The Future Factory: Mapping the Skills That Will Power Manufacturing

MANUFACTURING HAS ALWAYS BEEN AT THE VANGUARD OF TECHNOLOGICAL TRANSFORMATION

"Against the backdrop of an existing skills shortage and with skills needs evolving so rapidly, employers can no longer go to market to buy new skills when they want them. They need to become builders of talent to develop a workforce with the skills they need to remain competitive. Talent is the most renewable resource on our planet: ready to learn, adapt and thrive in new environments."

Rebekah Kowalski
Vice President of Manpower North America

Technical disruption is contributing to a Manufacturing Skills Revolution. Almost half of all roles in manufacturing (49%) will need to change within the next three-to-five years as the industry transitions to become fully digital.

Digitization, automation and transformation are impacting every industry, disrupting skills and creating new jobs. Manufacturing is the vanguard, with new roles appearing as fast as others become obsolete. Manufacturers are reporting growing talent shortages as they struggle to find the right blend of technical and soft skills to fill new positions. The catalyst for the early stages of this skills shift was automation – machine strength. Now sector-wide transformation has been turbocharged by the Internet of Things, the digitally
connected enterprise, the relentless expansion of data and Artificial Intelligence (AI) to handle the scope of the challenge – machine thinking.

To find practical solutions to this skills shortage and ensure up to 2 million new manufacturing jobs do not go unfilled,1 ManpowerGroup and MxD convened more than 30 academic, government and industry partners including Siemens, Microsoft, Caterpillar and General Electric to create an industry-recognized taxonomy that defines digital manufacturing roles of the future. The groundbreaking workforce analysis, developed in partnership with MxD (formerly the Digital Manufacturing and Design
Innovation Institute) provides the first taxonomy of its kind, outlining skills and roles of the future and serving as a practical toolkit for manufacturing organizations.

The industry’s transition to full digitization is already well underway and accelerating daily. This paper maps the trends reshaping manufacturing, identifies the skills and roles needed, and outlines how a culture of innovation and effective
leadership will be critical to success as companies transform.

Key Takeaways
• Digital transformation requires new skills, new roles and new approaches to leadership.
• Companies need new approaches to upskill people at speed and at scale to develop the talent they need to remain competitive.
• The right blend of technology, people and skills is key.

To read this groundbreaking workforce analysis, complete this brief form to download your copy of The Future Factory report.