Innovation and Technology

For Ketchie President and Owner Courtney Silver, retention all starts with culture. “I’m really happy to be here” is a phrase she hears often on her shop floor—and it tells her that the work culture at her company is in good shape.

• “A culture of empowerment that’s built on trust really fuels our team I think,” said Silver, who is the chair of the NAM’s Small and Medium Manufacturers Group. “They find so much dignity and purpose in fulfilling our mission here at Ketchie.”

Maintaining a high-performing, motivated and engaged workforce is a top priority for the third-generation precision machine shop in Concord, North Carolina, and Silver has implemented a number of strategies to keep it that way.

Team recognition: Every Wednesday, during Ketchie’s shift meeting, employees have the opportunity to recognize their team members for any achievement, big or small.

• “Recognition can be about anything,” says Silver. “It can be ‘Fred over there was able to cut five minutes of cycle time off this particular part because he changed the process’ or ‘Mary saved us money by switching out some tooling.’ We then post the feedback in the break room and email it out to the entire organization.”

• “There are so many things that can go wrong in manufacturing just trying to get a part out the door, and this is an opportunity to think about all the amazing things we’re doing,” she explained.

Silver also posts worker productivity charts every week. If workers meet their productivity goals and their indirect time goals, they get performance points, which are redeemable for gift cards.

• “I think people want to know if they’re on a winning team,” Silver said. “If you’re winning, it feels good. We’re all on the bus going in the same direction.”

Motivator Award: Each year, employees can also nominate a peer for the “Motivator Award,” which goes to the employee who best exemplifies Ketchie’s core values: to do the right thing, be agile and embrace continuous improvement.

• To honor the winner, Silver puts together a tribute video of team members sharing their thoughts about the employee and hosts a company brunch in celebration (to which the employee’s family is invited).

• “The winner also receives their own special parking spot, an extra day of vacation and a $1,000 gift certificate to the Marriott to take vacation with their family,” says Silver.

• “The team member that won the award last year had tears in his eyes, so I know that it’s been really impactful,” she continued.

Community service: Ketchie’s employees are passionate about giving back to the community. Through service projects, Ketchie supports the Boys & Girls Clubs of America as well as Cooperative Christian Ministry, which offers programs that relieve hunger and food insecurity and address homelessness and housing costs.

Opportunity Knocks: Silver isn’t only working to retain and support current employees, but also to train and mold the young people who will be tomorrow’s machinists.

• This year, Silver started an internship program for high school students named Opportunity Knocks. It allows students to shadow experienced machinists in factory environments while earning school credit.

• The interns go through a curriculum created by Edgerton Gear, Inc., called Craftsman with Character, a 16-week course that helps students explore the role of character in a professional trades environment. Silver said the course, which includes leadership and manufacturing-focused exercises, is taught at Ketchie four days a week in two-hour sessions. Three days of the week are job shadowing machinists on the shop floor, and one day is in a classroom setting at the shop discussing character traits and soft skills. The conversations lean on discovering what’s important in life and what might make them happy.

• “They absolutely love these high schoolers,” said Silver about the two mentors at Ketchie, who each have more than 30 years’ experience. “It gives them an opportunity to share their entire work career: what they’re doing, experiences learned along the way. It’s been neat to see.”

Investing in technology: Silver knows her team wants to work for a company that’s growing and investing in technology. She recently purchased a machine-tending collaborative robot, which takes over machinists’ “least favorite” part of the job—changing parts while the machines run.

• “I interviewed somebody recently who said to me in the interview, ‘It’s really good to see that you want to grow and that you’re making these big investments,’” said Silver. “You’re buying new technology that excites them. They want to be part of that mission and growth.”

The last word: Silver shared some advice for companies that might be struggling with workforce retention.

• “Use employee surveys, focus groups or roundtable discussions to see what you need to do or should do. Everyone wants to be heard. It’s important to listen.”

The NAM’s workforce development and education affiliate, the Manufacturing Institute, has many initiatives to help employers retain and develop their teams. For a deeper dive, check out this study by the MI on improving retention and employee engagement. The MI will also explore retention challenges and solutions at its Workforce Summit in Atlanta on Oct. 16–18. Click here for more information.

Lack of flexibility is a top workforce challenge for employees, according to a recent report released by the MI. To address this concern and help employees attract and retain more workers, the MI has been convening manufacturing leaders to discuss flexibility solutions, identify what’s working and share insights. Here are some of the key takeaways.

The shop floor challenge: Flexible work arrangements for shop floor workers are different from those offered to office staff or remote workers, as manufacturers must fulfill in-person production requirements and timelines.

• Companies have gotten creative, testing out different options including compressed work weeks, rotating schedules, flex scheduling, shift swapping and phased retirements.

A data-driven approach: Participants in the MI’s working group conducted surveys to gauge the types of flexibility their employees wanted. Companies then assessed production needs before determining what flexibility options they would test, sometimes with the help of a consultant.

• One company collected data on recruitment and retention as part of their pilot to help evaluate its effectiveness.
• Other companies utilized employee engagement surveys to assess the success of their pilots.

Support system: Companies in the working group talked about the importance of creating support structures for flexibility plans.

• For example, one company hired a training and scheduling coordinator to manage their new systems. Others employed technology platforms to organize shifts.
• Supervisors also needed to be trained to handle new systems and manage flexibility requests while meeting production demands, the participants noted.

Stay tuned: The MI is planning to release a white paper based on the working group discussions in the fall.

For Michael Canty, president and CEO of Alloy Precision Technologies, Inc., of Mentor, Ohio, the Environmental Protection Agency’s proposed air quality regulations are likely to backfire. They would put a significant burden on the natural gas industry, which has played a large part in America’s efforts to reduce pollution to date.

• “Natural gas is a fossil fuel, but it’s one of the cleanest fossil fuels,” said Canty. “It’s one of the reasons why this country has met clean air standards over the years.”

This is just one of the reasons why Canty, whose company produces industrial bellows, is concerned that policymakers haven’t fully considered the rules’ consequences.

Unintended consequences: Part of the problem with the EPA’s proposed regulations, according to Canty, is that they are likely to promote production in less regulated countries around the world and contribute to more emissions overall.

• “With some of these costly regulations, we’re driving our energy prices to a much higher level and driving production of business to places like China that are creating more emission,” said Canty. “So we’re creating worse air quality control around the world while losing jobs and stifling growth in our country.”

A push for innovation: Canty wants policies that spur innovation and tech development to achieve cleaner air, rather than imposing restrictive regulations.

• “The focus should be on encouraging new technology to drive efficiencies and reduce air pollutants,” said Canty. “If the cost of doing business goes up, you have less cash to put in that innovation. As the cost of energy goes up, the amount of energy innovation goes down—especially when you talk about small businesses.”

A plea for consistency: Businesses like Alloy Precision Technologies are also frustrated by the unstable regulatory environment, which seems to shift every few years.

• “When these policies change it makes it impossible for companies to make decisions about investing in equipment and smart manufacturing,” said Canty. “It disrupts the business marketplace, and it greatly affects our ability to produce and compete around the world.”

The last word: “Do I believe we ought to continue investing in newer technologies that will improve our air quality? Absolutely,” said Canty. “These regulations are well meant, but the end result will be disastrous for businesses and the United States.”

Today’s atmospheric pollution could become tomorrow’s building materials.

In February, Central Concrete, a subsidiary of Vulcan Materials Company, and carbon-removal firms Heirloom Carbon and CarbonCure, achieved an industry first: permanently trapping carbon dioxide from direct air capture in concrete using reclaimed-water technology.

How they did it: The firms took carbon dioxide captured from the air by Heirloom’s technology to a Central Concrete plant, and in a process developed by the Nova Scotia–headquartered CarbonCure, injected it into water that had been used to wash out concrete trucks. That water was then used to make new concrete.

• “Carbon dioxide reacts with calcium ions in the cement mix and turns into limestone—calcium carbonate,” said Alana Guzzetta, manager of Vulcan Materials Company’s National Research Laboratory in San Jose, California. “Once it’s there, it is very stable and stays as that limestone throughout the life of the concrete, even after demolition.”

Why it’s important: “Concrete is the most-used manmade material in the world,” Guzzetta said. “One reason is its versatility. We can take the same core ingredients and get a variety of capabilities and any shape. That’s where the topic of reducing embodied carbon [the greenhouse gases emitted during manufacturing and construction] becomes a big one.”

• The February demonstration captured approximately 66 pounds of carbon dioxide, or the equivalent of a car driving about 75 miles, according to reporting by Reuters.
• The process is also “going to better allow us to reduce the potable water demand,” Guzzetta said. “We’re implementing it and doing testing to figure out the right levels of carbon dioxide [to get] the best reclaimed water consistency, CO2 sequestering and performance with the potential to reduce embodied carbon.”

Sustainability-minded: February’s direct-air capture demonstration is one of many efforts that builds on the company’s decades-long dedication to environmental sustainability. In 2022, Vulcan also:

• Met its goal of securing 5% of all electricity from renewables;
• Supported biodiversity by maintaining projects certified by the Wildlife Habitat Council at 40 sites;
• Sustained a 98% environmental compliance rate across its 22-state footprint; and
• Supplied 2.1 million tons of recycled asphalt pavement and 1.7 million tons of recycled concrete to projects.

Moving forward: Vulcan Materials’ National Research Laboratory continues to test new products and form collaborations with other entities to develop lower carbon concrete and concrete with more sequestered CO2.

• “Any way that we can continue to trap additional carbon dioxide on the production side continues to offer us more ways to do lower-carbon construction projects,” Guzzetta said. “It just keeps moving us forward.”

The explosive growth of artificial intelligence is leading semiconductor makers to move quickly to create “designs that stack chips together like high-tech Lego pieces,” according to The Wall Street Journal (subscription).

What’s going on: “‘Chiplets’ can be an easier way to design more-powerful chips, according to industry executives who call the technology one of the most significant advances since the dawn of the integrated circuit more than 60 years ago.”

• The technology has the potential to deliver more powerful, cost-effective semiconductors, sources told the Journal.
• Last year, some of the world’s largest technology companies, including Qualcomm and Intel—which recently announced products containing chiplets—formed a coalition to craft chiplet-designing standards.

How it works: “A typical consumer device such as a smartphone contains many types of chip[s] for functions including data processing, graphics processing, memory, telecommunications and power control.”

• “The chips are delicately tethered to minuscule wires and ensconced in a protective plastic casing, forming a package that can be fixed to a circuit board.”
• “With the new chiplet packaging, engineers have found ways to bolt together pre-existing chips, the equivalent of using a few Lego pieces to build a toy car.”

The caveats: Chiplet manufacturing is not cheap, however, and the technology requires its own performance-verification process.

• What’s more, chiplets “aren’t suited to every function,” and lend themselves better to high-end desktop computers than mass-marketed cell phones.

China’s role: It is estimated that China controls 38% of the semiconductor assembly, testing and packaging market, a fact that “poses two potential risks for the U.S. While many American companies have been working with factories in China to handle these specialist chip-making roles, the supply chains could be tangled by a geopolitical crisis or another pandemic.”

• “In addition, the U.S. has imposed export controls on advanced semiconductor technology and could seek to expand controls in the future.”​​​​​​​

As part of Careers on Track, the MI and Union Pacific Railroad partnered with Everfi® to create and launch the Transportation Central module on Future Creators (Endeavor) – a digital education program giving middle and high-school students an opportunity to explore STEM careers. Using interactive gameplay, students explore a variety of professions, encounter real-world scenarios and learn new ways to solve common problems while interfacing with diverse employees along the way.

Transportation Central is an immersive simulation focused on careers in transportation, distribution and logistics (TDL). Other modules explore concepts in advanced manufacturing, data driven decision making and more. Read about how the MI and Union Pacific Railroad are leading the way to raise awareness and inspire students to pursue careers in manufacturing and TDL in the Transportation Central Case Study.

Unlimited access to Future Creators (Endeavor) is provided at no cost to select schools thanks to Union Pacific’s support. Contact Jen White, the MI’s Director of Student Engagement, to learn how you can help the MI provide Future Creators (Endeavor) to more students in schools across the U.S.

Since the MI’s inaugural DEI benchmarking survey, conducted in partnership with Keybridge and released in October 2021, manufacturers have taken active steps to improve DEI in the workplace. The MI has recently surveyed manufacturers again to highlight current practices and attitudes around DEI in our new DEI Benchmarking in Manufacturing Report. Our updated survey lays out how manufacturing employers are approaching their companies’ initiatives in new ways. The report provides helpful information on the state of DEI in the manufacturing industry and recommendations for employers to use as they improve on progress made over the last two years. Check it out here.

KEY TAKEAWAYS:

• 72% of manufacturers agreed that improving and maintaining DEI was a key focus for their company – and many of them have been taking tangible steps towards that goal.
• More than 60% of respondents reported that the representation of women within their companies has increased in the past 5 years.

To learn how sectors and businesses are using artificial intelligence, The Economist (subscription) created an index of firms in the S&P 500—and the results show that “even beyond tech firms the interest in AI is growing fast.”

What’s going on: “We looked at five measures: the share of issued patents that mention AI; venture-capital (VA) activity targeting AI firms; acquisitions of AI firms; job listings citing AI; and mentions of the technology on earnings calls. … [C]lear leaders and laggards are already emerging.”

The findings: In the past three years, approximately two-thirds of the companies examined by The Economist have placed a job ad that refers to AI. One of the sharpest increases in such mentions has been among chipmakers.

• The number of registered AI-related patents rose between 2020 and 2022.
• This year, about 25% of venture deals by S&P 500 companies involved AI start-ups, an increase from 19% just two years ago.

Outside Silicon Valley: While the index found that the most “enthusiastic” users of AI are technology companies, “[b]eyond tech, two types of firms seem to be adopting AI the quickest.”

• Data-heavy sectors, including insurance, pharmaceutical and financial-services companies “account for about a quarter of our top 100.” In this category, Abbott is building AI-powered medical tools.
• The other category of company quickly adopting AI includes “industries that are already being disrupted by technology,” such as automakers, telecom, retail and media. Among these are Ford and General Motors, which are using AI in electric-vehicle manufacturing.

The last word: AI use may have some drawbacks, including cybersecurity risks, potential legal liability and possible inaccuracy of results. However, these “must be weighed against the potential benefits, which could be vast.”

With the backing of major HVAC manufacturers, start-ups are working to make air conditioners that are capable of easing the strain on the power grid, according to The Wall Street Journal (subscription).

What’s going on: “Companies such as Blue Frontier, Transaera and Montana Technologies are raising money from investors including industry giant Carrier Global … to develop more efficient technologies. Many of those efforts focus on the humidity rather than the heat, using new materials like liquid salt to dry out the air.”

Why it’s important: The number of air conditioners in use worldwide is expected to more than double by the middle of the century, to 5.5 billion, with many units likely to be inefficient.

• “Stalwarts such as Carrier and Trane Technologies say they are spending billions of dollars to offer more efficient versions of conventional ACs while evaluating the new approaches.”

A different AC unit: Traditional air-conditioning units work by converting refrigerants from gas to liquid and then back again, while circulating air with fans. They are unable to remove humidity without cooling the air, which is what makes them inefficient, according to the article.   

• “Blue Frontier aims to separate humidity and temperature control using a liquid salt solution that was developed with the National Renewable Energy Laboratory. The solution also stores energy, reducing consumption at peak times, when electricity grids are strained on hot days.
• Innovation is also required to make air conditioning affordable for people in developing nations, according to the Journal.

More investment: “The need for new approaches is pushing Carrier to make venture investments to complement its other growth strategies, said Jennifer Anderson, Carrier’s chief sustainability officer. Trane is investing in startups like data-center-cooling company LiquidStack while looking at new technology approaches, CEO Dave Regnery said.”

The Creators Wanted tour landed in Atlanta last week for the SkillsUSA National Leadership and Skills Conference—the largest gathering of the America’s future skills workforce.

Over the course of the three-day program, the tour, an initiative of the NAM and the Manufacturing Institute, helped change attitudes and challenge misconceptions about manufacturing, opening up a new world for some of the country’s most talented rising workers.

By the numbers: The tour’s SkillsUSA stop, sponsored by Honda, Snap-on, FactoryFix and Union Pacific, helped share the story of modern manufacturing with many of the brightest career mentors and technical education students in the United States.

• 15,000 people attended the event, including many career and technical education students, educators and parents.
• More than 1,500 people took part in the Creators Wanted immersive experience at SkillsUSA.
• More than 120,000 students and career mentors signed up to learn more about modern manufacturing careers during the tour stop in Georgia.

More participants: Other leading manufacturers were also in attendance, engaging students with information about careers in manufacturing. A few of the participants included Caterpillar, John Deere/Korematsu, Volvo NA Group, Vermeer Corp., Toyota, Cummins, Penske and 3M.

A special guest: Snap-on Chairman and CEO Nick Pinchuk dedicated a full day to inspiring students and educators. The NAM executive committee member and Manufacturing Institute board member emphasized the “Creators Wanted” mantra in order to remind participants that manufacturers aren’t just recruiting workers—they’re inspiring and empowering creators. 

Local coverage: The visit made waves in Georgia, where it was covered on Fox 5’s Good Day Atlanta:

• “A huge turnout down here,” said Fox 5’s Paul Milliken, who had multiple live hits at the Creators Wanted immersive experience. “These students are so talented, so incredible … the future of America’s skilled workforce.”
• “This conference—it’s just a really incredible opportunity for these future workforce leaders to come together, meet each other, network and compete.”

WATCH: @GoodDayAtlanta's @PaulFromFox5 reports on #CreatorsWanted traveling to @GWCC_ATL for @SkillsUSA #NLSC23. Check out how we are working to inspire students to consider rewarding careers in modern manufacturing. https://t.co/0GAlhxDmTb pic.twitter.com/BFJeKyXS9G

— The NAM (@ShopFloorNAM) June 20, 2023

Overheard at the event: Plenty of participants shared their excitement, emphasizing opportunities to connect with employers, learn about new skills and find paths to future careers.

• “These are viable careers. They are jobs that you can make quite a bit of money right from the beginning, and at the same time you’re learning core skills that you can carry on for the rest of your life.”
• “We’ve got tons of jobs out there across the U.S. Everybody is looking for talented individuals.”
• “You can explore … different careers that you want to do, [to] help you become a more successful adult in the future.”

The big picture: Over the course of the Creators Wanted Tour, which launched a year and eight months ago:

• 4 million students and career mentors have signed up online to learn more about modern manufacturing careers.
• Over 10,000 students and more than 3,000 career mentors have participated in our immersive experience, with 84% reporting a significantly improved view of modern manufacturing careers.
• The tour has received $5.35 million in positive earned media and 150 million digital impressions. 

Making an impact: “Interacting with the students, educators and caregivers, we could truly feel the impact we’re making,” said Chrys Kefalas, managing vice president of brand strategy at the NAM. “This isn’t just about changing minds—we’re creating dreams and altering life trajectories.”

What’s next: The tour keeps on rolling this fall to Minneapolis and St. Paul, Minnesota, and Circleville, Ohio. You can also keep an eye out for new online resources that are coming out this summer, or browse the more than 330,000 open manufacturing jobs and 150,000 training programs listed online.