How Kill-The-Box Thinking Can Solve Manufacturing’s Systemic Problems | So Good News

In manufacturing, we manufacture boxes; building boxes; Good at continuously improving boxes. But what we really need to do is kill the box. As talent shortages grow by the hour, we are losing the technology race to China, lagging behind in innovation, and the global supply chain is disrupted.

These are not problems we can get out of Lean or Six Sigma. As Albert Einstein said, “We cannot solve problems with the same thinking we used when we created them.” Systemic problems can only be solved by boldly killing a brave box that brings together different minds from many different places. Now is the time.

With $280 billion in government investment on the line, the momentum to boost U.S. manufacturing has never been higher. We have an opportunity to lead a new era for our industry; But we need to invest that money in the right solutions – not piecemeal. not a part It will not be the same. We need to invest in real innovations that get to the root of our complex problems.

I’m excited to see some amazing examples popping up as of late. Here are three things I think have powerful lessons for business.

Bringing ideas to life with Leading Edge Tech.

EY and Nottingham Spirk are leading innovators themselves. However, through a recent partnership, the two companies will design for companies; We are enabling innovation for manufacturers by creating a space where we can engineer and create the products and services that will ultimately take us.

Packed with technologies—from augmented and virtual reality experiences to a 4K LED touch screen wall—the EY-Nottingham Spirk Innovation Hub is home to manufacturers, Production It helps manufacturers test the viability of an idea by virtually simulating the prototyping and supply chain. If the manufacturer goes ahead. It’s the design inside the 60,000-square-foot Hub, which opens in 2021. engineering It uses Nottingham Spirk’s vertical innovation approach through replication and packaging.

Located in Cleveland, where the shop known as Ernst & Ernst was launched, the Hub is one of the nation’s most dynamic manufacturing regions and serves companies from around the world. We hope to help address one area where Northeast Ohio does not excel: for every 10 patents; Only one startup is commercialized, less than three times the average in peer cities. The Hub has an outstanding hit rate. Entrepreneurs and companies come to commerce 95 percent of the time, says John Nottingham. According to John Nottingham, Nottingham Spirk Co-President and Co-Founder. “Within months, you have something on the market that generates high-margin revenue from a customer.”

By creating viable companies, the Hub doesn’t just line pocketbooks; This helps create a sustainable innovation ecosystem that will benefit future manufacturing years.

Directing training to create more advanced workers.

Public-private partnerships also provide a path to creating more manufacturing innovations. Employers; educational institutions, Community and faith-based organizations and employers to close the manufacturing skills gap and create ramps; educational institutions, There is no better model than the Northland Workforce Training Center, which brings together community and faith-based organizations and state and local government. to high-paying, high-end manufacturing jobs.

Northland’s secret sauce? post-secondary education; From transportation to childcare; A comprehensive approach to overcoming barriers, from educational readiness to affordability. Those in financial need can get free or no-cost loan education, while students who need academic remediation can get free literacy and numeracy support.

The center’s training approach “combines awareness, recruitment, assessment, career planning, education and training, job placement and retention services with a rigorous support environment to ensure student suitability, preparation, retention, placement and career growth.” Students can pursue an Associate Degree or Certificate. Beginning in 2017, the program enrolls approximately 20 students per class and recruits students with the goal of placing students in advanced manufacturing jobs. These jobs in Buffalo pay an average of about $47,943.

The industry needs a lot of help in recruiting this new talent. According to Deloitte, US manufacturers are expected to have 2.1 million unfilled jobs by 2030. to grow new companies and innovations; We need to find smart ways like this to fill the ever-growing gap.

Creating industrial excitement that captures the next generation.

In some ways, manufacturing is a numbers game. The more excited we are about our industry. The more we see the opportunities in manufacturing, the more we see. The more intelligent minds become, The more we are drawn to inventing the next big thing. The increase in numbers is fueling growth and increasing the skilled workforce to make these products in the US. Without enough people, everything falls apart.

We’ve been trying to close the aforementioned skills gap for two decades, and it’s only gotten wider. Finding qualified talent is 1.4 times more difficult than ever in 2018, according to Deloitte. It’s time for radical new ideas.

That belief is the backbone of what we’re doing in Cleveland’s historic Hough neighborhood, and MAGNET (the nonprofit I lead) is coming together to open a landmark new facility in the area, fostering and attracting existing and potential small producers. A new generation of workers. The facility will host more than 3,000 K-12 students, as well as many other current and prospective manufacturing employees, for hands-on tours of what makes this such a rewarding career. Students and companies can interact with collaborative robots and monitor real-time data; 3D printing; Explore Industry 4.0 technology such as augmented reality and the Internet of Things.

Hough is an economically depleted, predominantly black neighborhood. When it comes to hiring diverse job applicants, we join efforts to revitalize the area with the goal of attracting residents to a large and long-failed industry. By 2021, 79.5 percent of manufacturing workers will be white, 17.4 percent will be Hispanic or Latino, and 10.3 percent will be black, according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics. Our goal is to make the industry more like our community and place more people of color in manufacturing jobs that pay an average of $70,000 a year.

We hope that some of them will also become innovators using our 20,000-square-foot prototyping lab, or EYNS Hub. We know that diversity breeds innovation and talent accelerates growth. Both are needed to compete globally and reclaim America’s manufacturing crown.

To do so, Many programs like this example are needed. All three use killer thinking and radical collaboration. That would put American manufacturing at the top.