Proactive Technologies Report – August, 2020

Learning, Unfortunately, The Hard Way

by Dean Prigelmeier, President of Proactive Technologies, Inc.

Employers are being tested these days on their ability to respond to a rapidly changing world and maintain operational continuity. Who could have imagined that a pandemic would so disrupt the world’s supply chain, and realign consumer needs and preferences so fast and furiously, that even previously successful business operations would be pushed toward shuttering?

I am sure we all thought that after the Economic Crash of 2008 and its horrible aftermath that we had left those days behind us. But here we are with another test to see who was paying attention. For some firms, just-in-time manufacturing and extreme Lean engineeringhas made it difficult to ride out the economic effects of the pandemic. Without having warehouses of inventory to call up while the supply chains straighten themselves out, the effects are immediate and debilitating. Many firms frantically attempted to reinvent themselves, in some cases in the most extreme way, without a clearly defined market or consumer, while other firms found themselves checkmated nearly overnight.

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Things Learned About Human Development at Home During the Pandemic

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

For those of us who have children and were thrust into the new role of being an “adjunct,” at-home teacher during the pandemic shut down, we have come away from the period with new experiences and new understanding of how people learn in a remote environment. I personally have a newfound respect for our teachers and instructors who have spent their days building on my child’s, and other people’s children, skills foundation they will need to succeed in life, further education and careers.

We started the pandemic shut down with very little guidance as to how parents would now play an integral part of their children’s learning – most with no experience in teaching, no support materials or guidance to do so and distractions in our own lives. Some of us experimented with online resources the best we could provided we have had the wireless access to do so. An estimated 14 million people lack access to in this country and another 25 million lack fast enough speeds to access many of the resources available, according to the FCC, with Microsoft placing the combined number at more like 163 million people. We know that, prior to the shutdown of schools, internet access was an important part of a student’s learning in school and homework at home. Still, parents tried to provide the facilitation needed to help our children learn even though our skills in those particular areas might’ve been weekend by many years of nonuse.

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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.

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Celebrating 20 Years With Long-Time Aerospace Industry Client Triumph Thermal Systems LLC and Retirement of its Lead Advocate

by Proactive Technologies, Inc. – Staff

Since 2000, Proactive Technologies, Inc. has provided technical implementation support for the structured on-the-job training system they were asked to set-up at Triumph Thermal Systems LLC, a division of the global Triumph Group. It is a manufacturer of civilian and military aircraft engine heat exchange systems and a registered F.A.A. repair site.

Initially, Ken Jackson, Human Resources Director’s, who retired in the Fall of 2019, primary concern was the loss of fully trained experts due to approaching retirements (i.e. 40% of the technically trained workforce was scheduled to retire in a 2 year period; 80% over a 6 year period). Triumph, originally “Parker Hannifin United Aircraft Products” when the project started,  is located in one of those rare remaining small-town heartland places where workers are hired and stay for their career – often repeated generation to generation. Cross-training allows workers to train in, and master, multiple job areas during their time at Triumph, so opportunities for personal growth abound.

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Read the full August, 2020 Proactive Technologies Report newsletter, including linked industry articles and online presentation schedules.