Play Video

Manufacturing Skills Gap

Advances in training haven't kept up with advances in technology

It’s a familiar issue: advances in training haven't kept up with advances in technology.
What companies are doing to fill the skills gap in manufacturing

Manufacturing careers pay about $15,000 more than the rest of the private sector, and manufacturing can provide job security and upward mobility like no other industry.

Mike Molnar is the director of the Office of Advanced Manufacturing with the National Institute of Standards and Technology, an agency reporting to the U.S. Department of Commerce. He reiterates the need for talent, “Even in the depths of the Great Recession, and even today, the number one problem cited by manufacturers is finding people with the right skills. Not anything else. It’s finding people with the right skills.”

So what’s the problem? It’s a familiar issue: advances in training haven’t kept up with advances in technology. But regardless of the how, manufacturers still need to produce products and humans need to be a big part of the equation.

One answer, giant companies like Toyota have committed to addressing this issue by training workers to operate advanced systems. And smaller businesses like Xometry have transformed their models to take advantage of the technology to assist their clients.

Another solution, companies seeking skilled workers have been looking to veterans to fill the void. Each year 250,000 service members enter the civilian workforce and organizations such as Workshops for Warriors are committed to assisting veterans and transitioning service members into advanced manufacturing careers.

Resources: Workshops for Warriors: https://wfw.org/
Toyota training program: http://bit.ly/FutureWorkToyotaModel
Xometry model: http://bit.ly/CraftingFuture

Additional Videos is our signature digital series that shines the spotlight on the most innovative initiatives helping to train and re-skill Americans for the most in-demand jobs now and in the future.

Additional Videos

Dana Beth Ardi

Executive Committee

Dana Beth Ardi, PhD, Executive Committee, is a thought leader and expert in the fields of executive search, talent management, organizational design, assessment, leadership and coaching. As an innovator in the human capital movement, Ardi creates enhanced value in companies by matching the most sought after talent with the best opportunities. Ardi coaches boards and investors on the art and science of building high caliber management teams. She provides them with the necessary skills to seek out and attract top-level management, to design the ideal organizational architectures and to deploy people against strategy. Ardi unearths the way a business works and the most effective way for people to work in them.

Ardi is an experienced business executive and senior consultant who leverages business organizational transformation through talent strategies. She uses her knowledge and experience to develop talent strategies to enhance revenue and profit contributions. She has a deep expertise in change management and organizational effectiveness and has designed and built high performance cultures. Ardi has significant experience in mergers, acquisitions, divestitures, IPO’s and turnarounds.

Ardi is an expert on the multi-generational workforce. She understands the four intersecting generations of workers coming together in contemporary companies, each with their own mindsets, leadership and communications styles, values and motivations. Ardi is sought after to assist companies manage and thrive by bringing the generations together. Her book, Fall of the Alphas: How Beta Leaders Win Through Connection, Collaboration and Influence, will be published by St. Martin’s Press. The book reflects Ardi’s deep expertise in understanding organizations and our changing society. It focuses on building a winning culture, how companies must grow and evolve, and how talent influences and shapes communities of work. This is what she has coined “Corporate Anthropology.” It is a playbook on how modern companies must meet challenges – culturally, globally, digitally, across genders and generations.

Ardi is currently the Managing Director and Founder of Corporate Anthropology Advisors, LLC, a consulting company that provides human capital advisory and innovative solutions to companies building value through people. Corporate Anthropology works with organizations, their cultures, the way they grow and develop, and the people who are responsible for forming their communities of work.

Prior to her position at Corporate Anthropology Advisors, Ardi served as a Partner/Managing Director at the private equity firms CCMP Capital and JPMorgan Partners. She was a partner at Flatiron Partners, a venture capital firm working with early state companies where she pioneered the human capital role within an investment portfolio.

Ardi holds a BS from the State University of New York at Buffalo as well as a Masters degree and PhD from Boston College. She started her career as professor at the Graduate Center at Fordham University in New York.