MT Magazine September/October 2022

MT MANUFACTURING TECHNOLOGY

SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2022

27

Workforce: Keeping Pace With a Changing Economy and Emerging Technologies The need for smarter in-house training solutions is now more vitally important than ever to U.S. manufacturing companies. BY GREG JONES VICE PRESIDENT, SMARTFORCE DEVELOPMENT, AMT What is keeping many small, medium, and large manufacturers from adopting smart digital manufacturing technologies? Is it a general reluctance to change in the context of dealing with day-to-day supply chain issues, uncertainty about the return on investment when bringing in new technologies, equipment, and processes, or a general lack of knowledge about new and emerging technologies? It’s all those reasons and more, as well as workforce development – or, rather, the lack of available workers across existing job functions, not to mention for new jobs brought on by new technologies, which plays a major role in decisions about technology adoption.