August 23, 2012

Vets reinterpret job skills in manufacturing program

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Finding the right job is like finding the perfect mate; sometimes a matchmaker can help find hidden similarities between two parties and pair them up. For the resurgent Puget Sound manufacturing sector, one of these matchmakers is Thomas McLaughlin, who oversees a public/private program to find highly skilled manufacturing candidates from a seemingly unlikely source: the U.S. military.

Launched this January by the Kent-based Center for Advanced Manufacturing Puget Sound (CAMPS), the Military to Manufacturing (M2M) Career Pathway Training program has helped train about 140 returning military veterans and their family members in Washington state for opportunities in the expanding field of manufacturing. At least half of these program graduates have been able to find a wide variety of living-wage jobs at local companies such as Red Dot Corp., OmniFab, Orion Aerospace, Stress-Tek and GM Nameplate, among others.

"The results have been phenomenal," says McLaughlin, executive director of CAMPS. "One of the reasons is that it's based on what the companies really want. They told us they wanted job candidates who demonstrate a willingness to learn, who will show up on time and who already speak the language of manufacturing."

One of the best pools of talent that shares all of the above characteristics is the military, McLaughlin says. Veterans "already have the necessary technical science and math skills; they just don't use the same terminology as manufacturers," he says. "We're just taking the tools used in military training and translating them to the civilian market. Often they'll get hired in entry-level jobs and get promoted very quickly to better positions."

M2M is a partnership between CAMPS, the Washington State National Guard Department of Transition Services, the Washington State Department of Veterans Affairs and Green River Community College. After starting as a pilot project last November, the program was seeded with $400,000 in funding from CAMPS and $220,000 from the state. To help sustain M2M, participating companies must agree to pay $1,000 back into the fund for each person they hire from the program.

During the three-day M2M program, classes of between 10 and 20 students are given 24 hours of instruction on modern manufacturing operations, including technical training on automated equipment and machine assembly. Other areas of study include quality standards, waste reduction techniques, problem solving, Lean Six Sigma process-improvement methods, and various math and science skills.

"In the old days, manufacturing was 80 percent brawn and 20 percent brain," McLaughlin says. "Today, that's flipped around to be about 90 percent brain and just 10 percent brawn."

To McLaughlin, the program encourages a natural progression of transferable skills learned and tested in battle. "The military is really nothing more than a process, much like a manufacturer," he explains. "It's a lot of people doing a lot of different things for one goal. For every soldier in the field there are 14 others behind him in support roles, all taking part in a large process. This manufacturing mentality and culture is already in the DNA of the soldier."

Though the program is set to expire in March, McLaughlin expects M2M to be extended due to increased demand. July figures from the Bureau of Labor Statistics showed that manufacturing jobs in the Seattle-Tacoma-Bellevue region rose by 8 percent since July 2011, outpacing all other business sectors. Because most skilled engineering workers in the region are quickly scooped up by the colossus of Boeing, M2M serves a critical role in placing qualified workers at many of the smaller manufacturers.

The conveyor belt of raw talent isn't likely to slow down either. Currently, about 5,000 to 6,000 people are mustered out every year from Tacoma's Joint Base Lewis-McChord, McLaughlin says, and another 2,300 come home from the U.S. Navy bases at Bangor and Bremerton. These figures are only expected to increase next year as more military budget cuts and troop withdrawals kick in. Something must be done to transition these people back into civilian life, and job training, he says, is one of the most important ways that businesses and governments can help.

M2M is also helping these veterans in another equally important way. "I see their confidence rise," adds McLaughlin, the matchmaker. "At first, many of them feel a bit gun-shy when they face the unknown. But then, when they go through the program and realize they've already received much of the same training in the military, they start to say, 'Hey, I can really do this.'"

For more information on eligibility requirements, class times and locations for the Military to Manufacturing program, please visit the M2M website.

Randy Woods writes about job-search tools, networking techniques and other tips to help you land your dream job.

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aerospace, education, government, manufacturing, military, technology, training, veterans