The manufacturing industry is the backbone of many economies worldwide.
Whether manufacturing goods for consumers or the equipment used to create those goods, manufacturing is the foundation of countless industries. Like most industries, manufacturing relies heavily on a highly skilled and motivated workforce to keep everything up and running.
Liberty Staffing Services knows that this task goes beyond just filling the job vacancies. It requires assembling a team with the right skills and expertise to meet production demands and maintain all quality standards. Here are some tips to help ensure your facility is not only fully staffed, but fully staffed with the right people.
Which Staffing Logistics Affect Manufacturing?
Staffing logistics in manufacturing refers to the planning, acquisition, and management of the workforce to best meet operational needs efficiently. This umbrella term includes a range of processes that are meant to ensure that a manufacturing business has the right people with the right skills in the right place.
These include:
Strategic Workforce Planning: Through analyzing current and future needs and identifying gaps in skills and abilities, a plan can be created that will align staffing needs with the company’s long term goals.
Talent Recruitment: Identifying and attracting the kind of skilled talent you’re looking for is a huge part of a manufacturing business’ staffing strategy. It involves using all available resources to find candidates, assess qualifications, conduct interviews and hire the best candidates for the job.
Workforce Deployment: Putting the right employee into a specific role, shift and department is a key element of staffing logistics. This process ensures that you are optimizing your productivity and utilizing all available resources properly.
These processes and more are vital to making sure that your workforce is ready to handle everything it needs to meet the company’s goals.
Why are Staffing Logistics So Complicated?
The manufacturing industry faces its own set of challenges when it comes to the logistics of staffing. Some of the biggest challenges they face when it comes to staffing include:
Labour Shortages
Like many other industries, manufacturing is not immune to the phenomenon of labour shortages. As more workers retire, fewer young people are choosing careers in manufacturing, which can make finding skilled and qualified workers an obstacle to being fully staffed.
Seasonal Fluctuations
Depending on what area of manufacturing you specialize in, you may experience peaks and valleys in demand that happen seasonally. Without effective planning, filling your labour needs appropriately can be challenging and can end up costing companies a lot of money.
Skill Gaps
Manufacturing is becoming increasingly complex and technology-driven. It’s vital but often difficult to bridge the gap between the skills of the employees and the evolving demands of the job.
Facing these challenges, it’s important for all manufacturers to have a plan and a partner who can help you navigate them.
What You Can Do to Address the Challenges
There’s a lot that is not in your control when it comes to staffing logistics in manufacturing, but there’s plenty that you do have control over. To ensure your company is fully and adequately staffed to meet the demands of your industry, you can:
Upskilling and Reskilling
You might have the right people with the right skills right now, but can you guarantee that the job they’re doing will be the same five years from now? With rapid changes in the industry, no one can make that guarantee. Invest in the workforce you have and give them the skills they need to be able to evolve with the job instead of getting lost in that skills gap.
Emphasize Technical Skills
Automation is taking over many aspects of the manufacturing industry. That means the skill sets you are looking for in prospective employees needs to shift as well. In your recruitment process, make sure that you are putting an emphasis on the need for technology skills in the workforce you are trying to recruit.
Keep Up with Trends
Know the staffing trends that are current in the manufacturing industry. Analyze these trends and your current practices to see how your practices can change to match those your competitors are using. This will ensure you are able to keep up with the recruitment of the workforce you need.
Invest in Workforce Development
Combating labour shortages has been the challenge for all industries in the last few years. Ways you can attract people to your company and the manufacturing industry include developing and implementing training programs, establishing apprenticeship programs to attract those interested in the manufacturing industry and collaborating with local technical schools or community colleges to help produce a pipeline of skilled workers.
Partner with a Staffing Agency You Can Rely On
Staffing agencies, like Liberty Staffing Services, are the perfect partner to help you combat your staffing challenges. We can help you find top candidates with the right skills to fill the vacancies you have now. We can help you recruit through local channels to find future members of your workforce. Additionally, we can help you meet your workforce needs through the ebbs and flows of seasonal demands.
Liberty Staffing Services will not only save your company money, but we can help you put your focus where it needs to be in your company. Contact us today to discuss your options to create an adequate, highly skilled workforce that will keep your company running smoothly.
