LED FastStart Projects Win 2017 AVA Digital Awards

BATON ROUGE, La. — Today, AVA Digital announced five LED FastStart®-supported digital communication productions as 2017 AVA Digital Award winners. Three submissions received platinum recognition: Sasol, Lake Charles: Safety Campaign; Louisiana Dream It. Do It. website; and CDIT, Louisiana: Recruitment Video. Other LED FastStart projects honored are New Orleans Quality of Life Microsite (Gold Award) and Bell Helicopter, Lafayette: Pre-Hire Assessment (Honorable Mention Award). The AVA Digital Awards recognize outstanding achievement in conception, direction, designing and production of media reflecting progress in digital communication.

LED FastStart submitted the five projects for the award as they represented the most exemplary work and collaboration between LED FastStart and the organizations it supports. As the workforce development arm of Louisiana Economic Development, LED FastStart develops effective, engaging multimedia resources to recruit, evaluate and provide workforce training for projects that have invested and are operating in Louisiana. Based on workforce, capital investment and other criteria, the services of LED FastStart are awarded to companies investing in Louisiana as part of a customized incentive to expedite hiring.

“These LED FastStart productions are especially deserving of their recognition from AVA Digital, as they represent the high-quality, effective services of FastStart,” said LED Secretary Don Pierson. “These awards are further confirmation of what businesses across the nation and globe have come to realize: LED FastStart produces cutting-edge materials to attract the best workforce, deliver effective training and provide the companies that invest in Louisiana with a competitive advantage in their industries. It is this high-level of product delivery that has made LED FastStart the nation’s best workforce development program for seven years in a row.”

The projects receiving recognition from AVA Digital represent a cross-section of prominent services and industries in Louisiana, and demonstrate the wide-ranging effectiveness of LED FastStart’s multimedia resources. The Sasol safety campaign included digital and print resources to energize the company’s corporate safety program with a centralized sports theme that introduces new hires to the company’s safety culture.

The New Orleans Quality of Life Microsite was created to be used at a convention, allowing prospective job candidates to get an overview of the quality of life aspects of New Orleans using an iPad. The Bell Helicopter pre-hire Assessment interactive iPad tool was created as part of a pre-hire skills assessment to evaluate prospective job candidates at a paperless production facility for the aviation company. The CDIT Louisiana recruitment video combined the use of motion graphics and live action footage to highlight the IT firm’s unique recruiting process, and the Dream It. Do It. website was created to unify two of LED FastStart’s state manufacturing initiatives.

“On behalf of LED FastStart, we are proud of this recognition from the AVA Digital Awards,” said Paul Helton, director of LED FastStart. “Our mission is to provide our in-state job creators with the effective workforce development and training tools so they are ready on day one. I’m proud that our team’s efforts are not only producing results in practice, but that they are also receiving recognition for their high quality and creativity from AVA Digital.”

The AVA Digital Awards are administered and judged by the Association of Marketing and Communication Professionals. With several thousand members in the marketing, communication, advertising, public relations and media production fields, the association manages several recognition programs, providing judges and rewarding outstanding achievement and service to the various segments of the marketing and communication professions.

“The inventive and effective submissions from LED FastStart exemplify the creativity of the AVA Digital awards,” said Ed Dalheim, director of AVA Digital Awards. “As digital communications have evolved, they are becoming more interactive and visually compelling, enhancing the delivery of information. LED FastStart’s efforts embody this evolution so well, as they utilize a wide array of multimedia tools to support workforce development objectives in Louisiana.”

For expanding companies in target industries, FastStart tailors comprehensive recruiting, screening, training and orientation solutions that enable a company’s new employees to be fully prepared for the launch of new operations from day one. In August 2016, Business Facilities magazine judged the Louisiana program as the best offering from any state for the seventh year in a row, extending a streak that begin in 2010.

About AMCP
AMCP administers and judges several international competitions for marketing and communication professionals involved in the concept, writing and design of marketing and communication programs and print, visual and audio materials. Entries come from corporate marketing and communication departments, advertising agencies, PR firms, design shops, production companies and freelancers. AMCP’s membership consists of the several thousand people and organizations who have entered the MarCom Awards, Hermes Creative Awards and AVA Awards. Each entrant’s fee goes toward the administration and judging of the awards programs. For more information, visit http://amcpros.com/.