by Dean Prigelmeier, President of Proactive Technologies, Inc.
Paraphrased many times and in many ways, the meaning is the same. “If you don’t know where you are going, any road will get you there.” W. Edwards Deming put it more succinctly, “If you can’t describe what you are doing as a process, you don’t what you are doing.”
How often do you hear an employer critically examining their system of worker selection, development and maximization? Has anyone tried to describe your firm’s strategy for developing new-hires once on board, or developing incumbent workers to something more than a fraction of what everyone expects of them? Does it sometimes seem that all you have to train your workers to be their best once hired is, “Bob, this is Jim. Why don’t you show him around?” Don’t be embarrassed; it is more common than you think.
Has anyone tried to calculate the enormous hidden, but real, cost of unused worker capacity, manifesting itself as hiring too many people when workers you already have hired never had a formal. structured, deliberate development plan? Or how low worker productivity, lower than expected quantity and quality of work, lack of compliance with work processes, quality plans and safety requirements, eats into profits?
For capital investments, on the other hand, textbooks have been written on how to classify them, and how to predict and measure return-on-investment. It is unthinkable for a firm to invest in a $1,000,000 piece of machinery and be satisfied with it putting out 50% less than advertised. Yet, the same principles should apply to the investment in workers. Why would anyone be satisfied with every worker hired only being trained and capable of performing 30-50% of their job? Still, decisions are made to keep the underperforming equipment and not funding the training of the operators to run it…until backed against the wall and the decision is made to cut the “cost” of the workers themselves.
Adding to the dilemma, to cut costs many employers also quit looking for that person with the right background and experience to make sound worker development decisions. They opt, instead, for “HR Generalists” who typically graduate from college without mastering how to know the differences between “learning” and “training” – the latter being the most important factor in worker selection, development, cross-training, maximizing and retention. More often, someone is hired who should know how to set-up and manage the right approach for the firm, but just as often that person lacks the knowledge and experience to select and utilize the right approach needed.
Today many manufacturers seem to be, once again, entering uncertain times. Gyrations in the stock market, changing monetary policy, tightening business lending standards, supply chain issues and inflation invoke short-term remedies with long-term consequences – not all good. These challenging times often immediately impact workers first. The old-standby of cutting labor costs because it is the “accounting standard” and easy (employers accepted it as the only solution decades ago) is invoked, since worker value is reduced to a “cost” because no one has developed a sound and standard measure of worker value and incorporated it into the textbooks. The firm has noone to explain the loss of intellectual capital being laid-off and the tragic costs of that decision soon to be realized. Decisions that look good on this quarter’s balance sheet too often are made without realizing that the short-term gain grossly underestimates the long-term losses yet to be realized; reduced capacity, loss of historical expertise that made the business thrive and degradation of work process compliance.
Whether expanding or contracting, the solution is in the deliberate balance in finding, keeping, developing and maximizing the workers even with ever-changing business constraints. Without a system and process, finding quality candidates for job positions, developing new-hires into solid workers while short-handed with people to train them, and retaining workers while maintaining or expanding a business, employers are focusing an inordinate amount of time and resources (i.e. “costs”) with very little forward motion to show for it.
The PROTECH™ system of managed human resource development was designed for manufacturing from personal experience with the lack of tools and resources employers faced. Using the firm’s subject matter experts, it builds on first capturing all of the critical tasks that make up the job classification, with each task’s best practice and all the information needed to master the task. It incorporates all of the firm’s existing standard work processes (including quality and safety standards) if available and the analysis – by observation – of any tasks not yet defined. Once the target for each worker is clearly defined and agreed upon by the stakeholders, the new-hires and cross-trainees are place on an accelerated path of expertise transfer. Incumbent workers are inventoried for tasks already mastered and put on the same accelerated path to close the gap of unmastered tasks.
The system is designed to replicate a firm’s star performers quickly and completely! This approach:
- Focuses the worker training effort on mastery of the tasks an employee is expected to perform. The accelerated transfer of expertiseTM drives new-hires and incumbents to “full job mastery” and full capacity. The structured training infrastructure can easily be, and has been, utilized for internships and registered as an apprenticeship (or just operated as an apprenticeship without registering it).
- Every organization already relies on unstructured, haphazard and undocumented informal on-the-job training anyway.
- This approach builds an infrastructure around what is already there, but broadens the range of tasks an employee needs to master – creating a system that is measurable, documented, revisable and improvable.
- This approach creates a worker development system that accelerates and drives incumbent and new-hire workers to full job mastery and creates cross-training opportunities.
- Concurrently and effortlessly provides ISO/AS/IATF/ quality program compliance support (e.g. a worker’s process-related training, knowledge capture and management, record keeping and human capital reporting).
- This approach and documentation has helped many clients comply with ISO/AS/IATF/ audits, which includes the latest requirement of capturing of “institutional knowledge and skill management.”
- The documentation and records this approach provide helps clients ensure compliance requirements are passed. Auditors have cited the Proactive Technologies’ structured OJT system and records management as “world class, best practice” level.
- Helps lower an employer’s internal cost of training while lowering turnover, increasing worker capacity, work quality and quantity and compliance (engineering specifications, safety requirements, etc.) – the return on investment!
Many states have Incumbent Worker Training grant funds available to employers who are serious and committed to developing the workers they need. Proactive Technologies, Inc has had great success obtaining funds for their clients. State agencies recognize that, in addition to the numerous benefits to the employer, the approach offers workers a chance to achieve a credential while mastering their job classification for the employer and have witnessed the results of this approach.
These grant funds will offset most, if not all and then some, of the employer’s investment to set-up and implement a 12-month structured OJT program! This means the client employer gets all of the return on investment this approach provides…with the investment reimbursed! In addition to providing this support, Proactive Technologies will prepare the grant application for the client’s review and submission and manage the grant reimbursement requests and reporting requirements. Those employers who are implementing the programs have been funded for additional years and/or or expanded their programs with other funds available through the state to, for example, register the programs as apprenticeships (although not a requirement).
Proactive Technologies provides the structured on-the-job training technical and implementation support -– including monthly reporting, credentialing (in partnership with an educational institution) of employees reaching Job Mastery and grant maintenance – so the employer can focus on running their business!
Whether contracting or expanding, your workers and their collective value should be recognized for the wealth of technical expertise, historical memory and proprietary data they inherently possess. There is an alternative to tossing your “human capital” out with the trash. Instead of feeling like you’re in the movie “Ground Hog Day,” take a moment and learn more about this approach. You have nothing to lose and a whole lot to gain.
Proactive Technologies’ helps employers build and implement a structured on-the-job training system approach to expedite each worker’s accelerated path toward full job mastery. To learn how it might work at your firm, your family of facilities or your region. Contact a Proactive Technologies representative today to schedule a GoToMeeting videoconference briefing to your computer. This can be followed up with an onsite presentation for you and your colleagues. A 13-minute promo briefing is available at the Proactive Technologies website and provides an overview to get you started and to help you explain it to your staff. As always, onsite presentations are available as well.
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