Manufacturing Institute Offers Advice For Filling Workforce Gaps

As MSCI members know all too well, it is difficult to find qualified employees to fill jobs that are open right now. To explore this topic, the Manufacturing Institute conducted a study on different approaches to attracting and retaining manufacturing talent in rural versus urban settings.

The study consisted of an online survey and in-depth interviews with manufacturing company leaders. The purpose of the study was to identify key workforce challenges and find creative solutions that companies have implemented to address these issues and find paths forward.

The full report can be found at this link, but here are the Manufacturing Institute’s key findings.

• Rural companies need to widen talent pipelines to include more women, veterans, refugees, employees who may have a law enforcement record, and neurodiverse individuals. Several companies had successfully implemented such programs.
• Manufacturers used similar incentives to attract and retain talent in rural and urban locations. Competitive wages and salaries, referral bonuses, and career advancement opportunities were among the top incentives for both locations. Rural locations were more likely to offer career advancement and professional development, along with sign-on bonuses and paid relocation expenses.
• When recruiting, there were distinct differences in what manufacturers highlighted to attract applicants. In rural areas, the top aspects were work/life balance (74 percent), a sense of community (68.8 percent), cost of living (66.2 percent), and career advancement (62.3 percent). For urban areas, access to quality healthcare (64.7 percent) and work/life balance (61.8 percent) ranked highest.
• Manufacturers in rural areas ranked cost of living (74 percent) as well as available facilities and spacing needs (64.9 percent) as the most attractive features in deciding to locate there. Urban manufacturers ranked existing infrastructure (73.9 percent), the available workforce (62.3 percent), and the proximity to suppliers or customers (50.7 percent) were the most attractive features.
• For rural locations, the top labor force challenges were difficulty of attracting new employees to the area (65.3 percent) and lack of childcare or eldercare options (53.3 percent). For urban locations, cost of living (53.6 percent) and insufficient compensation (43.5 percent) ranked highest.