Ingredients:
1. New technologies
2. Increased efficiency
3. International markets

Mix together. Result: Higher efficiency, productivity, wages, and revenues.

New technologies and increased efficiency
New technologies and increased efficiency contribute to increased bottom lines. In his Worcester Business Journal article "Grinding It Out In Manufacturing," Matt Pilon reports that Worcester manufacturer Saint-Gobain uses newer presses to produce "grinding wheels four times faster than previous equipment did." And a new facility for grinding wheels for the electronics industry positions the company for growing sales. The company also benefits from greater efficiency by using LEAN manufacturing, a method for eliminating waste. What's more: manufacturers connect new technologies with increased efficiency, citing new machinery investments as crucial to reducing waste and speeding up processes. 

Growth in international markets
The U.S. Department of Commerce attributes more than half of the Worcester area's manufacturing output to exports. Statewide data show growth in exports in 2010 and 2011 due in part to specialized products and domestically healthy companies increasing their business internationally.

The manufacturing job market
While manufacturers who use these ingredients report higher efficiency, productivity, wages, and revenues, these successes result in less jobs. The number of employees in Central Massachusetts' manufacturing sector has fallen by nearly 29 percent during the last decade. When Saint-Gobain experienced a revenue increase, they also reported fewer employees. Needing to automate in the global market explains these changes in the Commonwealth's manufacturing job market.

For decades, rigging companies, inspectors, elevator companies, and wire rope companies have relied on us for Imperial sheave gauges in sizes ranging from 1/4" to 2-1/2". Last year, we introduced a metric set to this mix. And in the coming months, we plan to introduce even more sets to give you what you need at the best prices available in the global market.

FInding out what you need
We're talking with and surveying you to find out:

• How much you want to pay for a metal set instead of plastic
• What tolerance you prefer (2.5% or 5%)
• What leaf sizes you need
• Whether or not you'd like a cutout to measure the wire rope

We learned even more about your sheave gauge needs of wire rope manufacturers at the Associated Wire Rope Fabricators (AWRF) General Meeting in Brooklyn this week.

Last week, we learned how to map out our processes at a Value Stream Mapping (VSM) workshop with the Massachusetts Manufacturing Extension Partnership. VSM involves six steps that will help us identify waste and create more efficient processes:

1. Group products, starting with those that have the highest volume, share operations, have the greatest demand, and use the greatest capacity. 
2. Map the current state. Get consensus on the material and information flow. Figure out what data to collect, then collect the data with the team to draw out the current state map.
3. Transition to the future state map. Figure out the customer demand rate, where the new scheduling point is, how to distribute the work to be performed, what activities need to be performed to reach the future state, and if you can implement continuous flow and pull systems.
4. Map the future state. List improvements and future process steps. Estimate the future data and draw the future state map.
5. Create a Kaizen plan. List out the improvements that you need to make.
6. Implement the Kaizen plan. Implement the improvements you just listed out.

While some predict that robots will increasingly take over jobs, the Association for Advancing Automation (A3) claims that robots contribute to an increase - not decrease - in U.S. employment. 

A3 cites vast research that robots are the key to claiming back offshore manufacturing jobs and increasing global competitiveness in its white paper "Robots Fuel the Next Wave of U.S. Productivity and Job Growth" 

Robots help companies stay competitive
A3 President Jeff Burnstein says that robots:

• Let U.S. companies win new orders
• Improve work environments by removing the boring and dangerous jobs.

Studies in China, Japan, Brazil, and India support this notion. When robot use went up, so did employment.

​"Our first figure in the study went back to 1996. We looked at industrial robot shipments versus employment. We assumed that if robots were job killers, you would have expected that unemployment would rise when robot shipments rose. But we found the exact opposite. When sales of robots go up, unemployment falls.... The factors that lead companies to buy robots are the same factors that lead them to employ people," says Burnstein.

The question of low-cost labor abroad
Burnstein says that quality - not low-cost labor - keeps companies competitive: quality products and short lead times. "Companies that are closer to their customers can deliver more quickly. That's a reason to be very happy about the advantage that automation provides U.S. manufacturers," he adds.

Moving forward
"We need to make sure we're training people for the jobs of the future," claims Burnstein. "People right now don't have the requisite skills. Workers can get those at technical schools, at community colleges."

Source: New paper argues automation will revive U.S. manufacturing and create new growth, more jobs

Last week, the Commonwealth of Massachusetts took another step toward helping manufacturers by launching the Advanced Manufacturing Training Program’s Workforce Development Grants for training programs for unemployed and underemployed individuals, according to the October 2, 2015 article "State opens Manufacturing Workforce Development Grants for applications."

Governor Charlie Baker attributes Massachusetts manufacturers' global competitiveness to their highly-skilled and highly-educated workforce. Lt. Governor Karyn Polito added that manufacturing drives the Massachusetts economy, 

Learn more.