Tag: Guest Blogger

What To Do About Millennials & Generation Z in the Manufacturing Workplace

Post: Jan. 29, 2019

 

By Guest Blogger: Skip Weisman 

I continue to hear complaints from business owners about the younger “millennial” generation in the workplace. I find it comical. I really do.

There are a couple of reasons for this:

1) The “younger” generation has always been a problem in the workplace. Even the more senior/veteran generation in the current workplace was the problem in the workplace when they were the younger generation.

2) This “younger” millennial generation is currently leading some of the largest, most highly valued companies in the world, so they can’t be all bad. I’m talking about people like, Facebook’s Mark Zuckerberg, and:

  • Lyft found John Zimmer, 34
  • Spotify founder Daniel Ek, 35
  • Instagram founder, Mike Krieger, 32
  • WordPress founder, Matthew Mullenweg, 34

Before you give me a hard time that it’s all men in that list, check out this list of 15 female millennial and Generation Z (the generation after the Millennials) entrepreneurs you haven’t heard of yet, but you may very soon.

3) A generation is a very long window of time, between 15-20 years. As I have posited to my audiences in my seminars on this topic, “do you think an older Millennial at 35 years of age, has the same needs, desires, and interests as a 21 year old Millennial?” They all agree the answer is “no.”

My point is that there are good and bad people in every generation, there are wide variances in needs, desires, and interests across the timeline of people in each generation. It’s time to stop blasting an entire generation.

Do those in the Millennial generation and Generation Z have different attitudes, habits, work ethics, and interests than those in the older generation? Absolutely! 

Is the younger generation growing up without an interest in working with their hands beyond typing on a keyboard or using their thumbs to communicate? Absolutely!

Is this going to make it harder for manufacturing companies to find qualified, skilled, and already trained workers to step into roles? Absolutely!

Just like every younger generation always has different quirks than the older generation. 

Yes, it may be more acute than ever for manufacturers and other trade industries because of the dearth in fundamental skills required in those work environments, but it’s not impossible to overcome.

It starts with a mindset shift on the part of the leaders of the manufacturing firms. Instead of expecting ready made machinists, welders, and others needed in a manufacturing process, it may require an expectation of finding those who want an opportunity to learn a trade and invest in them first.

This may have some advantages:

  • They come with little or no bad habits in doing your type of work.
  • You can mold them to be what you need them to be and teach them your way from the beginning.
  • They become pretty loyal since you and those at your company gave them a chance and became their mentor.

Every generation comes into the work environment with some deficiencies that cause challenges for those in charge and need to get things done. It’s just our turn now to be on that side.

Some may remember that back in the 1950s and early 60s when the older generation was thinking Elvis Presley and the Beatles were undermining society?

At the beginning of the 1970s the flower children of the late 60s came into the workforce with an attitude to “not trust anyone over 30.”

Not long after I started my small business coaching and consulting,  about 10 years ago, I had a client who complained to me about the work ethic and the focus of his Gen Y employees.

His complaint was that they weren’t motivated enough for advancement. They were too complacent and comfortable and only wanted to focus on their personal life and family. They weren’t ambitious enough for him.

Now, this generation, for some, is too ambitious. They have an “entitlement” mentality, think they know it all and should be advancing before they’re ready.*

You can’t have it both ways.  And, I will argue you should want more of the latter and less of the former. They’re easier to mold and coach to become what they want and what you may need.

I say embrace that latter mentality and use it to your company’s advantage.

Every one of my clients has at least one young millennial who is a superstar at their company, pushing older generation folks to get better, faster, up to speed on technology.

I think that’s a good thing.

Maybe the problem isn’t the younger generation in the workforce but the older generation doing the hiring.

And, remember, if you’re still worried about the Millennial generation in the workplace, it’s too late. You better start learning about Generation Z, which is already starting to infiltrate the workplace.  

*(SIDE NOTE: You may also have the alternative “entitlement” mentality. That’s the other end of the generation scale with veteran employees who expect to have their job and their salary increases without improving their skills, keeping up with technology, not expecting to have to bring any additional value to the company as they wait for the calendar to turn the page to retirement.)

Eric Armenat and Mike McQueeney on Corporate Turnarounds

Post: Nov. 8, 2018

 

By Guest Bloggers Noa Simons and Luke Stangel, Upstate Capital Association of New York 

Eric Armenat spent decades building a successful career in aerospace manufacturing before he began embarking on corporate turnarounds. After successfully turning around a family-run healthcare business, Armenat took on a large-scale incineration with a dysfunctional management team before landing in his current role as President and CEO of Buffalo-based Multisorb, a leading manufacturer of oxygen and moisture absorption products.

When he started at Multisorb, Eric found a long-running company that was well regarded by customers, despite its high costs and 8-week lead time on orders. From the outside, the company seemed stable, but behind the scenes, Multisorb was struggling financially, with a management team that insisted on building manufacturing plants in Alabama and the U.K., with plans to build a new facility in India.

That didn’t make sense to Armenat, who halted the company’s expansion plans and closed its ancillary plants, focusing instead on improving its manufacturing base in Buffalo.  Within a year, Multisorb trimmed its global workforce from 678 to 470 people, while simultaneously growing its revenue by $14 million, Armenat says. He’s inspired by Amazon’s warehouse operations, which he called a “leaned out, wire-tight, cost-effective process.”

“What’s the gap? What’s preventing you from flowing information, or flowing a production process, so it doesn’t stop from the time it starts to the time it ends?” Armenat says. The company studied “how long it took at each step and why it took so long. So what we’re working on now is a three-day order cycle. If you call today, I’ll get it on my machines later today, and have it on that dock and ready to go on the third day. That’s the vision, and now you work on everything preventing you from achieving that.”

Summer Street Capital brought Eric into the business along with a private equity investment. Mike McQueeney, Managing Partner, shares that Summer Street’s hands-on approach to corporate turnarounds is somewhat unique among its peers, some of whom have earned a reputation for improving a company’s bottom line by slashing budgets and cutting headcount.

“We don’t want to do business with everybody,” McQueeney says. “We’ve learned this over time. There are people who want help and people who don’t want help. People who are open to learning and improving their businesses? Then that’s a great fit. But management teams that give us the Heisman [block]? Not a good fit for us.

“Having a cooperative partnership, which is what we have most of the time, is a great fit for us.”

Both Eric and Mike will talk about their experiences turning companies around on November 15 in Buffalo, NY at Upstate Capital’s “Under the Hood” event.  Everyone is welcome to attend to learn more and network with investors and business leaders across Upstate New York.

Tomorrow’s Technology and Skill Sets: A Perpetual State of Flux

Post: Oct. 25, 2018

By Guest Blogger Elisha Tropper

The World Economic Forum recently released their Future of Jobs 2018 report which simultaneously hailed and warned about the imminence of what it refers to as the Fourth Industrial Revolution.  This revolution refers to the technological advancement across all aspects of society that will substantially disrupt the labor requirements and, by extension, the workforce and its livelihoods, across all industries. The disruption, according to the study, will ultimately net a positive number of new jobs, but will “entail difficult transitions for millions of workers and the need for proactive investment in developing a new surge of agile learners and skilled talent globally.”

Regardless of which sector of the economy you occupy, it is crystal clear that automation is no longer an option. It must be an essential focus of every single business, from manufacturing and medicine to accounting and transportation. Like transformative implementable philosophies such as Lean Manufacturing and Continuous Improvement, the effective design and execution of automated solutions in any organization can only result from a forward-thinking, company-wide cultural shift. As the WEF study so pointedly observes, the rise in robotics and automation will eliminate human tasks, not jobs.

“As has been the case throughout economic history, such augmentation of existing jobs through technology is expected to create wholly new tasks—from app development to piloting drones to remotely monitoring patient health to certified care workers—opening up opportunities for an entirely new range of livelihoods for workers.”  In other words, employees need not fear for their jobs per se; they need to understand that flexibility and continuous training for new tasks will be the new norm – if it’s not already.

For businesses, the challenge is to strike the balance between maximizing current output, investing in new technologies, and preparing its workforce for a future that will require different skill sets and knowledge bases.  Just as machine operators incrementally replaced manual laborers along the production line, so too will the developers, programmers, builders, and installers of smart technologies replace the current machine operators.  The fact is that the implementation of new technologies drives business growth AND both job creation and the altering of existing positions, but only if the business can provide the proper vision and new-skills-based-training to a motivated and adaptable workforce.

Most companies will face significant challenges as they pursue a new equilibrium. It is inevitable that skill gaps and the disruption they carry will emerge at all levels, from the boardroom to the factory floor.  These skill gaps will have the potential to wreak havoc across companies, workforces, and even entire communities.  It is up to the management of every company to anticipate what is coming, embrace its imminence, and develop transformation plans that encompass solutions at both the process and people level.  The successful companies of the future are those who recognize today the requirements of tomorrow, all the while understanding that both technologies and skill sets are permanently in a perpetual state of flux.

Elisha Tropper is the CEO of Cambridge Security Seals, a Pomona, New York-based manufacturer of tamper-evident security devices.

A Value Proposition with an Altruistic Twist

Post: Sep. 19, 2018

 

By Guest Blogger Stephen Casa 

Last month I wrote about the incredible opportunity businesses have to find and cultivate talent, by partnering with a local BOCES. This month I’d love to tell you what happens at one and how you can benefit. I’ll use Ulster BOCES as an example.

Ulster BOCES provides cost effective solutions to eight component school districts by offering programming for students and adults, professional development for educators, and much more. There are close to thirty, industry specific, programs offered at the Career & Technical Center, Hudson Valley Pathways Academy and Special Education Center.

Instructors and staff in these programs are highly skilled in that area, in fact, many come directly from industry with many still actively engaged. Students are given the opportunity to learn and be trained on the most current and innovative technology using industry vetted curriculum. Students are also offered authentic experiences in the local workforce such as field trips, guest speakers, job shadowing, mentoring, internships, etc. These are all managed by a workplace learning coordinator. Ulster BOCES collaborates with the county workforce development office to ensure our future workforce has the soft skills necessary to be successful in the workplace.

As you can see, a partnership with your local BOCES can be a cost effective, value add for your company.   

In 1948, the New York State legislature created Boards of Cooperative Educational Services (BOCES) to provide shared educational programs and services to school districts within the state. Today there are 37 BOCES that are partnering with nearly all of the state’s school districts to help meet students’ evolving educational needs through cost-effective and relevant programs. Learn more and find a BOCES program near you here.

     Stephen Casa
     Workplace Learning Coordinator
     Ulster BOCES
     scasa@ulsterboces.org
     www.ulsterboces.org