21,420 to be exact. This is a 20% increase in the number of credentials issued in the United States from 2014. It is a great start toward the 100,000 skilled jobs that industry will need to fill over the next decade…
PMPA is an original founding partner of NIMS, and continues to support its mission to develop and certify industry recognized credentials for our workforce through consensus skill standards.
NIMS has developed skills standards ranging from entry-level to master-level that cover the breadth of metalworking operations and industrial technology maintenance. NIMS certifies individuals’ skills against these national standards via credentials that companies can use to recruit, hire, place, and promote individual workers. Schools and employer training programs incorporate the credentials as performance and completion measures to deliver high quality training to industry standards. NIMS will soon add credentials in Industrial Technology Maintenance and Computer-Aided Manufacturing (CAM) to its portfolio of offerings in 2016-2017.
NIMS works to ensure all individuals entering the workforce are equipped with the skills needed to be successful on the job from day one.
“Executives from PMPA member shops all tell us that they would hire people with skills -even if they did not have an immediate opening,” says Bernie Nagle, Executive Director of PMPA. “Our support of NIMS, and the RIGHT SKILLS NOW program is one way that PMPA and our members are addressing the issue of lack of skilled workforce. We congratulate NIMS, and their entire team, on the growth in credentials issued in 2015.”
PMPA congratulates NIMS, all of its partner and sponsoring organizations, and the professionals doing the work that made 2015 a record year for credentials issued. This record is evidence of both the commitment and achievement of developing a competitive workforce through our NIMS community.
For more information about NIMS : NIMS READY
For more information about Right Skills Now: Right Skills Now
For more information about a career in Precision Machining: Career Overview
Career fact sheet
Tag: Career In Precision Machining
Despite the fact that there has been no significant “recovery” of employment under the current Administration and Congress, There is a way to create your own personal “employment recovery.”
PMPA tracks employment sentiment monthly as part of our Business Trends reporting,
Employment outlook sentiments have been positive for the PMPA members- above 90% for the entire year of 2013.
And our shops have been scheduling overtime- average length of first shift is 42.8 hours for calendar year 2013.
And by the way, earnings of new hires in manufacturing are higher than those not in manufacturing. 38% higher according to the U.S. Department of Commerce Economics and Statistics Administration
The folks in Washington haven’t done much to turn the nation’s employment situation back to the upside as you can see in the top graph.
But if you are comfortable with high school math- geometry, algebra, and trig- you could have a great career in precision machining.
For info on training programs in your area check out the PMPA Comprehensive Career Training Database.
Career overview.
Why you should consider a career in manufacturing.
One of our members posted on Linked In “We would hire 3 guys right away with the right skills.”
Get skills. Create your own personal economic recovery.
21 PMPA member shops across the country took part in MFG Day 2013.
Here are some photos and some lessons learned:
Lesson 1: Pride of Job. The hosts at the various shops were obviously proud of the work that they do and the equipment that they use.
Lesson 2: People doing the work connected with the attendees. In nearly every case hosts- guides, speakers and demonstrators- were the actual workers on the machines.
Lesson 3: Connection and interest existed in attendees.
Lesson 4: Manufacturing is an area worthy of career consideration. ask the hundreds of attendees to PMPA member shops hosting MFG. Day Events.
Manufacturing Day participation by PMPA member companies helped to change the perception of Manufacturing in the minds of attendees- some of whom we will employ as our future workforce.
And in their communities.
Next year, we hope that you can open your shop to the local community and potential workforce as part of MFG Day 2014. Our 2013 experience tells us that you’ll be glad that you did.
August 14th we published a post that asked the question-“What does the precision machining shop of the future look like?”
We also posted the link to several relevant groups on LinkedIn.
Jim Henderson, Continuous Improvement Consultant at Kalman Manufacturing replied to the discussion on the American Machinist Metalworking Group on LinkedIn.
We think that you will appreciate his vision of our future. and perhaps find some actionable ideas in his post.
His vision reframes the question to “What do the employees in our future precision machining shops look like?”
His vision of the shop of the future is not at all staffed like ours are today…
Here is Jim Henderson’s reply:
“Interesting discussion. I see the successful shops of the future as being highly automated. Lots of multi-axis lathe/mill and FMS.
My vision of the employees of the future may not be in line with others. In fact it may infuriate some.
I see highly educated, as in engineers with B.S. degrees in industrial, mechanical engineering and other related disciplines. Quality engineers adding value through process validation and contributing to manufacturing process development, not trying to inspect quality into the parts. A collaborative relationship with all. These college graduate engineers will be the value add in the shop of the future.
The advanced equipment of the present and future requires highly educated programmers to optimize it’s utilization. They do need the talent/experience of the long term machinists for advice!!
Fortunately on the other end of the spectrum there will be a need for operators and support personnel.
The $$ generated per employee will rise considerable due to the throughput of the equipment. Thus resulting in less employees overall.
The best news is, from my experience, if a shop uses best practices in all areas of it’s business there is such a demand in the U.S. that those shops can be highly profitable. Therefore they can provide a very handsome benefit package to their employees. This can result in attracting good recruits and high employee retention. For those shop owners and employees that are willing to step up and play the game with this formula, manufacturing in the U.S. can have a true renaissance.
For those that want to continue arguing about who is to blame and why there should be more government funding for training etc. the future is indeed bleak.
We all need to get together and right the ship for our collective success.”
There you have it. A positive view of our future shops through the lens of what our future workforce might look like.
Are you actively working on workforce issues for your shop’s future?
You can bet Jim Henderson’s shop is…
Many people think that the choice of where they went to school is an important factor in their post graduation earnings.
A new report from Georgetown University shows that the choice of major has a much greater influence on those earnings.
We thought that we would show how the average wage of a skilled machinist compares to those earnings- without the 4+ years of college and the debt most graduates build up while at school.
Our figures for the skilled machinist were taken from our latest Shop Hourly Employee Wage Report and represent the annual straight time hourly earnings for a setup qualified multiple spindle, rotary transfer, Swiss type, or multi axis CNC turning/machining center operators.
The machinist earnings are a low estimate, frankly, because many machinists are scheduled overtime.
The college major earnings data was posted by Planet Money on the NPR site. It was originally prepared by the authors of the Georgetown study.
We were well served by our college degree, eventually. The problem was, when we graduated, we were making more in manufacturing than our degree would earn us in an entry level position in our field.
If you have the passion for academics and a 4+ year university program, that’s great.
But if you know that you really aren’t “scholarship’ material, and you’d rather be doing exciting work than writing papers and piling up student debt, we think it will be worth your time to investigate a career in precision machining- or any other craft like electrician, mechatronics, welding, tool and die making, robotics…
Successful completion of high school math algebra, geometry, trig is all that is needed to be able to do the math for precision machining.
We’d love to help you start your well paying career.
More information:
Career overview
Career benefits
Career training
P.S. I interviewed a member CEO today: Their machinists averaged $50,000 last year, plus top of the line medical, vacation, holidays, personal days,uniforms, plus company paid training and more… You should really give serious thought to gaining a skill rather than a degree.
While there is no real recovery in Workforce Participation Rate at the national level, individuals can create their own personal economic recovery plan through training for a career in precision machining.
In the precision machining industry, we are convinced that the unemployment issue is structural- we have job openings but no qualified applicants.
Here is a graph showing US Labor Participation Rate 2007- 2013.
Meanwhile, the folks who think that it isn’t structural continue to pump trillions into the economy- to no avail.
Advice to job seekers:
If you are comfortable doing high school math, and would like a career where you positively impact someone’s life everyday by making things like human safety critical anti-lock brake or airbag components, medical device components, aerospace, fluid power control, and parts used in other critical technologies, consider a job in precision machining.
Our shops continue to look for talented people to bring their skills to our shops.
A couple of introductory courses to our trade are all that is needed to get the skills needed for an initial hire.
Our latest Business Trends Report for May 2013 shows that 92% of our responding companies felt that employment prospects would be the same or better.
You can find information needed to find a training program at PMPA’s Comprehensive Career Database here.
Want to explore the idea of a career in precision machining? Go to our Careers Page here.
The folks in Washington D.C. continue to shovel money to the markets in hopes of creating recovery. We’ re not optimistic. Hasn’t worked yet, see the graphs above.
But we ARE optimistic that anyone that can do the math can make a strategic decision to get some training and create their own personal recovery with training leading to a job leading to a career in Precision Machining.
Our member companies are looking for people with skills. The want ads around the country show plenty of machinist wanted, CNC machinist wanted, CNC setup operator wanted advertisements.
You can get those skills.
Those skills will get you a job.
Fed assets graph courtesy NAM economist Chad Moutray
The Atlantic titles their article “Here’s How Little Math Americans Use at Work”
Spoiler alert, in Precision Machining, we all use a lot of math through algebra, geometry trig and statistics.
“…the best blue-collar jobs do in fact require a level of mathematical literacy on par with what you’d expect a student to know if they were college bound. To me, that hints at an argument for more high level vocational programs: It might help if students actually knew that those boring equations really one day would earn them a paycheck.”
If you can do the math, the precision machining industry has a great job and career for you.
We have been working on the skills gap issue for a couple of years.
This infographic from MSN careers shows that the issue of finding skilled workers is a global, not just U.S. and Canada problem.
Precision Machining openings are begging across the country- and were even at the peak of the 2009 Recession. Demographics are going to make finding skilled machinists an even more urgent management imperative.
Four of the top five manufacturing sectors by added employment in 2012 were key markets served by precision machining; Transportation Equipment, Motor Vehicles and Parts, Fabricated Metal Products, Machinery.
(The fifth market was Food Manufacturing, and yes, some of our companies make parts for food service too- think blender parts, nozzles and components for food dispensing, preparation and packaging equipment.)
According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the number of Jobs in Manufacturing increased by 180,000 in 2012.
“In December, manufacturing employment rose by 25,000, with small gains in a number of component industries. In 2012, factory employment increased by 180,000; most of the growth occurred during the first quarter.”
“In December, the average workweek for all employees on private nonfarm payrolls edged up by 0.1 hour to 34.5 hours. The manufacturing workweek edged up by 0.1 hour to 40.7 hours, and factory overtime was unchanged at 3.3 hours.”
While there are signs that manufacturing employment gains have slowed down in the second half, those were connected to the economic uncertainties tied to the Presidential Election, Fiscal Cliff, and Global Economic Slowdown. Two of these three special causes are now behind us.
As the graph above shows, Manufacturing is the place to look for employment gains.
The softness in manufacturing employment in the last half of 2012 belies the demand that our industry will have for talented workers going forward. As the BLS workweek hours indicate, Manufacturing currently is using overtime to meet its needs. Given demographic trends, current lean staffing, and the push to reshore production, any economic upturn at all will be strongly bullish for employment prospects in Manufacturing in 2013.
Improvements in Housing Markets are already visible and a 15+ million auto sales forecast are two indicators that suggest if you want to find a well paying job in 2013, Precision Machining (Advanced Manufacturing) is a great place to apply.
For information about careers in Precision Machining, check out our Career Resources Page on the PMPA Website.
Find a training program near you using PMPA’s Comprehensive Jobs Training Database.
I continue to speak with instructors, counselors, and officials at local community colleges across the country. They are unanimous in saying that their machining students “have multiple job offers before they graduate.”
USA Today has an extensive article and video segment on Right Skills Now, the skilled workforce development program spearheaded by Darlene Miller of Permac Industries, in Burnsville, Minnesota.
Darlene is an elected vice president of PMPA and a member of the President’s Council on Jobs and Effectiveness (PCJC).
“We can’t wait two years or four years,” for students to graduate college, says Darlene Miller, CEO of Permac Industries, a contract manufacturer in Burnsville, Minn., who promoted the idea for the program last year when she was unable to find seven CNC operators. “We need people now.”
Experts say the program could serve as a national model for employers needing skilled workers yesterday and many jobless Americans unable to spend two years earning an associate degrees.
A pipeline of skilled factory workers is sorely needed, especially with Baby Boomers retiring. A year ago, 600,000 skilled manufacturing jobs were unfilled, and 80% of manufacturers couldn’t find proficient workers, according to a survey by the institute and Deloitte.
“Our programs, especially Rights Skills Now, are generated by industry needs.” Deborah Kerrigan, Dunwoody College of Technology. “There is a huge need for skilled labor.”
Read the full story and watch a great video at USA Today Right Skills Now