Home › News › Page 4

Proactive Technologies Report – May, 2022

Posted on by DPrigelmeierpti

Tips for Establishing Your Company’s Training Strategy – Practical, Measurable, Extremely Economical and Scalable

by Dean Prigelmeier, President of Proactive Technologies, Inc.

For most companies, an in-house training center doesn’t have to be brick and mortar, and doesn’t necessarily require additional equipment and personnel to support it. It is about focusing the resources already available to develop workers faster and to a much higher level of capacity. This does not happen by throwing dollars or classes at the problem; if that were the case many employers who did so would have solved the “skills gap” problem. It takes a more deliberate approach than that to achieve the outcome that has been out of reach, for many, for decades.

In previous articles, such as in the May, 2016 issue of the Proactive Technologies Report, “A Simple Solution to Skill Gaps – New-Hires and Incumbents” I described a simple, easy to implement strategy for developing new-hires and incumbent workers to full capacity. I emphasized that by focusing on the outcome, the proper inputs become clearer. But by focusing on the inputs, the connection to the outcome may not necessarily be clear. Any use of irrelevant, improper or ineffective worker development inputs means unnecessary costs with low or no return, wasted time and additional opportunity costs.

click here to expand

Over the years, I have noticed that many employers’ idea of a worker training strategy is a hodge-podge of classroom and online training. This seems to be based on the assumption that all of the right people have been hired, they all have mastered the tasks of the job and that a few classes will drive each worker’s performance to higher levels.

Where does this assumption come from? Why do employers collectively settle for this type of model even though decades of experience and day to day worker performance offer many clues that this model of worker training is not as effective as hoped? Too often the feedback from workers attending classes is, “I don’t know why the company had me attend that class.” “That was a waste of time.” In an informal way, this is a form of “content validation,” or in this case “invalidation.”

“Conceptually, a better overall approach is simple, accurate, efficient and effective. If an employer isn’t including these simple steps in their worker selection, development and performance evaluation strategy the might be wasting company time, money and resources.”

This legacy approach is a comfortable model to explain. Everyone has attended school; some higher education as well. It is what we grew up with and the sentiment has become acceptance from familiarity. Some accept this approach because they are unaware of better alternatives. Some find comfort in being among the “herd.” Most of the employers seemed locked into this model, so it must be the right way to train workers. If this were true and reinforced with evidence, why after 30 years of concentrated application (as technology entered nearly every aspect of worker performance) the “skills gap” we all talk about has not only survived, but has actually grown? Read More

Structured On-The-Job Training Programs for Salaried Personnel

by Stacey Lett, Regional Director of Operations – Eastern U.S. – Proactive Technologies, Inc.

It is not just the hourly workers that, once hired, run into the “Bob, this is Sally. Why don’t you show her around” form of “training.” In environments where no structure exists to deliberately train hourly workers, supervisors and managers are similarly shown their desk and wished “good luck.” Yes, the company may offer a series of management courses that explain contemporary management theories, but often the most overlooked training is for the tasks against which performance is ultimately measured.

We frequently hear anecdotal stories about supervisors who are “thrown into the mix” of not only having to lead their workers to measured levels of performance, but concurrently learn their own job from their surroundings as best they can. Other supervisors and managers may be under the same pressure to focus on output, so they may be rarely available to mentor a new manager. Most likely, nothing was ever written down. Even worse, supervisors or managers who are new to the entire operation may have to learn what it is their employees do by observation before they can attempt to lead them to better performance.

click here to expand

Sounds familiar? It seems to run contrary to all the other business improvement initiatives, such as Six-Sigma, LEAN, Continuous Improvement, Total Quality Management, etc. Do companies have to settle for a “seat-of-the-pants” learning experience for their hourly and salary workers? And could this be a major contributing factor in reduced organizational competitiveness? Read More

Reducing an Employer’s Turnover Rate in a Practical, Efficient Way

by Frank Gibson, Workforce Development Advisor, retired from The Ohio State University – Alber Enterprise Center

I recently attended a local economic development meeting at which one of the structured on-the-job training (“SOJT”) projects I have been following was a subject on the agenda. Two members from Custom Glass Solutions LLC (“CGS”) human resources department presented a short update on the SOJT programs underway at their Fostoria, Ohio and Upper Sandusky, Ohio facilities.

These projects began in the latter part of 2019, right at the beginning of the Covid – 19 experience. Their lead technical consulting company, Proactive Technologies, Inc, focused on setting up for SOJT programs for nine job classifications at the Fostoria facility and 10 job classifications at the Upper Sandusky facility. This included 320 incumbent workers and many more new hires.

click here to expand

When the project initially began, one of the main concerns of the CGS upper management was the challenging high level of turnover, exacerbated by the Covid – 19 events and aftermath. At times it seemed as if turnover reached the 20 to 25% level.

After the SOJT programs were underway, each incumbent worker’s inventory of tasks mastered was established to baseline each worker for the tasks they have previously been trained on and management and the employee believed they had mastered. Customized SOJT programs were developed for each based on where they were in their development (to avoid wasting time and money training workers on what they could already do) and what was necessary to close the “task mastery gap.”

New-hires were set-up on their own customized SOJT program, starting at a level of zero tasks mastered, and therefore given a complete SOJT checklist binder. Both groups were, and continue to be, driven towards “full job mastery” in what is called an “accelerated transfer of expertise.” Each employee receives certificates of task mastery for reaching the 50% of tasks mastered mark, and certificates of job mastery once they have mastered the entire job classification. Read More

Structured On-The-Job Training for Non-Manufacturing Job Classifications

by Dean Prigelmeier, President of Proactive Technologies, Inc.

Although the PROTECH© system of managed human resource development was designed for manufacturing and there has extensively proven its effectiveness, the approach is just as effective for jobs in any industry, and level of the organization. Proactive Technologies, Inc.’s job/task analysis methodology is rooted in those used by the U. S. Departments of Defense and Energy – modified for use in the private-sector world with private-sector budgets and time constraints. The development and use of the job data is based on those practices that seemed to be working in human resource management, human resource development, technical writing, quality control and workforce development – modernized to an ever-changing and challenging world.

When it comes to the analysis of the job, which is the center of all instruments and activities developed from it, the common factor of all work is that it can be defined in discrete units called “tasks.” Nobody is ever hired and expected to be very knowledgeable about a subject, or be very aware, or be strong. These attributes do not become useful until applied in the performance of a meaningful recognizable unit of work. If correct performance of the task, the “best practice,” requires these attributes as either a necessary to learning to perform the task or needed in the performance of the task, they become prerequisite, but not the outcome.

click here to expand

Every job classification can be broken into its duties (groups of related tasks), tasks and subtasks. That is where performance is measured and it should be the outcome that is detected and improved. There are individuals who cannot conceptualize this relationship and say something like, “my job is too complicated, it cannot be defined because I am asked to do so many things.” Once they are walked through how they think their way through a series of steps to get to an outcome, they are usually converted. If the analyst cannot get a handle on a job classification, perhaps there really isn’t an underlying job.

Each task and subtask has beginning point and an ending point and a series of steps between called “elements,” process steps” or “procedural steps” that must be performed correctly, in the right order and meeting specifications to get the right, repeatable outcome. Read More

Read the full May, 2022 Proactive Technologies Report newsletter, including linked industry articles and online presentation schedules.

Posted in News

Proactive Technologies Report – April, 2022

Posted on by DPrigelmeierpti

Economic Development Opportunities – An Important Incentive in Attracting Companies to Your Region

by Dean Prigelmeier, President of Proactive Technologies, Inc.

According to Ed Timmons, CEO of the National Association of Manufacturers, “our labor costs in the U.S. are still 20% too high.” If he means that employers may be paying too much for unused or unusable worker capacity, and they should seek methods to develop it, I can agree with that. If he means employers should focus on spending enormous amounts on finding alternatives to labor, or randomly cutting workers, or asking workers to work for less wages and less benefits, I would say “hold on a minute.”

Given the growing fear and discontent by workers who still haven’t recovered from the Crash of 2008 and now knocked down with the Covid-19 pandemic, they may want a seat at the discussion. These workers will be trying for some time to, once again, regain value in their 401K and other impacted assets and to rise to the wage level they once had for the talents they possess. Many have the perception, wrongly or rightly, that their employer and their shareholders built great profits while workers slid backward. Many families, today, are challenged by rising prices of nearly everything…against eroding wages. This preoccupation with driving down labor costs, while reporting to Wall Street record quarterly profits, may benefit shareholders in the short-run, but it is surely illusionary and self-destructive in the long-run as the Crash of 2008 should have demonstrated, but the Covid-19 pandemic might remind.

click here to expand

As reported in Industry Week, a group of CEOs from major U.S. corporations, The Business Roundtable, released a statement saying that shareholder value is no longer its primary focus – shifting their practices to line up with their new definition of the “purpose of a corporation.” The new vision emphasizes investing in employees, supporting communities, dealing ethically with suppliers and providing customers with value. “The group signed the Business Roundtable’s new Statement on the Purpose of a Corporation. It’s a sea change that moves companies away from the age-old philosophy that companies’ main goal is to look after shareholders.”

“There is an effective, proven alternative to cutting labor costs through gutting organizational capacity.“

Focusing solely on shareholder profits has stunted the long-term viability of many a thriving organization. Under the cover of “making the firm more efficient,” when more profits could not be derived from expanding the market and market penetration, some investors forced cuts on firms that determined the firm’s long-term capability to compete, take advantage of emerging market opportunities, and adapt to changing markets and turbulent economic forces. Read More

Algorithms for Hiring, Credit…What Next? Perhaps Caution Should be Exercised

by Stacey Lett, Regional Director of Operations – Eastern U.S. – Proactive Technologies, Inc.

We are pushed from all sides to embrace advancing technology meant to impact every aspect of our lives. Peer pressure – from friends, family, colleagues, industry “experts” drive us to consider embracing “our future” – often explaining away the disruptions it causes to our present. Sometimes naïve, but always enthusiastic, media compete to be the first to break the news, bombard us with everything from subtle shaming to industry-driven pushes to accept and use technology – even if lacking thorough testing or proper consideration of all ramifications from its usage. If the technology causes damage, shoulders are shrugged and the horizon is scanned for the next.

Driven by massive amounts of marketing cash –often to create the illusion of trends when market acceptance is tepid – who is helped and who is hurt by the innovation is a distant afterthought. The damage can be done and those promoting the technology push to broaden its acceptance. If press coverage is too harsh when its promise comes up short and shareholder interest wanes, abandon it and move on to fabricate the next “trend.”

click here to expand

Take, for example, the recent examples of Apple and Goldman Sachs credit cards, which it appears issued lower credit limits to spouses of husbands who shared the same credit score. “A tech entrepreneur, David Heinemeier Hansson, first raised the issue when he tweeted that the Apple Card’s algorithms discriminated against his wife, giving him 20 times the credit limit it had given to her.” His wife’s credit score was much better than his own. This, also, happened to the spouses of Apple cofounder Steve Wozniak and other prominent figures.

Some banking algorithms utilize around 400 attributes in its determination of creditworthiness. And that might be made up of many we wouldn’t expect, but we will never know since it is considered a “trade secret.” But, as in most cases of machine learning, a lot of trust and faith is afforded the technological advancement which is only rocked when something tragic, abnormal or, in this case anti-social and potentially illegal, is discovered. Read More

Tips for Workforce Developers – Partnerships That Matter…and Last

by Dr. Dave Just, formally Dean of Corporate and Continuing Education at Community Colleges in MA, OH, PA, SC. Currently President of K&D Consulting

Having partnered with Proactive Technologies, Inc. on workforce development projects for the past 20 years, it gave me a chance to innovate and learn what works, what efforts are most appreciated by the employer, trainee and employee, and which projects utilized resources most efficiently and effectively. There are numerous resources available from many sources that can impact a trainee with varying effectiveness, but the secret is selecting those that are appropriate for the project outcome the employer expects.

As Dean of Corporate and Continuing Education at community and technical colleges in Massachusetts, Ohio, Pennsylvania and South Carolina, at the start of each assignment I had to first learn what resources our school had available for the sectors we were targeting, and how current and relevant the courses, materials and instructors were for the specific skills employers were seeking. To be honest, in some areas our products and services were weaker than expected, so the determination needed to be made whether we had the resources and will to upgrade what we had or develop what we needed. We also had to consider if it would be more economical to strategically partner with outside providers who always had the current technical expertise and already created solutions we could incorporate into our offerings.

click here to expand

Too often there was internal resistance and a lack of understanding of how important being relevant was to workforce development. Many institutions grew complacent to change or were discouraged by shrinking budgets or misaligned priorities from innovation. Always feeling a sense of urgency to overcome the ubiquitous “skills gap” that cast a shadow on all education and workforce development efforts, there are some important steps that I developed for myself to help me better assess each employer’s need and provide solutions client employers appreciated. This is the reason most employers we worked with kept us engaged year after year. We earned, and maintained, their respect and gave them confidence in our solutions, which ensured our continued role in their business model. This provided a continued revenue stream for the school to continue, improve and expand those efforts. Read More

 

Read the full April, 2022 Proactive Technologies Report newsletter, including linked industry articles and online presentation schedules.

Posted in News

Proactive Technologies Report – March, 2022

Posted on by DPrigelmeierpti

Recent Supply Chain Disruptions: Re-shoring Work to a Disrupted Workforce the Next Challenge, but Surmountable

by Dean Prigelmeier, President of Proactive Technologies, Inc.

No doubt about it, with the Crash of 2008 and the Covid-19 Crisis of 2020 most businesses have been forced into deep introspection about their products and services, their supply chains, maintaining their current and future workforce needs…even their survival and the evolving needs of an impacted consumer base. Any one of these topics would be plenty, but all at once while against the headwinds of an uncertain, but improving and evolving, economy and society is daunting.

Each one of these topics impacts the others. For example, changing a product or service may require adjustments or changes to the mix of suppliers and logistics, and may even influence decisions to perform tasks in-house or outside. Changing products or services, and potentially the tasks requiring workers to perform them, will determine what skills incumbent and new workers will need. It will require a reassessment of current worker selection practices, core skill development and task-related training. Most operations should consider to:

click here to expand
  • Re-determine products/services;
  • Determine tasks required to deliver products and services;
  • Define task procedures for best practice performance;
  • Develop “job performance aids” (e.g. process documents, quality documents);
  • For non-process document driven tasks, define the best practice to complete the job data set
  • Develop structured on-the-job training materials so they are ready before new processes begin;
  • Define related technical instruction to build worker core skills for mastering task-based training;
  • Determine which tasks to be performed in-house and which off-site;
  • For in-house work, assess current workforce for core skills learned and mastered so the foundation upon which to master tasks is confirmed;
  • Remediate deficient levels of core skills;
  • Deliver structured on-the-job training for incumbent workers
  • Apply same worker development process and standards to new-hire workers
  • (For supplier-performed tasks) Supply assessment and structured on-the-job training materials along with engineering and quality documents to dramatically expedite the adjustment to high quality vendor performance
  • Monitor, measure performance, continuously improve and maintain data for new changes.

You may be thinking this approach is too daunting to attempt. That is why many businesses get caught flat-footed when disruptions occur. If you might have convinced yourself, or have been convinced by others, that this approach is too time and labor intensive to warrant its consideration, that would be a shame. Ad hoc, disjointed, unfocused and unnecessarily too costly strategies are the only alternative. Anything between is half as effective. Read More

Thinking Past the Assessment – Unfinished Goals and Unrealized Expectations

by Stacey Lett, Regional Director of Operations – Eastern U.S. – Proactive Technologies, Inc.

Literally speaking, an “assessment” is the process of measuring the value, quality and/or quantity of something. There are many types of assessments, and methods for assessing. In theory, it is the process of evaluating one thing against a set of criteria to determine the match/mismatch.

There are assessments for risk, for taxes, vulnerability. There are psychological, health, and political assessments. There is a group of educational assessments that measure a variety of outcomes such as educational attainment – assessments of course content mastery, assessment of grade level attainment, assessments of Scholastic Aptitude Tests (“SAT”) that compare a student to their peers nationally and a variety of college readiness exams.

click here to expand

“Determining that you, indeed, hired the right person for the job will not automatically ensure the person is successful in learning and mastering the job. The most important step in the employment process is seeing to it that the individual’s core knowledge, skills and abilities are applied in learning and mastering the tasks which they were hired to perform. That is where the money is made. “

Educational assessments have been adapted for use in workforce development and employment, used to assess a prospective employee’s suitability for a job opening. They often measure more of what, if anything, a student learned and retained before graduating than how they match the employer’s actual job opening. Psychological assessments have been adapted to measure a prospective employee’s sociability to the workplace, morphing into a new category called “psychometric assessments.”

We have seen a growth in the employment assessment industry over the past 2 decades – particularly after 9-11. There are assessments for cognitive tests, physical abilities, “trustworthiness,” credit history, personality, criminal background and more. When used improperly, the methods have been challenged in court for their appropriateness and intent. Read More

Pairing Structured On-the-Job Training with Related Technical Instruction Just Makes Sense

by Frank Gibson, Workforce Development Advisor, retired from The Ohio State University – Alber Enterprise Center

I have for worked with educational institutions for many years, trying to reach out to employers with the latest and best courses and seminars they had. It is what we did with good intentions, but in many cases this was a difficult sale at best. Their products were often already built…before they precisely knew the needs of the employer. If the employer engaged them for our services, when delivered it was more of an underwhelming experience for the customer than I felt comfortable with. Often it didn’t lead to follow-on work.

An employer’s operation is driven by accounting for the bottom line. Accountants are quick to dismiss core and technical instruction as a cost. That is what they were taught in college, and truthfully there is no evidence that attending a course improves work performance in most cases. Sadly, that level of “job relevance” or content validity was considered less important than the power of the institution’s name that was promoting the products or services.

click here to expand

When I became familiar with Structured On-The-Job Training (SOJT), I appreciated SOJT because SOJT built from the bottom up. The training delivery structure was designed around the actual tasks the employee is expected to master, for which the employer hired the individual in the first place. Structuring the best practices into training delivery so that workers can learn faster how to perform each task and to standardize the delivery between each shift’s trainers and each trainee gets to the company’s bottom line. It is seen as an investment that can be defended to accountants, unlike core and technical instruction. Read More

Replicating Your Best Performers

by Dean Prigelmeier, President of Proactive Technologies, Inc.

One project I was involved with sought to establish a structured on-the-job training program for a “CNC Operator” position and establish an apprenticeship. It consisted of around 40 different machines; manual and NC-operated of several brands, controller types and purposes. When I analyze a job – task by task – I first contact the resident “subject matter expert.” It is my experience that in lieu of accurate standard process documents that everyone can use when assigned a machine, each operator keeps their own setup and operation notes. They are usually reluctant to share them.

As analysts, we assume that if the subject matter expert is assigned to us, it is a reflection of management’s confidence in the operator’s consistently high level of performance. We also learn a lot about the sub-culture that has arisen at the organization, bordering on “work performance anarchy.” Despite the connotations, this is a useful revelation. This lack of vital information sharing that has been going on can be eliminated. The collective wealth of task-specific information can be screened, validated, standardized and revision-controlled to be shared with all who are asked to perform the tasks.

click here to expand

This highlights several other preexisting issues in addition to the obvious. First, if the company is ISO/AS/AITF certified, an auditor would be appalled and likely “gig” the company for the use of uncontrolled “process documents.” Notes in toolboxes and lunchboxes are not revision controlled. If the company has even questionable process documents that they claim drive their “high level of quality performance” the existence of operator notes are a strong contradiction. A client visiting the site may have serious doubts about the practices, as well.

The next issue is, “what role do these notes play in the training of new-hires and cross-training incumbents?” Does the trainee even know these are available? My experience has been that each trainee is on their own to create their own notes…if they even think it is necessary. So now we have multiple sets of notes for each machine, seldom compared and standardized, AND the company’s process documents if they exist. This is a recipe for incidents of scrap, rework and equipment damage at a minimum.

It also appears that each trainee is on their own to learn the safe performance of each task. It is not enough to provide general safety knowledge learning. When a trainee is taught a task for the first time, that is when they should be shown how to apply the general safety knowledge to the safe performance of that task. Once a pattern is established, the trainee will be able to better apply the safety knowledge to the safe performance of all tasks. If ways to avoid a safety incident are known, shouldn’t that knowledge be shared with each trainee so that no one has to be hurt when the odds of an incident are known and avoidable? Read More

Read the full March, 2022 Proactive Technologies Report newsletter, including linked industry articles and online presentation schedules.

Posted in News

Proactive Technologies Report – February, 2022

Posted on by DPrigelmeierpti

Technique is Important to Successful Task-based Training

by Dean Prigelmeier, President of Proactive Technologies, Inc.

Generally speaking, the most prevalent form of worker training – for any job classification, any industry – is informal, unstructured on-the-job training. That unmeasurable, unimprovable and undocumented one-on-one experience when one person who knows how shows someone who doesn’t how to perform tasks required of the job classification. This seems to work in lieu of anything else, since products are produced and services are being delivered…until they are not, or are but now not as timely, efficiently, consistently and/or as compliant with requirements as expected.

In an economic shake-up, these deficiencies become more pronounced and more threatening to an operation’s survival. During mass disruptions such as the Crash of 2008 and the COVID-19 pandemic, good performers left the organization or were released – with all of their technical wisdom and expertise – along with marginal performers, leaving the employer to rebuild from scratch in some cases. Consequently, any chance of training workers to build back the organization, at a minimum, just got tougher.

click here to expand

While, indeed, informal, ad hoc, unstructured and undocumented training is better than no training, this ambiguous approach can lead to unexpected consequences and inconsistent outcomes. The easy solution is to build a structure around this to make the informal formal.

The structured on-the-job training process approach is one in which the informal aspect of task-based training is structured in a way to standardize both the process of performing the task and the delivery of the training itself. The implementation “accelerates the transfer of expertise” to ensure each trainee – new-hires and incumbent workers – master the tasks of a job quickly and completely.

Much can be lost in interpretation of what a trainee hears and sees being displayed in an informal training experience. Read More

Challenges Presented by the Widening Skill Gap

by Stacey Lett, Regional Director of Operations – Eastern U.S. – Proactive Technologies, Inc.

There are at least five growing, major challenges to maintaining a skilled national labor force. These forces are causing those organizations who could help to, instead, spend tremendous sums of money on “whack-a-mole” type efforts. Sure, this approach sustains all of the profit and non-profit organizations that sprung up to take advantage of the chaos, but if we are serious about solving this issue that has undermined economic recoveries and stifled economic growth for over 30 years, we need to get serious.

It starts by critically evaluating the challenges that have plagued the U.S. labor force and have been barriers to an employer’s commitment to American labor. Like nearly all challenges, one can choose to target the underlying cause, treat the symptoms, mask the symptoms, define an alternative – but not necessarily relevant – cause and focus on that, or ignore symptoms and cause and hope for divine intervention.

click here to expand

Choice of action matters. Take, for example, the choice to take a prescribed “cholesterol lowering” statin that inhibits the body’s production of lipids – fats and fatty substances, producing a cholesterol number within an acceptable range but at a cost of blocking or impairing other vital body functions and often producing “side-effects.” Your doctor may have good news about your cholesterol level during this visit but soon he might be discussing other, more serious issues with you such as, according to the Mayo Clinic, your muscle pain and damage, liver damage, increased blood sugar and type 2 diabetes, neurological side effects… Choosing to treat a symptom without determining why your body is producing excess lipids in the first place may leave the underlying cause unaffected.

Similarly, focusing resources on symptoms and ignoring the underlying cause of a non-systems approach to worker development may lead (and one could say may have already lead) to depleted resources and lost opportunity. Continuing to turn out graduates, some with outdated or non-essential skills which are bolstered by marginally relevant credentials, may lead to a feeling of action but yet the skill gap widens. Unless each of the following five major challenges are addressed, it is unlikely that the skill gap will move towards closing, and any effort to bring back the generations of lost workers into meaningful employment prohibitively difficult.

Jobs have become a moving target. Read More

Apprenticeships: Be Careful Not to Minimize Integrity While Spiking the Numbers

by Dr. Dave Just, formally Dean of Corporate and Continuing Education at Community Colleges in MA, OH, PA, SC. Currently President of K&D Consulting

In a Community College Daily News article, “Drawing Lines on Apprenticeships,” business and industry representatives seemed to have expressed to their congressional leaders the changes they would like to see in apprenticeships before they would consider participating. The opening statements from the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee chair Sen. Lamar Alexander (Tennessee) and ranking minority member Sen. Patty Murray (Washington) set the debate, with “Alexander arguing that registered apprenticeships limit creativity and flexibility that employers seek because of cumbersome administrative red tape. More companies want less-formal, industry-recognized apprenticeships that allow them to work on specific skill sets, he said, adding they also are more appealing to industries such as health care and information technology that don’t traditionally offer apprenticeships.”

Ranking Member Pat Murray (Washington) rebutted this claim, “…registered apprenticeships ensure rigor and program quality. She said GOP efforts to encourage more nonregistered programs is designed to ‘weaken and water down’ programs and to open the training market to for-profit institutions.” Most people actively involved with apprenticeships know that much can be done to make apprenticeships more attractive, practical, fulfilling and feasible to employers and more attractive, achievable and valuable to apprentices. And that there is a role for for-profit training providers when the non-profit and institutional related technical instruction in the area is weak, has not been kept up-to-date or is non-existent.

click here to expand

There is no denying that the iconic apprenticeships of old were hard for employers to embrace. An 8-10 year apprenticeship program for, in many cases, 1 apprentice was a non-starter. And with developments in the last 30 years – massive relocation of jobs off-shore, instability of employment even before the Crash of 2008 but more so after (employees not able to continue in a job classification for 3 years let alone 10 year apprenticeship), the stagnation and decline of wages and continual introduction of newer technology that redesigns the nature of jobs – everyone involved including community colleges felt they were playing a seemingly never ending shell game. Add to that a period of uncertainty such as the current trade and tariff action exchanges and the only thing certain is an uncertain workforce development target. Read More

A Simple, Low-investment Solution to Closing Skill Gaps; New-Hires and Incumbents

by Dean Prigelmeier, President of Proactive Technologies, Inc.

Proactive Technologies, Inc. has worked with many employers over the years, establishing and technically supporting cost-effective, task-based structured on-the-job training programs. For each employer, every effort is made to tailor the worker training system to accommodate the employer’s budget, job classifications (even unique training programs for each job classification in each department), business goals and manage the system through all types of change. Unlike some products or services that require the employer to change practices that work in order to utilize them, the PROTECH© system of managed human resource development  is built around what is working for the employer, incorporating established information such as work processes and specifications, safety standards, quality standards, etc. This approach minimizes the need for the employer’s culture to drastically change what works for them, focusing instead on improvements in an area of weakness.]

“There is no doubt this approach is effective. After all, what is better: unstructured and haphazard worker training that cannot be explained, measured, improved or understood, or structured on-the-job training for all workers that is easily measured, implemented, improved and explained to auditors?”

click here to expand

The main steps used to build an employer-based structured workforce development system starts with understanding the desired outcome first:

  1. Determine the Employer’s Need and Agree on Strategy: How has the client been (or not been) training workers until now; what are the current and projected staffing levels for incumbents and new-hires along with attrition rate and reassignments; is the culture supportive of training workers and see it as vital to competitiveness; are any task-based documents available and are they in use (e.g. work processes, quality standards, safety standards); which jobs are targeted and why; is the company following any quality mandates, such as ISO/TS/AS and do they have any quality programs underway such as LEAN, Six Sigma; what is the budget for setting up the structured on-the-job training program and implementation. A strategy encompassing all of these points is prepared for the employer before an agreement and timetable is confirmed
  2. Job/Task Analyze the Target Job Classifications: The analysis is always performed using the employer’s subject matter experts to develop task lists of each targeted job classification, then each task is analyzed further for the best practice; also identified are relevant components that lead a trainee to reach “task mastery;” a review of data by subject matter experts is held to find reach concurrence on data; materials to structure the on-the-job training are created (the PROTECH© software system accelerates the data collection process and automatically generates all of the tools of the human resource development process from the data – materials are ready in minutes not years…at a fraction of the cost of manual development. One change updates all reports.). Read More

Read the full February, 2022 Proactive Technologies Report newsletter, including linked industry articles and online presentation schedules.

Posted in News

Proactive Technologies Report – January, 2022

Posted on by DPrigelmeierpti

Preparing for the New Workforce Reality

by Dean Prigelmeier, President of Proactive Technologies, Inc.

My experience in helping employers with their worker development programs for decades has led me to make a generalization that I believe to be true. Many employers have very little idea of how much capacity and value each worker contributes to their organization’s operation. For companies that make critical cost-benefit decisions daily, when it comes to harnessing worker value, what may seem to them as “penny-wise,” more often winds up being “pound-foolish.”

In these organizations you might find poorly written, or no longer job-relevant, job descriptions that shed light on how little is known about each job classification for which they are trying to find new-hires that have the right core skill base. Scratch a little deeper and you might find little in the way of a training strategy or infrastructure to identify and close any gap. Analyze the sum of your findings and you might conclude that this weakness makes it difficult, nearly impossible, to measure and improve individual worker performance – something that, when asked, each employer continues to dream of, but believes they are forced to forego.

click here to expand

A well-run company might know how many parts an investment in equipment should be able to produce down to the hour or minute. When it comes to the employees that run the equipment, employers admit to knowing very little. They have sketchy, if any, data as to which tasks the employee can perform expertly, which tasks they cannot and which tasks no one ever bothered to train them on. Employers talk about their “investment in their workforce” without fully realizing the importance of that statement.

There are many reasons for this. It was easy for employers to look the other way when business was good and output was generating the returns they expected. Short-term upper management strategies facilitate a myopia by focusing on the bottom line, and not so much on how it was reached or how it can be maintained.

When it comes to staffing, job descriptions, in many cases, are photocopies of a template that somebody created for a job that the writer thought they were familiar with. Because the job title was similar, and the requirements innocuous, it seemed to be “close enough.” Read More

“Realistic Job Previews” Can Be a Useful Tool for Measuring a Prospective Employee’s Transferable Task-based Skills

by Stacey Lett, Director of Operations – Eastern U.S. – Proactive Technologies, Inc.– Proactive Technologies, Inc.

The hiring process can be difficult for both the employer and the prospective employee. A wrong decision can cost each party a lot of time, money and opportunity. It seems reasonable to believe that some of the “hasty turnover” currently being experienced by employers – new-hires quitting in the first few days of employment – may be due to the shock of discovering the real nature, culture, requirements and environment of the job. An unwanted outcome based on the employer not providing an accurate picture of the job, work environment and work expected to be performed can be avoided with a “Realistic Job Preview.” (“RJP”).

Wikipedia points out that “Empirical research suggests a fairly small effect size, even for properly designed RJPs (d = .12), with estimates that they can improve job survival rates ranging from 3–10%. For large organizations in retail or transportation that do mass hiring and experience new hire turnover above 200% in a large population, a 3–10% difference can translate to significant monetary savings. Some experts (e.g., Roth; Martin, 1996) estimate that RJPs screen out between 15% and 36% of applicants.”

click here to expand

When RJPs are less effective, “according to researchers there are four issues that challenge RJP:

1. Recruiters do not share RJPs during interviews. (Rynes, 1991)

2. The nature of “realistic” information shared (in lab research or in the field) is unclear (Breaugh & Billings, 1988)

3. Not asking the right questions.

4. Applicants consistently report desiring more specific, job-relevant information than they commonly receive (Barber & Roehling, 1993; Maurer, Howe, & Lee,1992)”

In addition to this there is a chance for realistic job preview to become more effective in order to eliminate turnovers. The presentation format and timing of the RJP can be improved whether the real information is provided early on or later in the recruitment factor. Consequently, more specific topic should be addressed and information sources used (e.g. incumbent subject matter expert currently in the job classification versus human resource staff person).”

RJPs come in many forms; Read More

Decreasing the Cost of Turnover WHILE Increasing Worker Capacity, Work Quality and Compliance…With One Approach!

Stacey Lett, Director of Operations – Eastern U.S. – Proactive Technologies, Inc.– Proactive Technologies, Inc.

One of the blowbacks of persistently low compensation (i.e. hourly wage rate plus benefits and opportunity for advancement) is the corresponding high rates of employee turnover. The cost of turnover these days can be burdensome for any organization, and most encountering it express that they would like to minimize it.

In a previous article entitled “The High Cost of Employee Turnover” the causes, the costs and solutions were discussed. A handy way to estimate the cost of turnover to the organization was expressed. The Aspen Institute released a “Cost of Turnover” estimate tool of their own to assign a dollar figure to a firm’s level of turnover, to understand to what degree it is currently impacting operations and to explain to how turnover presents barriers to expansion or market adjustments.

click here to expand

Organizationally, things can be done to add window dressing that will attract candidates, but only a worker perceiving job stability and income sufficiency will stay away from actively seeking a better opportunity. Additional education and job-specific training opportunities may keep the worker from dwelling on the inadequate compensation for a while, but not adjusting compensation for the earned skills and value can fuel resentment.

One need only to revisit the Abraham Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs of college lectures to understand the powerful influence income instability or insufficiency can have on an individual’s decision making. The Crash of 2008 drove most of the workforce to despair from higher tiers down to the fundamental first tier of Maslow’s pyramid. Jobs were lost, homes were lost, dignity and self-worth were stolen and to this day few have felt that they gained that back. Read More

What is So Radical About Workers Asking for a Return of What was Taken From Them? Part 2 of 2

by Dean Prigelmeier, President of Proactive Technologies, Inc.

In the Part 1 of this article, I reminisced about the better times for workers several decades ago from my own experience as a young man entering the labor force via manufacturing. If you ask others who were around then, or did a little research, you must have found it was not a fantasy, but the life of a normal American middle-class worker.

Manufacturing was seen as a prestigious position, especially among the lower and middle classes. Someone was fortunate to have a job in manufacturing and could expect hard work but a comfortable life.

click here to expand

Before many employers, especially those listed on Wall Street Exchanges, began to follow neoliberal economics (not to be confused with “liberalism” – which ” is a political and moral philosophy based on liberty, consent of the governed and equality before the law“), companies like Hewlett-Packard, IBM, General Electric, as well as their suppliers, were the “gold standard” of employers. Although the steel industry started moving off-shore in the 1970’s, the movement of jobs and decimation of communities seemed to be an isolated occurrence.

Then a series of consequential events set the United States on a path of economic and societal decline for the vast majority of its citizens.

The 1980’s and the War on Labor Unions

The PATCO Air Traffic Controller Strike of 1981 ushered in an unrelenting pattern of legal rulings and legislation that eroded the strength of the labor movement, removing a potent alternative to unprincipled employers. Corporations were emboldened by an infamous 1970 New York Times magazine article in which the Chicago school economist Milton Friedman argued that “businesses’ sole purpose is to generate profit for shareholders. Moreover, he maintained, companies that did adopt “responsible” attitudes would be faced with more binding constraints than companies that did not, rendering them less competitive.”

Supported by right-wing groups such as the American Legislative Exchange Council(ALEC),  the Heritage Foundation, The Koch Brothers  and the US Chamber of Commerce, a number of states became “right to work” states, passing laws prohibiting or making it very difficult for labor to organize. Today, 27 states are right to work states, encouraging employers to move their operations there to take advantage of the “pro-business” environment.

According to USA Facts, labor unions declined in strength to 14.3 million, or 10.8%, of US employees in private employment in 2020 – over half of the 20.1% in 1983, when there were 17.7 million employed waged and salaried workers in unions. The number of unionized employees in public sector unions remained relatively constant, at around 35%. Currently there are movements afoot to unionize more of both public and private sector employment, but there are many decades of anti-labor laws in place to overcome. Read More

Read the full January, 2022 Proactive Technologies Report newsletter, including linked industry articles and online presentation schedules.

Posted in News

Proactive Technologies Report – December, 2021

Posted on by DPrigelmeierpti

We Have Enough Evidence: Without Employer-Based Structured OJT, Worker Development Falls Way Short

by Dean Prigelmeier, President of Proactive Technologies, Inc.

As a nation, we have become accustomed to kicking the can down the road. Maybe not deliberately, we appear to be locked into that mode with regard to worker development. It is not for lack of resources – billions are spent each year by federal programs, state governments and employers. If one backs away and looks at the big picture, the will is there but it seems more that the resources just are not properly aligned and focused.

Employers have been struggling with the “skills gap” since the 1980’s. Every manner of solution has been tried, but the gap seems to linger and grow. This is due, in large part, to disproportionately more emphasis being placed on preparing future workers for work and not enough on the employer’s vital role in providing the task-specific training once hired, and “upskilling” them through change.

click here to expand

Employers have been led to believe that the solution lies solely with education. While laying the strong foundation upon which to build strong workers is an important part of the solution, if the employer does not immediately begin building on the foundation, the foundation degrades relative to the continually evolving job requirements, and the opportunity is lost.

For nearly all firms, training a worker for the tasks they were hired to perform, once hired, is a mixture of uncoordinated efforts. Read More

The High Cost of Employee Turnover

by Stacey Lett, Director of Operations – Eastern U.S. – Proactive Technologies, Inc.– Proactive Technologies, Inc.

Most companies are dealing with uncomfortably high levels of turnover. When one separates out those employers that facilitated high turnovers to lower labor costs, there are many reasons for this. However, there is no denying the many costs associated with this that exist and the effects that often compound. These costs are often unknown and unmeasured, but all employers should keep an eye on this challenge and explore its full impact on the organization.

It seems counter-intuitive, but there are some who even recently promoted a business strategy that encouraged employee turnover. In a July 21, 2015 Forbes article entitled “Rethinking Employee Turnover,”  author Edward E. Lawler III, “Indeed, the turnover of some employees may end up saving an organization more money than it would cost to replace that employee. The obvious point is that not all turnover should be avoided—some should be sought.” The question is how to determine which ones to keep and which to encourage to leave. Without accurate measures of costs and values of a worker, good employees may be pushed out along with the “bad” and then the true costs of this action realized by the employer after it is too late.

click here to expand

Last year, Christina Merhar of ZaneBenefits wrote in her blog entitled “Employee Retention – The Real Cost of Losing an Employee,”  “Happy employees help businesses thrive. Frequent voluntary turnover has a negative impact on employee morale, productivity, and company revenue. Recruiting and training a new employee requires staff time and money. According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, turnover is highest in industries such as trade and utilities, construction, retail, customer service, hospitality, and service.”

“For the costs associated with the loss of 1 or 2 employees, the company can establish a holistic approach to worker selection, development and retention that will significantly lower both turnover rates and turnover costs, AND increase the value of all employees in that job classification.”

“Studies on the cost of employee turnover are all over the board. Some studies (such as SHRM) predict that every time a business replaces a salaried employee, it costs 6 to 9 months’ salary on average. For a manager making $40,000 a year, that’s $20,000 to $30,000 in recruiting and training expenses. Read More

Cross-Training Workers After Lean Efforts Builds Capacity Using Existing Staff

by Stacey Lett, Director of Operations – Eastern U.S. – Proactive Technologies, Inc.– Proactive Technologies, Inc.

Lean activities to redesign processes for better efficiency in a department, or between departments, sometimes result in “surplus” workers – partially or in whole units. It is the subjective priority of Lean practitioners since it is a tangible illustration of a successful Lean improvement. Processes that previously needed 3 people to complete may now only need two, if the efficiency were discovered. So what happens to that one person that has valuable acquired expertise, representing a significant investment by the employer? Would the wise outcome of Lean efforts be to just cut that person from the lineup?

The short answer is most likely not. Any efficiency and cost savings brought about by the Lean redesign would be offset by the loss of the expertise for which the investment has already been made. Most likely the reason for the Lean was not in reaction to no return on worker investment, but rather a desire to increase the return on worker investment.

click here to expand

If the worker is reassigned to another department, and no task-based training infrastructure is in place, that reassignment may lower the efficiency there which, again, reduces the gains made by the Lean effort. So part of the Lean effort must be the deliberate cross-training of workers in temporary assignments or longer-term reassignments to other departments that seem to have the need for increased staffing, perhaps as a result of the increased throughput achieved from the Lean effort in the upstream department in the chain.

Another outcome of a lean effort may not include moving personnel, but either equipment or processes out of the Leaned department into another department up or downstream, often without structured training to absorb the new activities and maintain efficiency. Here the loss of gains made are similar if no training on how to perform the processes or run the equipment is provided. Read More

What is So Radical About Workers Asking for a Return of What was Taken From Them? Part 2 of 2

by Dean Prigelmeier, President of Proactive Technologies, Inc.

In the Part 1 of this article, I reminisced about the better times for workers several decades ago from my own experience as a young man entering the labor force via manufacturing. If you ask others who were around then, or did a little research, you must have found it was not a fantasy, but the life of a normal American middle-class worker.

Manufacturing was seen as a prestigious position, especially among the lower and middle classes. Someone was fortunate to have a job in manufacturing and could expect hard work but a comfortable life.

click here to expand

Before many employers, especially those listed on Wall Street Exchanges, began to follow neoliberal economics (not to be confused with “liberalism” – which ” is a political and moral philosophy based on liberty, consent of the governed and equality before the law“), companies like Hewlett-Packard, IBM, General Electric, as well as their suppliers, were the “gold standard” of employers. Although the steel industry started moving off-shore in the 1970’s, the movement of jobs and decimation of communities seemed to be an isolated occurrence.

Then a series of consequential events set the United States on a path of economic and societal decline for the vast majority of its citizens.

The 1980’s and the War on Labor Unions

The PATCO Air Traffic Controller Strike of 1981 ushered in an unrelenting pattern of legal rulings and legislation that eroded the strength of the labor movement, removing a potent alternative to unprincipled employers. Corporations were emboldened by an infamous 1970 New York Times magazine article in which the Chicago school economist Milton Friedman argued that “businesses’ sole purpose is to generate profit for shareholders. Moreover, he maintained, companies that did adopt “responsible” attitudes would be faced with more binding constraints than companies that did not, rendering them less competitive.”

Supported by right-wing groups such as the American Legislative Exchange Council(ALEC),  the Heritage Foundation, The Koch Brothers  and the US Chamber of Commerce, a number of states became “right to work” states, passing laws prohibiting or making it very difficult for labor to organize. Today, 27 states are right to work states, encouraging employers to move their operations there to take advantage of the “pro-business” environment.

According to USA Facts, labor unions declined in strength to 14.3 million, or 10.8%, of US employees in private employment in 2020 – over half of the 20.1% in 1983, when there were 17.7 million employed waged and salaried workers in unions. The number of unionized employees in public sector unions remained relatively constant, at around 35%. Currently there are movements afoot to unionize more of both public and private sector employment, but there are many decades of anti-labor laws in place to overcome. Read More

Read the full December, 2021 Proactive Technologies Report newsletter, including linked industry articles and online presentation schedules.

Posted in News

Proactive Technologies Report – November, 2021

Posted on by DPrigelmeierpti

Understanding the Important Difference Between Classroom, Online and On-The-Job Training

by Dean Prigelmeier, President of Proactive Technologies, Inc.

In a past issue of Proactive Technologies Report article entitled, “Thirteen Good Reasons Why Structured On-The-Job Training Should Be Part of Your Business Strategy” I laid out 13 very important reasons employers should seriously consider adding structured on-the-job training to their business strategy. This is based on the supposition that the difference between “structured” and “unstructured” on-the-job training is clear and recognized, and the vast difference between true structured on-the-job training and “classroom” or “online” learning is unquestioned. It also needs to be understood that structured on-the-job training is not interchangeable with classroom and online learning, but rather the “capstone” of applying core skills developed from the latter into mastering units of work for which an employer is willing to pay wages.

click here to expand

There are not many jobs available for which employers are recruiting people who have taken classes, or a lot of classes, as if that is where value lies. If one finds a job like this it is because the employer believes, legitimately or mistakenly, it has a strategy to cultivate those core skills into the performance of work tasks. A task is recognizable by a beginning point, and ending point and a series of steps that, when performed in the right order to the right specification, result in a recognizable and desired outcome. No employer hires people and pays them wages for “being good at math,” “reading exceptionally well,” being aware of safety rules.” Rather they are hoping those skills are current enough, and apply directly enough, to tasks that need to be mastered and work the needs to be done.

To understand the importance of structured on-the-job training, it is important to differentiate between the three main types of learning in the workplace: classroom, online and on-the-job training. Read More

The Covid Pandemic Might Have Exposed the Perils of Non-Compete Agreement Over-Use

by Stacey Lett, Regional Director of Operations – Eastern U.S. – Proactive Technologies, Inc.

The recent Covid pandemic has opened up many unforeseen or unconsidered scenarios in human resource management and labor law. One of them is the growing overuse and, perhaps, misuse of non-compete agreements between employers and employees.

In the past, non-compete agreement use was limited to an employer’s need to protect intellectual property and trade secrets. It was enforced sparingly by the courts when an employer could articulate the nature and level of risk to business operation and owner equity. Their use was targeted toward those employees with access to highly sensitive and confidential information, processes or strategies.

click here to expand

These agreements protected the employer against an employee from leaving the company and going to work for a competitor, bringing all this proprietary information with them. A time limit was specified in the agreement when the terms would “sunset,” and for the most part employees and employers respected the agreement’s spirit and intent.

In recent years, encouraged by state employer councils and opportunistic attorneys, non-compete agreements started to appear in non-traditional roles and atypical industries. Some employers began to see it as a way to keep employees from leaving even if the conditions of employment were untenable. After all, if an employee is particularly skilled in an area useful for employer A, what better way to maintain an employee than to say you can leave but you cannot take your skills with you to a similar job with employer B.

This practice had been quietly taking a toll on some workers until events, such the Covid pandemic and subsequent lockdown caused a lot of reconsideration of what was considered “normal” employment practices. Beyond high-tech manufacturing and technology company use, non-compete agreements have found their way into the hospitality, retail and shipping sectors, to name a few. Studies are being undertaken to see if these agreements are playing a role in the shortage of workers employers say they are encountering. Read More

Workforce Development Realism: Properly Weighing Structured On-The-Job Training and Related Technical Instruction

by Frank Gibson, Workforce Development Advisor, retired from The Ohio State University – Alber Enterprise Center

With all the distractions caused by COVID-19 pandemic, employers and workforce developers are being forced to reevaluate what they thought were effective workforce development strategies. Work is being redefined, jobs are being redefined, and people are being reassigned to adjust to changing supply chain requirements and to the new realities of work. Unlike any time in history, except perhaps the Crash of 2008 and the Great Depression of 1929, have employers been required to expedite such mass reconsideration of its human assets – all while under a national health threat.

Prior to this pandemic, adult and continuing education was pretty settled in their approaches to training workers for today’s work. Classes and certificates were linked to what they believed were today’s realities, But the paradigm shifted with no indication yet that things will entirely return to that “normal.” Not only are educational institutions redefining themselves, their products and services, and their delivery methods, they are doing so while employers are in the process of redefining themselves to their new operational needs. Both transformations are impacting not only trainees who were currently taking related technical instruction classes at a community college in preparation for employment, what the employer does once they hire the individual in many cases is less defined now then it was poorly defined prior. In short, this is a period of flying blind to a moving target.

click here to expand

When Education encounters disruptions such as covid-19, institutions shut down, instructors wait at home, training providers are sidelined, and some of these even move on if the opportunity arises. Yet their employer – many left open as essential industries – are continuing to employ, informally train incumbent, new and transferring workers. Those employers that invested in a structured on-the-job training infrastructure were able to adapt and minimize the impact. Even those without a formal structured on-the-job training system were better positioned to continue to deliver training (albeit informal and ad hoc) compared to educational institutions and providers that were essentially shut down waiting for the green light on when and how to reopen. Read More

What is So Radical About Workers Asking for a Return of What was Taken From Them? Part 1 of 2

by Dean Prigelmeier, President of Proactive Technologies, Inc.

Incremental change can camouflage the growing accumulation of small impacts that when weighed in their totality can be life-altering. The pressures of life, or a plethora of streaming entertainment, sports, social media interactions, can cast shade on perhaps the most important events in our lives without us noticing. Then, one day a “last straw” or “last Jenga peg pulled” causes our world to tumble and us to reevaluate what was missed and what we could have done differently – but not before we find bottom an inventory of damage is taken.

In trying to understand the angst felt by, it appears, most of the workers in America who struggled with the trauma of the 2008 economic crash only to be knocked down again by the Covid pandemic and its effect on our economy and society, one needs to establish a benchmark for comparison. Both of these largest of economic events in recent history peeled back the illusion of an America where everyone is happily consuming and life couldn’t get any better – the version the media is keen on promoting. It caused me to draw a comparison to my experiences as a worker in my earlier years.

click here to expand

When I attended high school, in addition to the classes I and everyone else was required to complete for graduation, we were offered “vocational training program” options. These programs – automotive, electronics, drafting, woodworking, and others – were not seen by all of us as just an alternative to college. These programs were robust and highly rated by employers. I selected a 2 ½ year electronics program. Some of my peers found jobs immediately upon graduation, and some of us used it as a preparatory program for college to further pursue our interests.

It was easy for me to begin a career in manufacturing while pursuing a college education throughout the 1970s and 80s. I guess I took for granted the inherent fairness of the worker/employer relationship then. Sure, some employees had their grievances. But it seemed to me as long as an employee gave the job their best effort and expressed loyalty to the employer, most employers felt inclined, if not obligated, to reciprocate. Today, I do not sense the same general sentiment among employees I encounter or some of the many employers with whom I come in contact. The growing mutual distrust and adversarial relationships, and the tension it creates, is palpable. To understand the inherent terror workers must feel in struggling to find a way to fight back or explore a path to a new career, we must look beyond the present for clues.

In the 1980’s, I noticed things beginning to change. In the years prior, nearly every employer had a competitive wage and benefit package or they had a hard time attracting workers. Probably due to the existence of strong unions(union membership was in the 20% range), many employers were afraid that the workers would become disenchanted and organize a union themselves. So they set their prevailing wage and benefits similar to jobs in local companies with a union bargaining agreement. Since “inflation” or “the consumer price index” used to calculate the annual “cost of living adjustment” to pay rates was calculated under the old, simple formula before it started changing in the 1980s, workers were not as concerned about inflation since wages usually kept pace.

Most employers offered two weeks of paid vacation – available after your first year of employment. Some allowed increased vacation time up to six weeks the longer you stayed employed with the company.

Many employers had paid sick leave, so a sick worker could stay home rather than infect their coworkers because they couldn’t afford not to work. We had paid bereavement, paid time off to vote, and some employers offered sabbaticals to employees who felt the need to “find themselves.” Read More

Read the full November, 2021 Proactive Technologies Report newsletter, including linked industry articles and online presentation schedules.

 

Posted in News

Proactive Technologies Report – October, 2021

Posted on by DPrigelmeierpti

Balancing the Need to Raise Wages to be Competitive With Corresponding Worker Value

by Dean Prigelmeier, President of Proactive Technologies, Inc.

It is said employers are having a hard time finding workers. It may be due to some workers having time to think during the disruptions of the past few years and may be looking for jobs that are better aligned with their career goals. Some may still fear the status of the Covid-19 cases, and its variants, made confusing by the premature, incomplete and contradictory news reports. Some may want to return to work but are navigating the difficulties of child care and return to school policies that vary from district to district.

It appears employers have accepted that, for the short term at least and quite possibly the long-term, that they will need to reconsider their componsation structures if they are to attract the caliber of worker they need. Some feel that discussion is long overdue. Of course, raising wages and benefits is going to add to the cost of labor associated with production or services. If the shortage of supplies raising the costs of goods accelerate the reshoring of jobs to America, the competition for the best workers could get fierce.

click here to expand

“There is a way to mitigate the inevitable rising labor costs with higher worker value, and higher worker ROI.”

For decades employers have been laxed in their need to develop the most productivity and work quality from their workforce. It became more a hunt for “bodies“ than for developing more skilled workers. Most employers like to think that their in-house programs for training workers, once hired, meets their needs, but scratching the surface in most cases proves that there is very little structure, no plan, there is no documentation, and no sense of purpose. For most employers, people are hired, they are paired up with one of the existing workers and, hopefully, the existing subject matter expert will transfer expertise to the new worker to a level that, one day, might be recognizable.

Some companies that are struggling with a lot of turnover, and/or a surge of growth, see many of these workers can get lost in the shuffle. Some continue to hire more “bodies” who then wait for someone to train them to do something. Workers that could have been star performers are let go because there is no structured way to measure the outcome of the training process to anyone’s satisfaction. Then again, many workers leave employers when they discover that there is no way to improve themselves in the job classification. Read More

Your “Resident Expert” May Not Be an Expert Trainer, But Easily Could Be

by Stacey Lett, Regional Director of Operations – Eastern U.S. – Proactive Technologies, Inc.

Just because a worker is informally recognized as a “star performer,” it doesn’t necessarily follow that they can be an effective trainer. Employers like to think it is as easy as that, but seldom does it turn out to be the case. However, with a little structure, some tools and a little guidance these resident experts can, and often do, become expert trainers.

If one thinks about how an expert is measured and recognized, it is usually by subjective, mostly anecdotal measures. The worker performs job-related tasks quickly, consistently and completely. This implies few mistakes, performance that is mostly within specifications and standards of performance, and no one can remember anything rejected or returned as scrap or rework.

click here to expand

Thinking it through a little further, one might struggle to explain how the expert performer developed these traits. Someone showed them how to perform a task, and repetitive performance developed new, retained skills. They are now operating as a “robot” while performing a task, seldom thinking about the subtleties and nuances of each task (filed in memory long ago), which makes them fast, consistent workers – something the employer can notice an appreciate.

But if we ask “who trained this expert,” “how was he or she trained,” or “what specifications and standards were emphasized,” we come up empty. By just playing the role of a trainee, and allowing one of these experts to train you on a task, will reveal a lot as to what the new-hire or cross-trainee can expect. If we compare this expert’s task performance to other peer experts, we probably will notice slight differences in performance between them, which means workers that each trained may be trained differently on the same task. Sometimes these differences can be subtle and of no consequence, sometimes they become a point of contention, lead to confusion and/or unsafe and incorrect task performance.

Every work environment is less than ideal for learning. Production pressures, personality clashes, learning style and teaching style differences, and departmental boundary incursions do not make it easy for a trainer to train or a trainee to learn without structure and guidance. If any of our experts train the next wave of new-hires or cross-trainees without structure, tools and standards – the building blocks of “best practice” performance – some of the expertise might not transfer and the differences between them become more obvious with each wave. This can often lead to frustrating confrontation between shifts, with one shift declaring the other two shifts as incompetent. Read More

Large Scale Worker Training Projects are Possible for Small and Mid-size Employers

by Dr. Dave Just, formally Dean of Corporate and Continuing Education at Community Colleges in MA, OH, PA, SC. Currently President of K&D Consulting 

I spent many years as Director of Corporate and Continuing Education at several community colleges in multiple states. I think back on those years before working with Proactive Technologies when employer engagement was very difficult to achieve, let alone retain. Often it was only possible to get the employer to agree to send a few people to classes, either on site or offsite, if grant money covered the cost. But the scope was limited and the results were often inconclusive.

In the mid-90s, I began to partner with Proactive Technologies on what they called “structured on-the-job training programs.” It seemed simple and intuitively I felt something the employer could relate to. Building a training program, and an infrastructure where there was none, that the employer could recognize and has the potential to yield results they can immediately realize seemed like a new concept, but one employers told me they wished for in nearly every meeting.

click here to expand

When we began talking with employers and were able to get them to commit to setting up structured on-the-job training programs for one job, maybe two, as a pilot. Inevitably, employers saw the value and expanded the programs to include other jobs critical to their operation and opened the programs up to more employees for training and cross-training.

Many of these manufacturers in South Carolina took the same path and expanded to include other jobs and other employees. They found that it also help them with their compliance issues with ISO 9001:2015, TS 19649, and AS 9001 type of certification programs. These qualities certification programs had a provision that required process based training and documentation to support it and documentation that the employer was serious about the effort and make sure that the job information and employee information is current and accurate. All of these projects worries Lee supported by Proactive Technologies and it’s many ways of reporting this information. Read More

Training Workers in a Roller Coaster Economy

by Dean Prigelmeier, President of Proactive Technologies, Inc.

Often an afterthought, the need for structured on-the-job training is just as critical during a time of contraction as during a time of expansion. During cutbacks in staffing, work is redistributed to remaining employees as workers with expertise are inadvertently let go. Sometimes more attention is paid to worker seniority and wage levels than the potential loss of the accumulated investment in worker expertise and related replacement costs as a result of hasty workforce reductions.

Unfortunately, selling the need for an investment in a training infrastructure can be a harder sell to management who might be reluctant to make the case for fear of being perceived as being too “spend-happy” rather than seen as appropriately proactive. However, if no consideration is given to such planning that fact will subsequently reveal itself later in the form of transition costs – lost capacity and decreased operational productivity.

click here to expand

“How an organization prepares for change determines if they will survive it or succumb to it.”

It can be said that if the organization was running efficiently before a cutback, worker expertise must have helped since the numbers now show that output and yield have been reduced. If the organization was not running efficiently before the cutback, and cutting workers has little effect on output and yield, perhaps the reason was there was a lack of expertise in running operations. Either way, developing expertise and preserving it through adversity should be seen as worthy goals by any organization.

Many years ago, CEOs became concerned with “succession planning,” which was limited to only key managerial positions. As organizations made themselves leaner, the number of positions that should be considered for succession planning multiplied but often went unnoticed until a disruption in operations occurred – quickly exposing vulnerabilities and loss of organizational capacity. Read More

Read the full October, 2021 Proactive Technologies Report newsletter, including linked industry articles and online presentation schedules.

Posted in News

Proactive Technologies Report – September, 2021

Posted on by DPrigelmeierpti

A Simple, Low-investment Solution to Closing Skill Gaps; New-Hires and Incumbents

by Dean Prigelmeier, President of Proactive Technologies, Inc.

Proactive Technologies, Inc. has worked with many employers over the years, establishing and technically supporting cost-effective, task-based structured on-the-job training programs. For each employer, every effort is made to tailor the worker training system to accommodate the employer’s budget, job classifications (even unique training programs for each job classification in each department), business goals and manage the system through all types of change. Unlike some products or services that require the employer to change practices that work in order to utilize them, the PROTECH© system of managed human resource development  is built around what is working for the employer, incorporating established information such as work processes and specifications, safety standards, quality standards, etc. This approach minimizes the need for the employer’s culture to drastically change what works for them, focusing instead on improvements in an area of weakness.

click here to expand

“There is no doubt this approach is effective. After all, what is better: unstructured and haphazard worker training that cannot be explained, measured, improved or understood, or structured on-the-job training for all workers that is easily measured, implemented, improved and explained to auditors?”

The main steps used to build an employer-based structured workforce development system starts with understanding the desired outcome first: Read More

A “Pay-for-Value” Worker Development Program – Fair to Management and Workers, and Effective Too!

by Stacey Lett, Director of Operations – Eastern U.S. – Proactive Technologies, Inc.

A conundrum for many employers – those who are allowed to consider the wage-value relationship in their business strategy – is “what is the right pay rate for work performed.” An often used strategy is to establish a competitive wage range for a job classification based on area surveys of similar job classification in the industry, adjusted for the uniqueness of work requirements for the employer’s job classification. Once hired, an employee progresses through the wage range measured by time in the job classification, in some cases with wage adjustments based on merit. While consistent, this approach may limit the employer to paying, in many cases, more for labor than the value derived. And here is why.

If an employer purchases a new, technologically advanced, piece of machinery that is advertised to increase the output of a process from 100 units per hour to 300 units per hour, the employer would be disappointed if it only received 150 units per hour. That employer would, most likely, challenge the manufacturer and perhaps request a refund if not satisfied.

click here to expand

“How would one determine the proper wage rate for the value derived if there is no effort to hire workers accurately to today’s job needs, train workers to all of the required tasks and measure workers for the work they were hired and trained to perform?”

Why doesn’t that same sentiment apply to hiring workers? In a hypothetical, but typical, example an employer has an opening for a job classification that consists of 50 critical tasks that the employer expects the person filling that job classification to perform. Why shouldn’t the employer expect that person to master all 50 tasks? What might happen instead, after what is considered to be the “training period” is completed, the employer notices through anecdotal evidence and whispers that the output from that hired individual is below expectation. As time goes by and dissatisfaction grows, the decision to terminate the employee is made, often not measured against the investment in the employee thus far. If retained, the employee progresses through the wage range with no guarantee that the employee’s output increases. Where is the concern to correct this? Read More

Custom Glass Solutions Holds Ceremony to Convey First Certificates to Employees Completing its Job Mastery Program

Proactive Technologies, Inc. – Staff

On August 31, 2021, Custom Glass Solutions, LLC. held its first ceremony to convey Certificates of Job Mastery and Task Mastery to its employees completing their job-based structured on-the-job training program today. Collectively, 156 employees received the portfolio at its Upper Sandusky and Fostoria, OH facilities.

In attendance were dignitaries from The Greater Ohio Workforce Board, Inc., OhioMeansJobs of Seneca and Wyandot Counties, and other workforce development agencies and educational institutions that have supported Custom Glass Solution’s program since it began in 2020: LuAnne Cooke, Lt. Governor’s Regional Representative for Northwest; Carol Kern; OhioMeansJobs Seneca County, Kathy Oliver, Seneca County Department of Job and Family Services Director, Greg Moon, Wyandot County Economic Development; Diana Jacoby: OhioMeansJobs Wyandot County, John Trott: Greater Ohio Workforce Board Executive Director; Rocky Rockhold, Greater Ohio Workforce Board Program Director; Kyle McColly, Mayor of Upper Sandusky, Jeff Long, Ohio Dept of Job and Family Services, Project Manager, Tonia Saunders, Assistant Director of Employment Services for the Ohio Department of Job and Family Services; Richard George, Tri-Rivers Career Center Adult Education Director– RAMTEC; Dean Prigelmeier, President of Proactive Technologies, Inc., Frank Gibson, Independent Workforce Development Consultant.

click here to expand

Custom Glass Solutions has been on a rapid growth path. While the more familiar, informal one-on-one training of its workers served its purpose, Custom Glass decided it needed to formalize it by building an infrastructure around what was in place. This standardization makes it possible for the company to accelerate the transfer of worker expertise, document the training progress more accurately, provide metrics to measure and improve outcomes, and provide credentialing opportunities to its employees. Read More

Confusion Over What Constitutes “Training” is Stumbling Block to Effective Worker Development Strategies

by Dean Prigelmeier, President of Proactive Technologies, Inc.

For the anyone searching for information to help them choose a worker development strategy, a web search of “on-the-job training methods” might produce thirty or forty informative, but confusing, charts. The search result is a mixture of domains, methods, philosophies – one seemingly in conflict with the other. A non-practitioner of workforce development strategies can gather from this search result alone why there is a perpetual state of confusion between even “experts,” marked by  decades of employer and trainee disappointment in the lack of recognizable strategies and outcomes, which are often devoid of meaningful results.

Over the years, approaches and methods have evolved out of their ineffectiveness, many diverging from the basic principals of workforce development. Markets for products to address these approaches grew and well-funded marketing began to find unaware customers. The notion of “training” morphed into branded versions of “learning,” selected not so much on their basis in logic, but more on the lack of “smart” choices and how well the marketing effort worked.

click here to expand

“A great first step is to clearly differentiate between “learning” and “training.” The strategies, methods of delivery and outcomes for each are very different. Without such clarity, one might mistakenly invest heavily in a strategy to accomplish worker development objectives that, instead, uses up vital resources and scare opportunity, and sours the organization’s attitude toward training for years to come.”

The acceleration started around 40 years ago. Prior to that, job classifications did not change much and were relatively simple in structure. Then panic set in over the approaching “skills gaps,” as computers were introduced into every aspect of our lives. Fear of baby boomers nearing retirement, taking their technical expertise with them, added to the challenge. Solutions started to appear out of academia, based on the world they knew and not as much on the world they were trying to improve, as they would have liked to think. Read More

Proactive Technologies Announces Summer “Turnkey Project” Discount Offer is Back – Expires September 30th, 2021

by Proactive Technologies, Inc. Staff

After a year-and-a-half long Covid-19 break, Proactive Technologies Inc. is once again extending to employers a generous discount offer of up to 30% from June 15 to September 30th, 2021 – so sign-up by then and lock in your rate.

This accelerated transfer of expertise™ approach is a tremendous offer without the discount, but with it can help any employer quickly and completely train the skilled workers they need AND realize an increase in worker capacity, work quantity/quality and compliance (ISO/TS/AS, engineering specifications and safety) while reducing the internal costs of training! New-hires and incumbent workers are driven to full job mastery and higher levels of return on worker investment (ROWI). The task-based, structured on-the-job training infrastructure is perfect for the apprenticeships; instead of marking the calendar for “time-in-job,” job-relevant tasks are mastered and documented.

click here to expand

Waiting on general classes or unstructured, ad hoc one-on-one training to improve performance and maximize the investment in each worker usually proves to be futile and disappointing. When a worker masters the work they were hired for, it can now be possible to explain, document, repeat and/or improve performance. When turnover occurs and puts you back to square one – wiping out any gains and wasting your investment – labor costs rise, quality and work consistency decreases and the “gap” skill remains. So why not treat workers as the investment it is and manage it for the outcome you need and expect?

n the event that anyone needs one more way (i.e. in addition to live online presentations, onsite presentations) to gather enough information to decide whether to move forward with structured on-the-job training to boost their training strategy, PTI is resuming onsite presentations. Contact Proactive Technologies to schedule an appointment.  Read More

Read the full September, 2021 Proactive Technologies Report newsletter, including linked industry articles and online presentation schedules.

Posted in News

Proactive Technologies Report – August, 2021

Posted on by DPrigelmeierpti

Apprenticeships That Make Money? Not as Impossible as it Seems (part 2 of 2) – Setting Up an Apprenticeship Center

by Dean Prigelmeier, President of Proactive Technologies, Inc.

In the first part of a two-part article entitled “Apprenticeships That Make Money? Not as Impossible as it Seems (part 1 of 2)” appearing in the Proactive Technologies Report, I discussed what seemed to be the obvious differences in European and U.S. apprenticeship models. I suggested that visionary U.S. business leaders consider creating a revenue-generating “apprenticeship center” within the organization to cover the costs of the apprenticeship and, in some cases, make money. How could that be accomplished? In continuing the discussion I would like to offer a possible strategy.

American manufacturers turned to lower wage labor sources, such as Mexico, China and India, during the last 30 years to lower their production costs in the hope that they would be more profitable. It is now understood that with lower wage costs comes additional supply chain costs which can, if uncontrollable, erase some or all of the gains a lower wage level might offer.

click here to expand

But what if some of the services or operations to manufacture products or sub-assemblies that were, or are to be, off-shored could be done internally – at the labor cost of “training wages” as done in Europe – using equipment that would otherwise have to be idled, sold or shipped? What if those training wages could be furthered reduced by state grants? Could employers find that the source of lower wages is in their own back yard?

Although the following approach for determining if an apprenticeship center/cost-reduction center is right for your organization is simple, it should be scalable to any organization with slight modifications: Read More

Are Advances in Technology Distracting Keeping HR From the Fundamentals of Worker Selection and Development?

by Stacey Lett, Director of Operations – Eastern U.S. – Proactive Technologies, Inc.

Billions of investment dollars are driving the advancements in technology into every corner of our lives, including the selection and development of workers. Predictably, the emphasis often seems more on the technology and the money it can make for investors than the practicality for the end-user or those it effects.

It is not just the refrigerators that talk to your grocery store, or watches that talk to the phone in your pocket. Wall Street, with an accumulating mountain of cash, can drive any idea to fabricate a “trend” that often dissipates as quickly as it emerges, sometimes leaving disruption in the wake but yields a return for investors. For investors it is the means to an end. To many, it may negatively affect their life and their future.

click here to expand

In the 1990’s, investors started to look at the National Security Agency’s and Central Intelligence Agency’s “key-word search” capabilities used to scan millions of documents from around the world for specific words and phrases to expand their intelligence gathering reach. They saw applications of this technology in the civilian world, including scanning the mounds of resumes and employment applications employers had to filter in order to find a few new-hires. On the surface, this seemed to be a godsend.

Soon employers and employment candidates saw what the developers of this technology did not. The technology first had to count on employers having accurately designed job descriptions in consistent formats, using standardized terms, words and phrases to describe pre-hire knowledge, experience, skills and abilities of interest. The fact was reality couldn’t have been farther from this, with job descriptions written 50 years prior, written precisely for someone the employer wanted to hire (not so reflective of the actual job requirements), or cut & pasted from a handy library resource.

Next, this technology had to rely the applicant knowing the right words and phrases to describe their own pre-hire knowledge, experience, skills and abilities of interest to the employer for the algorithm to recognize a closeness or match. In truth, most candidates even knew less about the difference between a skill and ability, knowledge and a trait, having “experience with” versus being “acquainted with,” or being “fluent” in a topic or having a passing knowledge.

Nevertheless, this technology, with all of its short-comings, stormed the market. Many who lost their jobs in 2008, as with the impact of the Covid-19 pandemic, had not written a resume or filled in a job application for 20 or 30 years, let alone were aware of how key-word search worked and the need to be precise in describing a life of work in terms used by employers which were evolving and who probably changed their own management line-up and company strategy. No one really knows how many highly skilled and perfect matches have seen their careers derailed by this technology, robbing the worker of the job they wanted and the employer of the worker they needed.

Today, while the matching technology is still in use, more and more employers recognize its shortcomings and have developed “work-arounds” to try to ensure more qualified candidates are fairly and more objectively measured. Some have thrown out the idea of key-word candidate screening but not before the years of damage was done. Read More

Proactive Technologies Announces Summer “Turnkey Project” Discount Offer is Back – Expires September 30th, 2021

by Proactive Technologies, Inc. Staff

After a year-and-a-half long Covid-19 break, Proactive Technologies Inc. is once again extending to employers a generous discount offer of up to 30% from June 15 to September 30th, 2021 – extended as requested by employers!

This accelerated transfer of expertise™ approach is a tremendous offer without the discount, but with it can help any employer quickly and completely train the skilled workers they need AND realize an increase in worker capacity, work quantity/quality and compliance (ISO/TS/AS, engineering specifications and safety) while reducing the internal costs of training! New-hires and incumbent workers are driven to full job mastery and higher levels of return on worker investment (ROWI). The task-based, structured on-the-job training infrastructure is perfect for the apprenticeships; instead of marking the calendar for “time-in-job,” job-relevant tasks are mastered and documented.

click here to expand

Waiting on general classes or unstructured, ad hoc one-on-one training to improve performance and maximize the investment in each worker usually proves to be futile and disappointing. When a worker masters the work they were hired for, it can now be possible to explain, document, repeat and/or improve performance. When turnover occurs and puts you back to square one – wiping out any gains and wasting your investment – labor costs rise, quality and work consistency decreases and the “gap” skill remains. So why not treat workers as the investment it is and manage it for the outcome you need and expect?

n the event that anyone needs one more way (i.e. in addition to live online presentations, onsite presentations) to gather enough information to decide whether to move forward with structured on-the-job training to boost their training strategy, PTI is resuming onsite presentations. Contact Proactive Technologies to schedule an appointment.  Read More

Environmental and Cultural Factors That Undermine a Successful Structured On-the-Job Training Program

by Dean Prigelmeier, President of Proactive Technologies, Inc.

I’ll start by saying that every worker is a capital investment. It seems to be conceptually obvious, but sometimes overlooked in practice. Just as with all of the collective expertise is intellectual capital, it should be deliberately developed, protected, its use maximized. ISO9001:2015, TS 16949, AS 9100 and NADCAP emphasize this fact and have sections in their guidelines that pertain to, and require compliance with, this concept.

The saying “can’t see the forest for the trees,“ implies that one is too close to the subject to see it accurately. In the case of worker development, employers have often been marginally successful with the informal, ad hoc, unstructured one-on-one training that seems to gets them what they need, but not as effectively and efficiently as they think or would like.

click here to expand

Even when an effort is made to structure the unstructured, there are those that resist the effort for a number of reasons. Some have a vested interest in defending the program that they have struggled with through many years of legitimate effort. Some do not like change. Some fear change will interfere with other important goals, such as production quotas – even though the effort to structure what is loosely already there (which takes much longer with lesser results) should only be seen as a positive development. Some may think they know what they are doing or talking about, but are confused about the major differences between classroom lectures, unstructured one-on-one training and structured on-the-job training.

There are only a few true practitioners(with varying approaches) of structured on-the-job training in the world, but the approach is gaining ground with the reintroduction of conceptually similar approaches such as “Training Within Industry”, an approach developed during WWII to help build a strong manufacturing supply chain,. And with the task-based knowledge capture and task-based training requirements of ISO/AS/TS that employers should literally comply with. It would be wise to follow the direction of whichever expert you bring in to help your firm build and implement your structured on-the-job training program until they are ready to hand it off to your trained staff. A professional firm would try hard to learn your culture and constraints before proceeding with a strategy right for your firm. Read More

Read the full August, 2021 Proactive Technologies Report newsletter, including linked industry articles and online presentation schedules.

Posted in News