesota. Janatopoulos will also work to modernize Minnesota’s workforce system, specifically, how DEED serves workers across the state to help them achieve economic success – regardless of background or experience.

With more than 50 physical CareerForce locations statewide, as well as a digital presence, Janatopoulos will work to build consensus among DEED workforce partners and maximize the power of CareerForce in the job seeker and employer communities.

A native of Greater Minnesota, Janatopoulos brings more than two decades of work experience in the nonprofit sector. She started in the mid-1990s as a housing planner at the Arrowhead Economic Opportunity Agency in Virginia and was later promoted to the role of planning director, a job she held for 16 years.

Most recently, Janatopoulos assisted the Department of Iron Range Resources and Rehabilitation with strategic planning, and worked at Hibbing Community College helping women achieve education and career goals.

Janatopoulos holds a master’s degree in public affairs from the Humphrey School of Public Affairs at the University of Minnesota. In 2016, Janatopoulos was named a Bush Foundation Fellow and completed a series of leadership training courses at Harvard as part of her fellowship.