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Workforce Development 48 MoldMaking Technology —— AUGUST 2016 a combination of hard manufacturing skills and soft skills, resulting in a shortage of capable, skilled talent required by manufacturers to sustain and grow their businesses. This shortage has, and will continue to have, a wide-rang- ing and potentially detrimental economic impact, not only on manufacturing, but on the U.S. as a whole. The National Association of Manufacturers (NAM) estimates that over the next decade nearly 3.5 million manufacturing jobs will likely be needed, and 2 million are expected to go unfilled due to the skills gap. The manufacturing sector plays a key role in providing family- sustaining compensa- tion and maintaining quality of life, as manu- facturers employ nearly 9 percent of the U.S. workforce in jobs that provide higher-than- average wages, and are much more likely to offer health insurance and other benefits. Manufacturers are also responsible for more than 75 percent of all the private-sector research and development performed in the U.S., providing a technological edge that is critical to continuing innovation and national security. The resulting impact of the skills gap will be far-reaching. Mike Walter, president of Met2Plastic, a custom plastic pro- cesser in Elk Grove Village, Illinois, that specializes in injection molding and mold building for mission-critical indus- tries including aerospace, medical and industrial equipment, says his com- pany has experienced this shortage of skilled workers felt by manufacturers across the U.S. "Back in the day, you could put an ad in the paper saying you needed a moldmaker or a process technician, you would have several people apply, and off you went." Walter says. That ease of filling skilled manufacturing positions is now a distant memory. "The pool of skilled people is an ever-shrinking one. Like everyone else in our industry, we have a hard time filling skilled positions for molding and mold building. The skills gap can limit growth, because you can't flex quickly and it makes it more difficult to adapt to the changing needs of customers," he says. Digging Deeper Given the skilled-labor deficiency in an economy where supply is assumed to meet demand, one might expect young people would begin to realize that significant career opportunities exist in the industrial and manufacturing sectors, and would then increasingly select manufacturing as a career choice. This is not the case, however. In fact, in a 2014 study conducted by The Manufacturing Institute and Deloitte, more than 1,000 members of Generation Y (roughly 19- to 33-year-olds) ranked "manufacturing" dead last on a list of industries they would prefer to work in if they were beginning their careers today. Emphasizing that point, when a group of about 60 high school seniors in Wisconsin's Fox River Valley was asked dur- ing the school's career day to offer their perceptions of manu- facturing careers, the feedback included "sweaty," "dirty," "long hours," "dead-end," "no room for advancement," "strikes," "layoffs," "hot" and "unsafe." If these words are what come to mind when young people consider careers in manufacturing, is it any wonder that industrial employers are struggling to recruit them? More than any other single factor—three times more than any other—a student's own interests and experiences have the greatest impact on his or her future career pathway. Met2Plastic is a custom plastic processer that has felt the effects of the shortage of skilled workers. The company has had a hard time filling skilled positions for its mold- ing and mold-building facilities. Image courtesy of Met2Plastic.