Overcoming the Skills Gap in Manufacturing
Strategies for meeting current workers’ expectations
With one of the key challenges facing industrial employers being worker retention, it’s important to look at specific strategies that you can use to keep your current workforce satisfied. By implementing the following strategies in your workplace, you’ll have a higher chance of retaining your current operations and maintenance personnel.
In addition, these strategies will also help you use your current workforce to close the skills gap within your organization.
Use collaborative leadership strategies
The “command and control” approach that people commonly associate with managers and supervisors is viewed as far less acceptable today than it was in the past. As such, leadership strategies within your organization will likely need to see some change, particularly as the workforce becomes more saturated with the Millennial generation.
More and more, people are coming to expect leaders to collaborate with their employees and coach them. That isn’t a bad thing. In fact, collaborative working environments have been shown to make companies five times more likely to perform well.
On top of retaining employees and improving performance, this type of leadership also provides coaching opportunities for individual workers, making it a powerful way to help close the skills gap.
Get workers certified
Investing in your current workforce can be a powerful way to improve retention while closing the skills gap. Most employees want professional development opportunities, and getting them certified can be a great way to do that.
For instance, the following certifications are excellent for maintenance technicians:
- CMRT (Certified Maintenance & Reliability Technician), which is great for technicians in general.
- CMRP (Certified Maintenance & Reliability Professional), for those who want to advance to supervisor.
- IMI Certification, another good all-around maintenance professional certification program.
By investing in these and other certification programs, you’ll give your workers plenty of opportunities to develop their skills and meet the ever-evolving demands of the modern industrial workplace.
Provide continuous training
On top of certification, providing continuous training within your organization is an excellent way to fill the pipeline. It gives your current employees an opportunity to develop their skills and abilities, and it also helps you keep experienced workers around longer. This allows veterans to train the workers you’ll hire down the road.
It will also help you keep on top of developing technologies, as they transform your workplace. By having a system in place for continuous employee development, you make the adoption of new technologies and methods more streamlined; thereby making improvement a core part of your corporate culture.
The training process can range from regular safety instruction, to paying for advanced degrees and certification. The key is to invest in your current workers’ development and give them opportunities to progress.
Show appreciation
Actively showing appreciation toward workers can boost morale at the workplace and improve productivity. Studies have shown that when gratitude is implemented in the workplace, it leads to numerous benefits, including:
- Less stress
- Fewer sick days
- Higher morale
- Improved job satisfaction
The end result is a happier workforce that completes more work and is more likely to stick around for the long haul, keeping experience and skills within your organization.
Improve planning
One final tactic that can help your employees stay in your facility and bridge the skill gap is improving planning. This can be a major issue since poor planning can not only negatively impact productivity, but also can make work less satisfying.
For instance, a maintenance technician who has to wait around for instructions or supplies, or make repetitive trips back from a job site, is likely to experience frustration, as they accomplish very little. By streamlining workflows with careful maintenance planning, those obstacles and frustrations are eliminated, leading to a higher level of satisfaction that comes from completing tasks successfully.
Improving planning requires communication. Often, that can come straight from your workers. If they are able to discuss the obstacles they encounter in their day-to-day tasks, you’ll have an easier time making sure those obstacles are dealt with in an effective manner.
Tips for attracting new qualified workers
The above tactics can help you keep your current employees satisfied while enabling them to gain needed skills, but they can also be used to attract new employees as well. Providing the promise of a satisfying workplace with plenty of opportunities for growth can make your facility a likely option for those seeking careers in manufacturing.
In addition to providing training, certification, and a solid collaborative culture, the following tactics can further help you attract qualified employees.
Partner with community colleges
Local community colleges and trade schools can play an effective role in creating a talent pipeline for your organization. Try reaching out to give their students opportunities for internships, apprenticeships, and job shadowing within your workplace. In addition, it may be worthwhile to take small groups of students on tours through your facility, giving them an idea of what working in your company would be like.
Create clear job descriptions
When you create job listings, it will be important to make sure they include clear descriptions. Make sure you are specific about what the position will entail, what requirements you need, and so forth.
In particular, you’ll want to make sure you elicit applications from people with the right amount of experience. For instance, if you need someone with two years of experience, don’t list the job as being open to all experience levels. Doing that will just make the hiring process more time-intensive, as you sift out a multitude of unqualified applicants.
Be transparent
Transparency is vital when creating job listings and interviewing candidates. Make sure you’re upfront about workplace conditions, safety requirements, and so forth. Doing so will allow applicants to know exactly what they’re getting into when they apply for jobs at your facility. Additionally, it helps facilitate team trust.
Recruit through your employees
A powerful tactic for recruiting new skilled workers is to have your employees invite people they know to apply. Of course, this only works if your employees are happy working with you. If they are, it can be a great way to source the talent you need for your facility. As you find people in this manner, they’ll be more likely to stay, since they already have existing relationships with your current workers.
Invest in apprenticeship programs
Apprenticeships and internships can be a great way to help train new hires into the skills they need to thrive in your facility. That way, you don’t have to rely strictly on those who already have training (of whom there are fewer than in former years). Instead, you’ll have the flexibility of hiring complete novices and training them yourself. It takes a bit of upfront investment, but it can be worthwhile, especially if you work to retain your current employees.
The bottom line
To summarize, the key to overcoming the skills gap is to meet the needs of your employees. That can be achieved by doing the following:
- Create a corporate culture based on collaboration and transparency.
- Invest in professional development and growth.
- Meet employee expectations and show recognition for their hard work.
- Reduce frustrations and obstacles in the workplace.
- Be transparent during the hiring process.
Forming partnerships with educational institutions and creating a talent pipeline through sound hiring practices can further help your organization close the skills gap and get the right talent on board.
Of course, the ultimate takeaway here is that if you take care of your employees, they’ll take care of you.
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Employers in manufacturing and other industrial settings are struggling more and more to find skilled labor to meet current workplace demands. There is a shortage of skilled workers to draw from, and many of those who are currently employed are likely to retire in the next decade. In addition, technology is evolving to the point where the skills needed in modern work environments are changing dramatically.
The end result is a widening skills gap within various industries, and that gap is proving to be a significant challenge. However, there are ways to overcome the skills gap, many of which have to do with focusing on what employees want most from their employers.
Here, we’ll discuss how to overcome the skills gap by meeting your employees’ needs.
The number one challenge – the skills gap
The widening skills gap is the result of numerous factors coming into play in modern industrial environments. These factors range from aging workers, to the ever-evolving nature of technology and what that means for the workplace.
Retiring workers
An estimated 10,000 workers reach the age of 65 every day, meaning a large portion of the workforce is likely to retire in the next decade or so. That means manufacturers will need to replace many of their aging workers, as years progress.
Retaining workers
Likely due in part to the large number of workers retiring, retaining existing workers, in general, is one of the greatest challenges facing manufacturers today. In a survey conducted by Plant Services in 2019, 47% of their 200 respondents stated that retaining their existing workforce was one of their biggest challenges.
Difficulty filling positions
As more positions are left vacant, the task of filling those positions also becomes more difficult. The same Plant Services survey indicated that finding skilled workers was the number one challenge facing manufacturers and other industrial organizations. In addition, another study found that an estimated 2.4 million manufacturing jobs will remain unfilled between 2018 and 2028, forcing employers to find alternatives.
Lack of qualified applicants
A significant part of the difficulty behind finding qualified applicants is the fact that most people aren’t currently looking for work in manufacturing. The vast majority of parents don’t encourage their children to pursue manufacturing careers (according to the National Association of Manufacturers), and trade and vocational schools aren’t usually recommended to students. The end result is a shortage of skilled labor for manufacturers to draw from.
Training new workers
Compounding that problem is the fact that those who are hired to fill vacant positions require training, which can take a couple of months. Even then, a significant portion of workplace injuries (about 28%) occur among those who have only been at their job for a year, making it worthwhile to keep existing workers on board.
Keeping up with evolving responsibilities
One final difficulty that’s contributing to the ever-widening skills gap is the evolving nature of industrial environments themselves. With the hours spent using technology-related skills projected to increase by 55% worldwide by 2030 (along with a projected decrease in basic physical skills usage), the demands of modern workplaces are changing.
In addition, high-level cognitive and social skills are also projected to increase in demand. As such, finding workers who have those technical, cognitive, and social skills is yet another concern.
The solution: Meeting workers’ needs
Fortunately, there are ways to meet these challenges and close the skills gap in manufacturing. The key is to focus on people and what they truly need. The better your workplace can fulfill the needs and desires of its workers, the more likely you’ll be to attract and keep skilled workers.
Some of the items that have the most positive impact on workers include:
Many of these factors come down to your workplace’s culture. By making sure your workplace has a culture that encourages transparency, collaboration, and development, your organization will be more likely to attract skilled workers and keep them long term.
Each of these items is discussed in more detail below.
Business practices in line with personal values
More and more, employees are coming to see their workplaces within the larger context of the global community. They regard businesses as citizens of the world as a whole, and while they may not necessarily look for places whose practices line up with their beliefs, they do tend to exhibit more loyalty toward companies who share their values.
Provide opportunities for growth
Growth and advancement are important to people looking for work these days. “Dead-end” jobs hold very little appeal for modern employees, which means it should be made absolutely clear what it takes to advance within a company.
For instance, a maintenance technician may want to advance to the position of supervisor, so they’ll often give preference to organizations that provide clear information on what it will take to get there.
Take ideas seriously
More and more people are seeing leadership differently. In former years, the role of a boss as a taskmaster with absolute control was the common expectation. Today, people seek more collaborative leadership structures, where managers and supervisors seek input from others when making important decisions.
Put simply, the more that employees feel that their input matters, the more likely they are to find fulfillment in their work and stay within the company.
Recognize employees' work
In connection with feeling like their ideas matter, employees want to feel like the work they complete makes a difference as well. Showing recognition for your employees’ work not only helps them to see that their time and effort is being noticed, but also lets them know that their leaders are aware of them. Ultimately, this builds loyalty within your organization.
Transparency
One of the more profoundly cultural factors that keep people on board with your company is transparent and clear communication. From your initial interview discussing the job and its requirements to day-to-day communication on workplace tasks, the common thread should be openness and clarity.
It ultimately comes down to trustworthiness. If your employees can feel that they can rely on you to be honest with them and give them clear instructions, they’ll be more likely to trust you, building loyalty and worker retention.
Compensation
Lastly, as important as everything else is—and it is vital—compensation is still a factor to consider. The idea here is employees should receive the amount of compensation that they’d expect for their labors, including wages and benefits. That doesn’t mean you have to overpay everyone, but neither should you attempt to extract labor from your workers at a discount.
Essentially, if you invest in your employees (particularly the good ones), they’ll repay you with quality work and a solid commitment to helping your company succeed.