One Word - Manufacturing

Everyone knows the famous line from the 1967 film, The Graduate. Standing outside, next to the swimming pool at a party in his honor, the socially awkward Benjamin Braddock is approached by family friend, Mr. McGuire. He whispers to young Benjamin the one word that promises the young man the key to future career success.

Mr. McGuire: I just want to say one word to you - just one word.
Ben: Yes sir.
Mr. McGuire: Are you listening?
Ben: Yes I am.
Mr. McGuire: 'Plastics.'
Ben: Exactly how do you mean?
Mr. McGuire: There's a great future in plastics. Think about it. Will you think about it?
Ben: Yes I will.
Mr. McGuire: Shh! Enough said. That's a deal.

If I were to give graduates today one word – I would say “Manufacturing.” Over the past three years, we’ve seen a manufacturing resurgence in America. More than half a million manufacturing jobs have been added to our economy since 2010.

This is an astounding reversal. For more than a decade, we watched millions of manufacturing jobs leave America’s shores. Even the most optimistic among us were hard-pressed to imagine a future of any kind for manufacturing in the U.S.

Now, why do I tell you this story? Like Benjamin, I would guess that most young graduates today aren’t thinking about a career in manufacturing.

And why would they?

As I’ve said before, modern manufacturing has a branding problem.

Young kids today will tell you that they never considered going into manufacturing. As they were growing up they heard that industrial jobs were going overseas or that they were low-paying or low-skilled. They hadn’t considered the kind of education that would prepare them for these kinds of jobs. They figured that all manufacturing jobs were about brawn over brains, and they wanted nothing to do with it.

The reality is, today’s manufacturing economy is the most sophisticated, forward-looking and innovative business function in the world today.

Until we close this perception gap—and position manufacturing as a career worth pursuing in the minds of millions of young people, their parents and school administrators —we are never going to get to the next level.

As I’ve said before, together, we need to create an environment of respect around skilled technical work. This is a matter of enlightened self-interest: we know it takes a combination of advanced science, technology, engineering and math skills to run our manufacturing facilities today.

When I look around Siemens, I see many executives – CEOs, CFOs and Senior Vice-Presidents -- who started as apprentices on the shop floor. And now they are running multi-billion dollar global businesses.

This could be your future too.

Images of men in overalls carrying their lunch buckets to a factory, hot warehouses, dirty work, and assembly line production have been relegated to the movies.

“Lot Size One” customized production will largely replace mass production assembly lines, advanced robotics are increasingly doing the dirty, dangerous work of manufacturing and, sophisticated software systems now run huge industrial machinery. Today’s factory workers have strong technical and analytical skills and are just as likely to carry an iPad as a wrench.

A career in manufacturing offers you the chance to understand real engineering and not just financial engineering. You will develop marketable skills, work in a high tech environment and potentially make more money than a lot of your peers.

It has been a long time since there was a better, more hopeful time to be in manufacturing in America than right now. So if that offer from Wall Street doesn’t come through, you might want to consider Main Street where Made in the U.S.A. is making a big comeback.

Photo: SasinT/Shutterstock.com