This September, carriers across the country celebrated the 21st annual U.S. National Truck Driver Appreciation Week. Lunches, coffee, T-shirts, and handwritten thank-you notes marked what many called the biggest celebration in the industry to date.
In recent years, truckers have joined warehouse workers, local delivery drivers, and manufacturing employees as some of the most desperately needed talent in today’s marketplace. As demand continues to rise, it’s become clear that it will take more than steady pay to attract and retain manufacturing professionals.
Offering More Than Pay
According to a recent survey of 3,000 multi-generational employees, modern workers — especially millennials — have different career motivations than their parents’ generations. Granted, most of us work to pay the bills, but the younger generation of workers wants more than a paycheck.
Today’s industrial workers want culture. While the above-mentioned survey found that older employees mainly wanted jobs centered on their specific skill sets, with money to save for retirement, millennials want to embrace their own lifestyle, and seek out professional cultures that can support it.
And rather than 401K or bonus incentives, flexible work options are often at the forefront today. In fact, these options encouraged more workplace loyalty in nearly 80% of millennial survey respondents, as did respect and concern for their work-life balance.
Seeking a New Type of Skill Set
In Michigan communities historically sustained by manufacturing, companies are banding together to seek out new talent — sometimes where it’s least suspected.
Kalkaska Screw Products CEO Kevin Schlueter says the company no longer even bothers to look for qualified skilled trades applicants. “If you have a student who wants to go to work, I’ve got a job for them. …We don’t hire for skilled trades anymore.”
Schlueter is part of a growing pool of manufacturers who seek applicants based on their potential. Do they show up? Are they curious? Do they seem motivated? If so, teams will step up and train the new talent themselves.
Apprenticeships, integrated training, and innovative skills education are changing the way manufacturing and industrial companies work — and the cultures they’re building to face the future.
Creating a Supportive Culture
Good training programs boost involvement, and involvement builds community. Even as wage growth surges and labor demands increase, studies show that work environment, personal engagement, and quality of life top the list of concerns for today’s manufacturing employees.
In fact, quality of life and worker happiness on the job have been shown to have such a serious impact on overall company success that some companies, like Hitachi, are actively tracking employee satisfaction and well-being with on-person sensors. Now, worker concerns that were once deemed white-collar — like paid lunch breaks, flexible vacation time, and one-on-one educational support — have moved to the factory floor.
Even the floor hierarchy is shifting. Amway Director of Manufacturing Operations Bradley Rick reports eliminating traditional titles at the company’s new, “high-performance” plants. In the organization's commitment to building a positive, open culture, Amway simply hires “manufacturing technicians” for these locations, allowing workers to move fluidly based on needs, skills, and interests, creating unique pathways to promotion directly from the plant floor.
By combining an open-ended path to the future with an immediately welcoming environment, Amway has created a place where workers can feel supported and motivated. And while everyone looks forward to payday, making the time in between a little more enjoyable is the trick to attracting — and retaining — the younger generation of manufacturing workers.
Resources:
- Driver retention requires more than a week of appreciation | Supply Chain Dive
- Millennials and older workers split on work motivations | HR Dive
- How to embrace office green spaces for better employee engagement | HR Dive
- The impact of green buildings on cognitive function | Sustainability at Harvard
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