WORKFORCE DEVELOPMENT
Te burden for workforce development is exceptionally high for small and medium manufacturers and we often don’t have the depth of team members needed to scale and support in-house training, especially during production hours. Wage and hour laws can also be punitive for training outside of work hours and this is where I think augmented and virtual reality training options could have a significant impact.’ Bishop-Wisecarver’s European partner,
HepcoMotion, based in the UK, runs an apprenticeship programme in partnership with Exeter College. Maurice Porter, head of learning, development and apprenticeships at HepcoMotion, says the benefits of the scheme are strong links with the community and an ability to refresh ideas and working practices, as well as to bridge the engineering skills gap. HepcoMotion has been running its
g
positions – in mechanical engineering companies must be sensitised to corporate cultural barriers. Tese include unconscious discrimination processes in personnel recruitment, career opportunities for women, but also how they are treated within the company.’ Šeimys also highlights the importance
of updating job images in a more realistic way to enable them to appeal to female engineering students: ‘Tis opens up new opportunities to modernise the rather conservative image of engineering jobs – [that is] screwdriver/cogwheel – in mechanical and plant engineering. Te topics of climate-neutral production, decarbonisation and resource conservation can likewise increase the attractiveness of mechanical and plant engineering as an employer for female students, in the sense of working on the great challenges of our time.’ Bharkhada of Make UK agrees: ‘As
manufacturing recovers from the pandemic and embraces new technologies, the task of reframing manufacturing as an attractive, progressive sector with employers who exude this approach has never been more urgent. Tis transformation will need more highly skilled employees from all sections of society who can respond to these opportunities and challenges.’
State-side shortages As you might expect, the skills shortage is not something unique to Europe. In California, motion control solutions manufacturer Bishop-Wisecarver is also seeing a shortage in skilled engineers. ‘It is partly driven by our proximity to
‘Te [digital] transformation [of manufacturing] will need more highly skilled employees from all sections of society’
Silicon Valley, where the emphasis is on software engineering,’ Pamela Kan, the firm’s president, tells Imaging and Machine Vision Europe. ‘We need mechanical, electrical and industrial engineers and those are often not as popular for students in California.’ She adds that one positive outcome of the pandemic is that it has opened up the talent pool for Bishop- Wisecarver’s engineering roles, as team members can now work remotely. Bishop-Wisecarver is a member of the
Association for Advancing Automation (A3) in the US, and Kan spoke on a panel discussion on the topic of workforce development during A3’s Automate Forward digital show. Similar to Šeimys, Kan highlights the
importance of training current employees as a tool for addressing the skills shortage. ‘California needs to promote, and
adequately fund, the Employment Training Panel (ETP), which helps companies like mine by reimbursing the cost of training current team members so their skills can keep up with the continual technology advancements,’ she says. ‘Other states and countries should have similar programmes.
10 IMAGING AND MACHINE VISION EUROPE VISION YEARBOOK 2021/22
apprenticeship scheme for 23 years. Te apprentices are sourced from local schools and colleges, and a full apprenticeship lasts for 42 months, although the firm also runs a 10-week traineeship in partnership with Exeter College. Trainees can secure operator roles in the firm’s machine shop or go on to take a place on the apprenticeship scheme. Porter says that, on the shop floor, the
company supports a learning culture with a skills transfer from older, experienced engineers to younger engineers. ‘Tis teaches our inexperienced engineers new skills, and empowers our older engineers and causes them to reflect on their own engineering practices,’ he says. HepcoMotion employs four or five
apprentices every year. ‘Te company realises the value of apprentices in terms of bridging the skills gap, as well as the addition of fresh ideas, enthusiasm and diversity,’ Porter adds. Some machine vision firms have similar
training schemes – Basler, for instance, offers vocational training courses for young people in electrical and mechanical engineering, and computer science disciplines, among others. In the long-term, Kan believes that firms
such as Bishop-Wisecarver should be involved in supporting community STEM programmes at all levels of education, and creating internship and co-op programmes for college students. Near-term, they should be promoting a corporate culture that emphasises the importance of a diverse engineering team and include evidence that this doesn’t just exist on paper. ‘Diverse individuals brought together to
work collectively can create faster, better and more innovatively, bringing transformative ideas to the company and industry,’ Kan concludes. ‘Diverse engineering teams create the best solutions.’ O
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