National Skills Summit
Innovative Initiatives: Manufacturing
Chapter 4: Introduction
Manufacturing
Although manufacturing has lost nearly one-half million jobs since its 1997 peak, there remain 18.5 million jobs in this sector, and a 1997 National Association of Manufacturers' (NAM) survey found that the overwhelming majority of respondents had a shortage of skilled workers. Demand for employees in the durable goods manufacturing sector is particularly strong. The Federal Reserve Districts report that shortages of labor are constraining output for manufacturers in most regions of the country.
The NAM survey found that the most common reason their employers rejected applicants was their lack of relevant technical skills and work experience. However, a full third of rejected candidates were not hired because of inadequate reading or writing skills; and nearly one-quarter of applicants were not hired because of poor communication or math skills. Most of the surveyed firms had not used human resource strategies to attract new workers, but more than half of the companies surveyed had put programs in place to retrain present workers and/or raise entry-level salaries or wages. Nearly half of manufacturers surveyed invested at least two percent of payroll in training their shop floor and other hourly workers.
The following practices illustrate the industry's creativity in altering tried and true training methods to meet the demands of today's manufacturing industry.
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