The Blueprint for a Skilled, Mobile Workforce
By creating high-skill, high-wage jobs through updated
industry-based training, we can increase
the number of workers attracted to industry and raise the bar for
high-performance workplaces. What’s needed are industry-developed,
nationally accepted standards and certifications.
by John M. Rauschenberger
A human resources manager at a manufacturing company reviews
100 applications to fill vacant positions. Only a few are worthy of
consideration for an interview and, of those, probably only one or two
applicants will
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get one. In the end, the HR manager has to go right back to the
in-box. The search continues and the positions at the company remain vacant.
A high school student sits in trigonometry class, the last
period of the day before heading off to a part-time job, wondering:
“What’s this all for? Why should I be excited to learn this stuff?
How is this going to help me get a good job?”
An employee at a manufacturing plant faces a dilemma: how to
advance himself in his career without knowing exactly what training and skills
are needed to achieve this.
These hypothetical situations are happening every day in the
real world and they spotlight the greatest challenge facing the American
manufacturing industry today: ensuring the existence of a skilled workforce in
the 21st century. Companies are spending large sums of money looking for the
right people. Educators are working to develop curricula that will prepare
students to fill positions. Workers want to upgrade their skills and are trying
to find the smartest and most effective way to do so.
On May 10, the Manufacturing Skill Standards Board (MSSC)
officially released A Blueprint for Workforce Excellence, a set of skill
standards created to address these very challenges. The Blueprint, created
under the guidance of the National Skill Standards Board (NSSB), represents the
nation’s first skill standards developed under a common format and common
language for all sectors of manufacturing.
Skill standards can have many uses — for hiring,
pinpointing training needs, developing career pathways and more. The standards,
when combined with the related assessment and certification tools that the MSSC
is also developing, will represent a major national initiative to elevate both
the skills and flexibility of the American workforce.
Why do we need skill standards?
In the past, manufacturing employers primarily operated
internal labor markets to recruit and prepare workers for long-term, stable,
good-paying jobs. Some employers relied on external education institutions to
train workers for high-skilled jobs, but the vast majority of manufacturing
workers gained their skills on the job or through internal training that was
rarely recognized outside a single firm. This approach suited everyone’s
needs for a very long time.
But manufacturing has changed. Jobs require more skill,
training and experience, especially in the use of technology. According to the
U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, in 1950, 60 percent of manufacturing jobs were
unskilled; today, only 30 percent are unskilled and, by 2005, the number is
expected to shrink to 15 percent.
In addition, retirement-eligible workers are leaving
manufacturing jobs in large numbers. A study by the University of Michigan reports
that the auto industry alone needs to find 250,000 workers by 2005 to replace
retirees.
In the 21st century, a skilled and knowledgeable workforce
will provide the U.S. industry with its greatest competitive advantage as it
strives to maintain its status as the world’s most productive economy,
according to the World Economic Forum. High volume has been replaced by high
performance and high value-added services in the global marketplace. As a
result, in this new economic and technological era, employers are looking for
high-skilled workers who work smarter, not just harder.
Yet there is a growing need for greater education and
training opportunities for existing manufacturing workers and new workers who
may be considering a career in manufacturing. According to a recent U.S. Census
Bureau survey, more than half of the responding companies cited the “need
for better education and training” as one of the most significant
barriers to the adoption of new technologies.
The American Management Association reports that in 1999,
almost 42 percent of manufacturing job applicants lacked basic reading,
writing, and math skills needed to do the jobs they sought. And in a recent
National Association for Manufacturers survey, 90 percent of the nation’s
manufacturers reported a shortage of qualified workers in at least one job
category.
We need to ensure greater opportunities for both entry-level
and incumbent workers to develop the skills and “portable”
credentials necessary to have rewarding careers in manufacturing. By creating
high-skill, high-wage jobs through updated industry-based training, we can
increase the number of workers attracted to our industry and raise the bar for
high-performance workplaces. Bottom line? We need industry-developed,
nationally accepted standards and certifications.
How did the MSSC become involved?
In the summer of 1997, major stakeholders in the
manufacturing sector came together to address the challenge of ensuring the
existence of skilled, mobile workers. MSSC brought together leaders
representing companies, workers, educators and related organizations in the
manufacturing industry to create a blueprint for a new skills pipeline in
manufacturing. It is our hope that this new pipeline will fuel all sectors of
the manufacturing economy with skilled workers, while also providing workers
with portable credentials and access to good jobs.
Since it is a unique partnership between education, industry
and labor, MSSC has been able to provide leadership in the creation of an
industry-wide Skill Standards System. In the three years since its inception,
the MSSC has completed the first two of four steps in the Skill Standards
System: creation of a broad-based coalition and the development of the Skill
Standards. The MSSC Skill Standards are the cornerstone of the entire system
and provide the framework for future assessments and certifications that will
enable companies, educators and trainers to put these standards to practical
use.
More than 3,800 front-line workers, 700 companies, 300 experts
and 30 facilitating organizations participated in the development of the MSSC
skill standards. By finding the right workers for the right jobs, the skill
standards will increase workplace efficiency and productivity and improve the
competitiveness of American manufacturing companies in today’s global
economy.
What are the skill standards?
These standards represent the best practices for
high-performance work and define the skills and knowledge required to ensure a
skilled, mobile industrial workforce. This includes the research and national
validation of the specific job functions in best practice work sites —
the indicators that tell when the job is completed successfully, as well as the
level of technical knowledge and skills needed for the job. Because MSSC
standards were developed with all manufacturing sectors in mind, they provide a
detailed outline of the skills and knowledge well-trained manufacturing workers
have and employers seek.
There are three distinct levels of skill standards: core,
concentration and specialized. MSSC has developed standards for six
concentration areas and has identified the core skills and knowledge that are
common to all six concentrations. The concentration areas are:
• Production;
• Health, Safety and Environment Assurance;
• Logistics and Inventory Control;
• Maintenance, Installation and Repair;
• Production Process Development;
• Quality Assurance.
The MSSC Skill Standards are meant to complement, not
compete with, existing training programs, like apprenticeships, which are
well-establish training mechanisms. To connect to the specialty level, the MSSC
will work with “specialty groups,” many of which have already
developed their own standards (for example, the metalworking, welding,
chemicals and electronics sectors) to see how their standards and those created
by MSSC fit together to provide a common pathway toward reaching MSSC Skill
Standards.
As a standalone piece of the system, the skill standards can
serve as a communications tool for use between companies, the education
community and current and future workers. The skill standards can be used in
many other ways:
• To benchmark manufacturing processes to best
practices;
• To develop job descriptions;
• To enable companies to work with line managers, unions
and employees to conduct training needs analyses;
• To develop and/or improve training programs;
• To work with local schools to develop curricula and
programs to prepare students for good manufacturing jobs.
The standards, when combined with the related assessment and
certification tools that the MSSC is also developing, will give workers a
“passport” — a set of transferable skills that are recognized
by virtually every sector within the manufacturing industry and beyond. This
passport gives displaced workers a heightened level of job security by allowing
them to carry a standard set of core and concentration skills from one position
to the next.
What’s next?
These MSSC skill standards are just the beginning. We have
already started to reach out to various segments of the manufacturing industry
to encourage adoption and implementation of the standards. We are committed to
updating these standards to ensure that the skills employers seek and the
training students receive will be relevant to America’s future
workplaces.
MSSC will also develop the skills assessment and
certification process before the end of 2001. Finally, research will be
conducted to determine the best use of the standards in various settings. Those
findings should also be available by the end of the year.
Eventually, using the MSSC Skill Standards System will mean
that our fictional HR manager will be able to accurately describe vacant
company positions and quickly identify the workers who are qualified to fill
them. Our high school student will know how the courses she’s taking now
will lead to a good job as soon as school finishes. Our worker will know
exactly the type of training and certification needed to upgrade his skills and
secure advanced positions.
By meeting this challenge, the manufacturing industry will
get its just reward: a workforce that enables it to continue to play a leading
role in maintaining the U.S.’s status as the world’s leading
economy.
About the Author
John M. Rauschenberger, chairman of the MSSC Steering
Committee, is manager of Personnel Research and Development for Ford Motor
Company where he is responsible for the design and implementation of a variety
of corporate workforce initiatives including workforce competency development,
leadership behavior assessment, employee opinion measurement, and external
workforce relations.
John has been active in a variety of school-to-work and
workforce development initiatives over the past 10 years. He holds active
memberships in the Society for Industrial and Organizational Psychology (SIOP)
and Academy of Management and is a charter member of the American Psychological
Society (APS). John is an author and co-author of a number of professional
research articles and book chapters, and is a past member of the Editorial
Board for the Innovations in Research-Based Practice section of Personnel
Psychology Journal.
For more information about the MSSC and the skill standards.
and to order copies of A Blueprint for Workforce Excellence, visit the MSSC Web site at www.msscusa.org.
