More than ever before, manufacturers need a well-trained labor pool from which to draw.  But as technology advances and production techniques are enhanced, new gaps are emerging between the level of training within the labor pool and that required by various industries.  This skilled labor deficit is at least partly the result of manufacturing’s poor image as a career choice, or the “sweatshop stigma”. 

High school counselors, students, and the general public have often been slow to recognize the improved, technology-driven career opportunities in manufacturing.  Studies have documented that many students still see manufacturing workers as mere assembly line automatons rather than a valued part of a production team.  They fail to recognize that today’s manufacturer values brain over brawn-that many jobs require not only communication skills, but organizational, mathematical, and critical thinking skills as well.

“Doing the same thing over and over” and “no hope of advancement” were two common responses amount students who were asked about their perception of careers in manufacturing.

According to a recent Labor Deportment study, while the United States produces highly competent lawyers, doctors, scientists, accountants, and other professionals, “the U.S. is losing the competitive race” in the non-college educated sector of the workforce.

By and large, high schools are still teaching college preparedness rather than educating students who are considering industry as a career.  Educators tent to emphasize fashionable post-industrial skills, such as a computer programming, rather than careers that require hands-on mechanical machining.  In addition, television glamorizes high-salary professions such as law and medicine, not manufacturing careers.

Manufacturers are employing a number of methods to break the sweatshop stigma and improve the poor image of manufacturing careers in general.  In 1991, the Upstate New York Roundtable on Manufacturing commissioned and distributed to area schools a video called “Making It”.  The video’s primary goal was to “dispel students’ negative image of industrial work”.  More recently, a four-lesson hands-on curriculum entitled “What’s Up in Factories?  Exploring the New World of Manufacturing”, was developed and released by public television in New York.  The video showcases the human dimension of manufacturing and features footage of state-of-the-art manufacturing and design facilities.

Other programs link schoolteachers with local firms for one- to six-week summer internships to acquaint them with the real world of manufacturing.  Schools and manufacturers are even forming partnerships in which schools provide continuing education for manufacturing employees.  these cooperative arrangements allow school faculty to brush up on the latest job skill requirements for local companies, provide a service for the manufacturer, and educate their students on needs in the real world as well.

Programs like “Project SMART”, which combines traditional academic courses with exposure to the manufacturing plant floor and production, are also being implemented.  Such programs are designed to develop a strong academic base while introducing manufacturing-related technologies and skills.

Students in The Ford Academy of Manufacturing Sciences, launched by Ford Motor Company, study economics, the history of manufacturing, manufacturing processes, statistics, and the application of technology in the workplace.  The academy emphasizes problem solving, teamwork, hands-on learning, and the use of computers in manufacturing.  Designed to interest high school juniors and seniors in applied technology and manufacturing careers, the project has now been expanded to include eight high schools.

In addition to forming partnerships with schools and promoting cooperative education, manufacturers are intensifying their efforts to boost the age-old practice of apprenticeships.  Apprenticeships, which are usually longer and more intensive than cooperative education, provide a hands-on, real-world experience through which students learn in the learn in the real world of manufacturing-with a planned, sequential course of training and work experiences.  The manufacturer usually bears the cost of apprenticeships, while the cost of cooperative high school training programs is often shared by government and industry.

enlightened self-interest is being seen by many manufacturers as the key to solving the growing skilled labor deficit.  Firms are not waiting for Washington-they are appealing to prospective workers themselves.  They realize that many students will not naturally gravitate towards manufacturing since they have no idea of what manufacturing is all about and have little opportunity to find out.

These manufacturers are trying to offset the skilled labor deficit by “taking the kids to work”-letting high school students and even younger students to see first hand the truly amazing technology employed in manufacturing today.  They know that students who love computers may also be impressed by the size, sophistication and complexity of modern manufacturing technology.

Faced with a limited number of potential workers, manufacturers probably can’t eliminate the skilled labor deficit.  But by working together-with other manufacturers, the schools, and local government-much can be done to reduce it.

What Manufacturers Can Do to Enhance the Skilled Labor Pool

  *  Create and enhance relationships between industry and high schools, technical schools, and other post-secondary institutions by establishing and promoting cooperative education, apprenticeships, continuing education and similar programs.

  *  Promote and emphasize the importance of basic math and science skills among all students.

  *  Participate in public awareness campaigns that let students know that manufacturing careers offer challenges, security, good wages, benefits, and a real opportunity to make an impact.

Visions of smokestack industries, heavy manual labor, dead-end jobs, and repetitive work must be erased.

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