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50 SMT Magazine • May 2017 MANUFACTURING THROUGH THE EYES OF HUMAN RESOURCES, RECRUITMENT AND NEW HIRE TRAINING est gaps in welding, CNC machining and elec- tronics. According to Deloitte and The Manufactur- ing Institute, over the next 10 years we will need to fill 3.5 million manufacturing jobs—the cur- rent skills gap will result in 2 million of those jobs going unfilled. Recently, we have seen a huge push to start teaching manufacturing at the high school lev- el again with a dedicated focus on STEM. See- ing this need, MC Assembly has participated in a local effort called Advancing in Manufac- turing (AIM), created by CareerSource Brevard. Funded by a two-year DOL National Emergency Grant, the program is making efforts to expand training and early education opportunities in the Brevard area to address immediate employ- ment skills needs and build a pipeline of talent for the future. At the same time, we have developed a ro- bust new hire training program. On the first day, we start new hires with a safety and quality training. This allows employees to learn safety tips, who to call, where to go and how to work in a safe way. It also stresses the most impor- tant aspect to our business, that quality as our number one priority. This happens well before an employee walks on to the production floor and works on our customers' products. On-the- job training follows the safety and quality train- ing. New hires are identified on the production floor with a different colored smock and are as- signed a mentor. Once the supervisor and mentor believe the OTJ training is complete and the employee is ready to be on their own our quality manager will assess their skill and what they learned and confirm the employees is ready to perform the job on their own. This process is very involved and usually takes 1-2 weeks, this helps new hire get up to speed quickly and have the confidence they are able to complete their assigned tasks. The skills we look for are "soft skills," which are essential. Every resume you look at will tell you whether a candidate qualifies for the job based on their work skills, work experience and education. The one variable that cannot be de- termined from reading a resume are the soft skills. Communication, problem solving, adapt- ability, teamwork, self-motivation and emo- tional intelligence are just as important, if not more, then the technical skills to do the job. The six soft skills are hard to identify in an in- terview setting, behavior based interview ques- tions are asked to help identify these skills in the candidate. I believe you hire character and train skill. SMT Brian Kingston is director of human resources at MC Assembly and responsible for implementing human resources strategies, culture and managing the company's human resources initiatives. Figure 3: New hire training sessions.