Warning:
Vocational Classes Falling Out of Favor
Decline in Technical Education a Serious Threat to U.S.
Manufacturing Capabilities
By Robert M. Williamson, president of
Strategic Work
Systems
How can we continue to ignore the decline of one of the
fundamentals of our society: Manufacturing generates
wealth? Since 1999, the percentage of U.S. gross
domestic product attributed to manufacturing has slid
from 16% to 14%. Manufacturing’s share of the national
income, which was 29% in 1950, declined to 15% in 2000.
Manufacturing job loss has been devastating. In an
equipment-intensive operation, reliable equipment is a
money machine and unreliable equipment is a money pit.
Look at the workforce: The lack of job- and
equipment-specific skills and knowledge in today’s
manufacturing workplace is reaching alarming levels. The
public vocational-technical training infrastructure is
but a shadow of its former grandeur. Here’s what others
are saying:
“Companies Repeat Mistake of Cutting Investment in
Workers” (USA Today – The Forum November 4, 2003)
“Vocational Classes Fall out of Favor” (Fox News 22 Sept
2004)
“A Smart Path that Isn’t College: The answer might be
vocational education” (USA Today – The Forum January 10,
2005)
“Going, Going, Gone? Recent Trends in Technology Teacher
Education Programs” (Journal of Technical Education
Spring 1997)
“Education Overlooked in Jobs Debate: New Skills Sets
Key to Success” (US Chamber of Commerce July 2004)
“Skills Standards Take Aim at Workforce Crisis”
(Managing Automation Magazine)
“Manufacturing Skills Crisis: Solutions for This
National Challenge” (National Coalition for Advanced
Manufacturing report November 2003)
“Trade Services jobs are Plentiful” (Dallas Morning News
September 7, 2004)
“Finding fewer and fewer competent workers,
manufacturers can control their own destiny and close
the skills gap by developing training programs that
leverage newer learning technologies.” (December 2004,
Managing Automation Magazine)
“Baby-boom retirements and new technologies in the
manufacturing sector over the next decade will open up
millions of jobs in the advanced manufacturing,
high-performance manufacturing sector for workers with
the ‘right skills’.” (National Coalition for Advanced
Manufacturing report November 2003)
“The only way in which the U.S. can remain competitive
over the long term with the low-wage, high-skills
countries such as China is to make aggressive use of
innovation, technology, and workforce education and
training to achieve higher rates of productivity growth
and lower unit labor costs.” (National Coalition for
Advanced Manufacturing report, November 2003)
“Installation, maintenance and repair occupations will
add 776,000 jobs, growing by 13.6% between 2002 and
2012. In addition, replacements will be needed for over
1 million jobs. Auto service technicians, mechanics,
general maintenance and repair workers will account for
more than 40% of the jobs.” (Bureau of Labor Statistics,
Occupational Outlook Handbook 2004-2005 Edition)
Now is the time for fast, focused, and sustainable gains
in productivity and cost reductions by improving
equipment reliability. We must aggressively improve
productivity and lower our manufacturing costs. This
means that the entire organization must make a conscious
decision to eliminate waste to reduce manufacturing cost
(a “Lean” fundamental). For those of us in maintenance ,
that means working with the rest of the organization to
identify and eliminate the causes of equipment downtime
(planned and unplanned), improve equipment efficiency,
and eliminate defects while lowering maintenance and
operating costs of the business’s single largest
investment: equipment and facilities.
How? By first focusing on the most critica l,
constraint, high-maintenance-cost,
high-downtime-equipment, big return-on-investments that
can be had: revenue generated, resources freed-up,
productivity increased, and costs reduced. How? Identify
the causes of equipment performance and reliability
problems. Look for signs that equipment-specific skills
and knowledge gaps or highly inefficient work practices
that contribute to the problems. The lack of proper
operations and maintenance skills and knowledge can
result in serious, chronic equipment problems no matter
how good your planning and scheduling, preventive
maintenance and predictive maintenance processes, CMMS
and work orders, no mater how well your MRO parts and
supplies are maintained. People cause equipment problems
by their actions and their decisions.
Without a robust vocational-technical education and
training infrastructure in the U.S., with vocational
education falling out of favor, with fewer and fewer
young people being encouraged to learn a skill and
pursue a career in manufacturing, it is only a matter of
time before we lose our manufacturing capability in the
U.S. Your company, your plant, your leadership, and your
fellow employees can make a difference right now. Train
and qualify your employees at all levels to be able to
address equipment-specific issues right the first time.
Focus your training and qualification efforts on the
core skills and equipment specific skills required to
keep your most critical equipment running like it’s
supposed to run, first time, every time. If you don’t
know how or don’t have the time, ask for help from
professional industrial educators and trainers. Reliable
equipment is the foundation for competitive
manufacturing. People with the right skills and
knowledge using proven best practices can keep equipment
reliable, lowering costs and improving your competitive
position. The time is now! |
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