By any measure, Stephen Jordan’s tenure as president of Metro State University of Denver has been eventful. His mission to raise the profile of Denver’s urban university has generated its fair share of critics, some of them competitors, but even they would acknowledge that Metro State is on the ascent, more influential than before.
Jordan’s reputation as an innovator helped land him the top spot at MSU, and our interview last week left no doubt he believes the university is poised to tackle one of higher-ed’s biggest challenges – overcoming a ‘skills-gap’ that continues to bedevil industry.
It’s a black mark for Jordan’s profession: oft-quoted data from McKinsey & Company found 42% of worldwide employers believe recent college graduates are ready for work, while 72% of academic institutions believe graduates are adequately prepared. Disconnect.
Among the casualties? Manufacturing. The common challenge for companies we’ve profiled has been the lack of skilled workers.
Against the backdrop of Metro State’s much-discussed Aerospace, Engineering and Sciences cluster initiative, which promises workforce development, I asked Jordan if higher-ed is doing its part (to address the skills-gap). He’s way ahead of me.
“We’ll all say we’re trying to do that”, he says, acknowledging the numbers and challenges facing manufacturers, in particular. He describes what he sees as the problem.
“We’re pretty typical of most institutions in the way we’re structured. We’re vertically aligned, not very integrated, with schools of letters, arts and sciences, of business, of professionals separated by discipline but also physically.” He points to a map with buildings scattered around the Metro State campus.
“We teach you all the fundamentals of being an engineer, but without any specific clusters in mind. It doesn’t allow you to replicate the kinds of work environment that work actually occurs in today’s workplace.
“What we’re starting to say is if we’re going to be effective in workforce preparation, we need to begin breaking down those vertical alignments and thinking about how we align departments around industry clusters.”
Metro State has embraced this approach with its acclaimed hotel and hospitality-learning center. “We have four components – hotel, restaurant, events and tourism management – integrated in the program in a facility around that concept.”
But it’s the AES cluster initiative at MSU that holds promise for manufacturing, an idea he says was inspired in part by a visit to Washington D.C.
“I had an opportunity to meet at the White House with the individual who was leading the President’s effort to create new manufacturing initiatives, around industry clusters they’d identified. One they identified was the aerospace industry cluster. I started thinking about what I could bring together at the university, realizing we had industry here – in fact the second largest aerospace workforce in the country.” The Obama team liked the public/private approach.
Jordan emphasizes the workforce piece. “At its core it’s a partnership of institutions and the private sector – preferably an array of institutions. It’s not a research agenda – it’s a manpower development agenda. It’s about how we’re going to manufacture this stuff, and who’s going to do it.”
MSU leadership was initially skeptical. Workforce development at this level is often not viewed as the domain of universities. “Even here, when I started talking to my institutional leadership, understandably their response was, ‘that’s what the community colleges do; it’s smoke-stack stuff.’ But it’s different today. My guess is that this ‘misunderstanding’ is not unique to our university; it’s a fairly widespread misconception.”
Jordan’s faculty is now onboard. As a practical matter, the idea of pulling disparate disciplines together to advance an industry cluster has energized department like physics, the science that underpins aerospace aviation. “We came back and I told them, ‘I’ve got this crazy idea how we can create a very unique focus around advanced manufacturing. We’ll ask those doing it what they need.’ Our people have rallied around the opportunity.”
Industry is supportive, but must be for the project to come to fruition. MSU plans to build what Lockheed Martin also calls the Aerospace Advanced Manufacturing Building, a $40-50 million dollar facility. Industry will pick up a third of the tab. Jordan sees them as a full partner. “There’s no way to deliver an integrated curriculum, or mimic the kind of space people would actually be manufacturing in without their involvement. So we asked them ‘what are the hard skills and soft skills you need?’ That’s how we came up with the notion of bringing aviation and aerospace together.”
It can begin to sound like Jordan sees opportunity in disciplines favored by his colleagues in Boulder, a place he spent time and who’ve pushed back on some of Metro State’s ambitions. But Jordan sees MSU’s purview as unique.
“Our role is about workforce. It’s such a perfect fit for our university. We’re not a research institution. We’re here to create a workforce. Our student is a very different student that goes to CU or CSU. And the neat thing about it for Colorado is that we’re creating a full array of workforce: the Martin Marietta’s are still going to need the CU engineers to design those systems.”
In the end it’s hard to argue with Jordan’s energy – and vision for Metro State.
“My view is that urban institutions are the new generation of the democratization of education, that in urban America today, faculty and students will engage in problem solving, rethinking the issues of the day to the benefit of the economy of the urban area. We laid out of that vision early on, that we’re going to become the premier ‘urban land-grant’ institution in America today.”
His optimism is a sentiment that Colorado industry shares. They believe they’re capable of great things. Stephen Jordan and Metro State may help them get here.
Bart Taylor is founder and publisher of CompanyWeek. Reach him at btaylor@companyweek.com.
The new heart and soul of Colorado business
/in General/by Bart TaylorHistory repeats itself and one might easily conclude that the heartbeat of Colorado business is once again energy. Not that oil and gas ever stopped flowing, but the shale boom, headlines of a forthcoming investment gusher and media’s opportunistic content push evoke Denver circa-1980, when the Petroleum Club was hip and Energy the business brand.
We’ll have learned nothing if that’s the case. Encana and Noble, Anadarko and Kodiak and dozens of others are terrific companies. But should energy again be the region’s economic calling card? Even the energy sector might see the pitfalls of such an eventuality.
But if not energy, who? Who’s shaping the character of the Colorado economy? What’s the new soul of Colorado business?
Colorado’s economy is service-centric. Government is the single largest employer, with state and local public-sector budgets on a steep upward curve even as federal spending slows. A growing population requires more services, like education. But other services like trade and transportation, health-care, utilities and professional services are also expanding to keep pace.
The influence of the service sector is manifest in the donor pool of the the state’s most powerful economic development entity, the Denver Metro Chamber of Commerce, where nearly all its ‘major investors’ are service businesses:
Is service then the new soul of Colorado business? As important as healthcare and finance are, again, probably not. But aside from Xcel, an energy-service provider, MillerCoors is the only maker/manufacturer on the list.
There was a time when Coors was Colorado’s bellwether business brand. Today it’s difficult to ascertain whether Molson Coors and its joint venture with SAB Miller, MillerCoors, values its Colorado roots at all. Frankly, Anheuser Busch can make as strong a present-day case as Coors for its Colorado-connection.
Gates Corporation was once an iconic Denver-based global company that manufactured here. Today, it’s tearing-down its historic physical presence in Denver and arguably what’s left of any meaningful brand connection to the community, which is unfortunate for its 400+ Colorado employees.
Lockheed Martin and dozens of other aerospace and electronics firms are terrific companies and define, in part, Colorado’s new manufacturing brand. Is ‘place’ an important operating principle for the sector? Maybe.
Colorado’s national business reputation is largely shaped by tourism, by iconic brands like Vail and Aspen. But it’s hard to reconcile Vail Resorts as Colorado’s posterchild business brand. Vail’s leadership has long acted like its outgrown Colorado.
I’d argue Colorado’s tourism brand is a more compelling asset in the hands of a new generation of operator who sees cross-over value in leveraging tourism on behalf of the entire state. Innovative operators like Monarch Mountain and Silverton who relate more closely to Colorado’s other growing lifestyle brands.
Like craft beer manufacturers. Colorado’s now the leading state exporter of craft beer in the nation. We’re also the international epicenter of a natural foods and natural products tsumani. Colorado agriculture is also sustaining an expanding wine sector – with increasingly relevant national brands.
Colorado also continues to rank high in nurturing new business start-ups – in categories that play to the state’s lifestyle attributes. A wave of lifestyle manufacturing growth-companies may emerge in the next three-to-five years if collectively, we can rally around the challenge of keeping these firms in business.
For me, the new heart and soul of Colorado business are companies and leaders who live here because they want to be here, see value in ‘place’ as a result, and view national and international opportunity through the lens of company-building and sustained growth here, in this community.
Want a soulful experience in keeping with a new Colorado lifestyle brand? Stay at Britt and Don Jackson’s Super 8 in Salida. Ride the Panorama lift to the top of Monarch. Bestride the Divide. Zip-up your Fly Low jacket to cover your Voormi layers, lock-in to your Meier or Wagner skis or Weston board, nibble a 34 Degrees cracker, and ski or ride to the bar and order an Oscar Yella Pils, Montanya rum or Woods High Mountain whiskey.
And consider the future of Colorado business.
Take sides, but lament the loss of Magpul.
/in General/by Bart TaylorReaction to news last week that Magpul was finally pulling up stakes developed along familiar lines. Empathizers blamed overreaching politicians. Supporters of the 2013 legislation charged the company with economic extortion.
Both tended to sidestep the unfortunate reality that losing manufacturing jobs, under these circumstances, is a lousy development. We’re left to wonder if more could have been done to prevent it.
Manufacturing jobs matter – now more than ever. Companies that make things build wealth. They’re critical to differentiating the regional economy. And building on national leadership that Colorado businesses have earned in advanced and lifestyle manufacturing, among others, seems an imperative. Not doing so would be a huge, blown opportunity.
Most importantly for some, manufacturers also drive innovation. Brookings’ Scott Andes and Mark Muro put it this way:
Of course these are business rationale. Supporters of the legislation that caused the dustup point to the human side of the issue, and assert that ammunition limits will save lives. Colorado Governor John Hickenlooper and other elected officials who lined up the behind the effort do carry a heavier burden.
It’s also possible that Magpul’s decision to move was fait accompli after Aurora and Sandy Hook, that events would inevitably conspire to force the company to move. It’s reasonable to assume that even if last years guns-and-ammunition legislation had failed, advocates would have continued to press the issue in subsequent sessions.
Let’s hope the move works out for both sides. Texas feels like a great fit for Magpul. Colorado should root for Wyoming manufacturing; the entire sector will benefit from strong regional growth. And critics aside, Colorado’s progressive brand is a catalyst for manufacturing growth, on balance. The dynamic, young, active, healthy vibe here has become a magnet for talent, for entrepreneurship, and hopefully in the future, more capital.
Industry and government benefit from alignment on policy issues impacting the economy. Hopefully the Magpul episode will provide a roadmap for more effective collaboration in the future.
Do university rankings matter? California business hopes so.
/in General/by Bart TaylorDo university rankings matter?
The easy answer it that it depends. For schools, the higher the ranking the more meaningful the list.
But with competition for students intensifying, rankings now generate more than passing interest, especially for those without the top-25 pedigree. A higher ranking can translate into more students, more tuition dollars. As reported in the Washington Post last week, “the number of new high school graduates peaked in 2011, after 17 years of growth, and is not projected to reach a new high until 2024, according to the Western Interstate Commission for Higher Education.” The race is on. Students mean dollars and dollars mean growth, influence, a more stable future.
Rankings also provide another perspective on a question we’re asking here, and that is, how well is higher-education answering local industry’s call for a workforce of the future? We know there a ‘skills-gap’. Who’s answering the bell?
Most of us are familiar with the U.S. News & Worlds Report annual ranking of universities. But Thomson Reuters’ Times Higher Education’s World University Rankings provides the additional filter of international competiveness. The results are fascinating if a bit disconcerting.
As with past years American institutions dominate the top of the list:
Three Colorado universities make the top 250 – the University of Colorado (97), the Colorado School of Mines (139), and Colorado State University (276). The University of Denver isn’t listed, nor is Colorado College, though U.S. News ranks DU (91) and Colorado College (31) in the National Liberal Arts Colleges category. CU is (86) on U.S. News’ U.S.-only ranking, Mines is also (91) and CSU (121.) Metro State University, Colorado’s up-and-comer, ranks (23) in Regional Colleges, West.
As predictable the list can be – the top universities are ranked in similar fashion on most lists – the results also challenge conventional wisdom.
The popular narrative here is that California is anti-business, that a flood of taxes and regulation are driving business out. But boy can they educate. California’s network of public institutions dot the top 100: Berkeley (8), Los Angeles (12) San Diego (40), Davis (52), Santa Barbara (33), and Irvine (93), all appear before the first Colorado school on the list – CU at (91). Another, UC Santa Cruz (136) is listed above Mines. And UC Riverside (148) rounds out the stellar California public class ahead of CSU.
Even if a higher number of California’s grads move out-of-state to pursue a career, in business-friendlier states, higher-ed is churning out a stream of quality graduates to drive service and industry.
What to make of Colorado’s modest showing – and does it even matter? How can universities here improve their rankings – and do they even want to?
The Times methodology involves performance indicators in five areas. Teaching: the learning environment; Research: volume, income and reputation; Citations: research influence; Industry income: innovation; International outlook: staff, students and research.
In its analysis, the Times notes that universities are specializing to make improvements in operational areas reflected in the list criteria, changes that would in effect drive them up the rankings. American universities generally “do better than the overall top 200 on teaching, research and citations.” Their “citation” scores are particularly strong: 18 of the top 20 performers in the table hail from the US.” the Times notes.
Should moving up the Times and US News lists be a priority? Should colleges tailor curriculum and programs to meeting the ‘establishment’s’ definition of success as defined by the rankings? Or should schools instead seek to better match graduates with opportunities? The oft-quoted research from McKinsey & Company, that 42% of worldwide employers believe recent college graduates are ready for work, while 72% of academic institutions believe graduates are adequately prepared, speaks volumes.
Quality is never be a bad thing. Especially in volume. California’s business environment benefits from its rich pool of diverse, award-winning universities. But ensuring graduates match industry needs seems a higher priority, to the extent they’re different.
We’ll hear from Colorado’s universities in the coming weeks about the path ahead, including an interview with Metro State’s President, Stephen Jordan, on a manufacturing initiative that may redefine how industry and higher-ed collaborate to educate a new workforce.
Metro State tackles MFG – and perceptions about a university’s workforce role
/in General/by Bart TaylorBy any measure, Stephen Jordan’s tenure as president of Metro State University of Denver has been eventful. His mission to raise the profile of Denver’s urban university has generated its fair share of critics, some of them competitors, but even they would acknowledge that Metro State is on the ascent, more influential than before.
Jordan’s reputation as an innovator helped land him the top spot at MSU, and our interview last week left no doubt he believes the university is poised to tackle one of higher-ed’s biggest challenges – overcoming a ‘skills-gap’ that continues to bedevil industry.
It’s a black mark for Jordan’s profession: oft-quoted data from McKinsey & Company found 42% of worldwide employers believe recent college graduates are ready for work, while 72% of academic institutions believe graduates are adequately prepared. Disconnect.
Among the casualties? Manufacturing. The common challenge for companies we’ve profiled has been the lack of skilled workers.
Against the backdrop of Metro State’s much-discussed Aerospace, Engineering and Sciences cluster initiative, which promises workforce development, I asked Jordan if higher-ed is doing its part (to address the skills-gap). He’s way ahead of me.
“We’ll all say we’re trying to do that”, he says, acknowledging the numbers and challenges facing manufacturers, in particular. He describes what he sees as the problem.
“We’re pretty typical of most institutions in the way we’re structured. We’re vertically aligned, not very integrated, with schools of letters, arts and sciences, of business, of professionals separated by discipline but also physically.” He points to a map with buildings scattered around the Metro State campus.
“We teach you all the fundamentals of being an engineer, but without any specific clusters in mind. It doesn’t allow you to replicate the kinds of work environment that work actually occurs in today’s workplace.
“What we’re starting to say is if we’re going to be effective in workforce preparation, we need to begin breaking down those vertical alignments and thinking about how we align departments around industry clusters.”
Metro State has embraced this approach with its acclaimed hotel and hospitality-learning center. “We have four components – hotel, restaurant, events and tourism management – integrated in the program in a facility around that concept.”
But it’s the AES cluster initiative at MSU that holds promise for manufacturing, an idea he says was inspired in part by a visit to Washington D.C.
“I had an opportunity to meet at the White House with the individual who was leading the President’s effort to create new manufacturing initiatives, around industry clusters they’d identified. One they identified was the aerospace industry cluster. I started thinking about what I could bring together at the university, realizing we had industry here – in fact the second largest aerospace workforce in the country.” The Obama team liked the public/private approach.
Jordan emphasizes the workforce piece. “At its core it’s a partnership of institutions and the private sector – preferably an array of institutions. It’s not a research agenda – it’s a manpower development agenda. It’s about how we’re going to manufacture this stuff, and who’s going to do it.”
MSU leadership was initially skeptical. Workforce development at this level is often not viewed as the domain of universities. “Even here, when I started talking to my institutional leadership, understandably their response was, ‘that’s what the community colleges do; it’s smoke-stack stuff.’ But it’s different today. My guess is that this ‘misunderstanding’ is not unique to our university; it’s a fairly widespread misconception.”
Jordan’s faculty is now onboard. As a practical matter, the idea of pulling disparate disciplines together to advance an industry cluster has energized department like physics, the science that underpins aerospace aviation. “We came back and I told them, ‘I’ve got this crazy idea how we can create a very unique focus around advanced manufacturing. We’ll ask those doing it what they need.’ Our people have rallied around the opportunity.”
Industry is supportive, but must be for the project to come to fruition. MSU plans to build what Lockheed Martin also calls the Aerospace Advanced Manufacturing Building, a $40-50 million dollar facility. Industry will pick up a third of the tab. Jordan sees them as a full partner. “There’s no way to deliver an integrated curriculum, or mimic the kind of space people would actually be manufacturing in without their involvement. So we asked them ‘what are the hard skills and soft skills you need?’ That’s how we came up with the notion of bringing aviation and aerospace together.”
It can begin to sound like Jordan sees opportunity in disciplines favored by his colleagues in Boulder, a place he spent time and who’ve pushed back on some of Metro State’s ambitions. But Jordan sees MSU’s purview as unique.
“Our role is about workforce. It’s such a perfect fit for our university. We’re not a research institution. We’re here to create a workforce. Our student is a very different student that goes to CU or CSU. And the neat thing about it for Colorado is that we’re creating a full array of workforce: the Martin Marietta’s are still going to need the CU engineers to design those systems.”
In the end it’s hard to argue with Jordan’s energy – and vision for Metro State.
“My view is that urban institutions are the new generation of the democratization of education, that in urban America today, faculty and students will engage in problem solving, rethinking the issues of the day to the benefit of the economy of the urban area. We laid out of that vision early on, that we’re going to become the premier ‘urban land-grant’ institution in America today.”
His optimism is a sentiment that Colorado industry shares. They believe they’re capable of great things. Stephen Jordan and Metro State may help them get here.
Bart Taylor is founder and publisher of CompanyWeek. Reach him at btaylor@companyweek.com.
Follow industry’s lead to put the goods-producing sector on the fast-track
/in General/by Bart TaylorBehind great brands are often stories of astute decision-making at pivotal times. Osprey, a growing Colorado company and respected global lifestyle brand based in Cortez, was at a crossroads early in life, choosing to stay in business by moving its manufacturing operations offshore. Now a “mature” brand (read Osprey’s profile), the company hopes to build on its success and relocate at least some of its future manufacturing operations here. A difficult decision has in the end paid dividends, with more to come.
A similar moment played out for Pasta Fresca’s management in 2003, when as Eric Peterson describes in his CompanyWeek profile, the Boulder company ‘pivoted to its brand-partner model’. The move fundamentally changed the company, putting Fresca Foods on a path to fast growth. It’s also having a profound impact on the industry.
As Executive VP Liz Myslik describes it, “Fresca’s model is to take on products with an established demand” – to become a ‘supply-chain’ partner with growing food companies by providing manufacturing and production capabilities that Myslik says often inhibit growth. The arrangement allows partners to focus on things like driving sales, on marketing, on brand extension.
In retrospect, it was a brilliant idea – the right business strategy at the right time. A company was essentially reinvented and in the process became a much-needed engine for industry growth, providing key services to other growth-minded companies. Fresca’s innovation has helped shape the national reputation Colorado now enjoys as an epicenter for growth in the natural foods industry.
Fresca’s model should inspire similar thinking in other manufacturing sectors here. In the maker and manufacturing space, visionaries and entrepreneurs often bring a singular expertise or passion to a business idea but lack skills or resources needed to scale beyond start-up.
It’s easy to envision a Fresca Foods-like approach in apparel and other soft goods – like packs – where Colorado’s brightest design and lifestyle entrepreneurs might lean on a cut-and-sew operation that provides critical early-and-mid stage manufacturing help. Or, a forward-thinking financier might consider a ‘MFG Fund’ to capitalize small business. The need for sustaining financing remains acute.
But if Colorado believes a growing manufacturing base is key to more sustainable economic growth, to higher middle-class wages, to economic development tied to industry attributes unique to the state, then risk-taking is better than losing jobs and influence offshore.
Those who support or service the region’s goods-producing sector would do well to emulate the inspired leadership we’re witnessing in maker and manufacturing businesses and take bold steps to move it forward. Focusing even more sharply on entrepreneurs poised to grow who nevertheless are in need of operational help would be one such step. Only good things will follow.
Bart Taylor is Founder and Publisher of CompanyWeek.
One company’s singular vision may lead Colorado apparel makers to new heights
/in General/by Bart TaylorOf the industry categories that comprise the region’s growing manufacturing base, apparel may intrigue me the most. It’s a personal fascination, in part. I’ve spent hours on my bike wondering why I’m forced to wear cycling clothes that often look like hell, all the while formulating plans for new line of loose-fitting performance apparel.
But it’s more than that. It’s the enormous challenge U.S. apparel makers face, and here, among regional makers, the sheer audacity I’ve encountered that compels entrepreneurs to launch headlong into wall of apparel-making bastions in Asia and elsewhere. This includes the upstart group of fashion designers we profile in the current issue of CompanyWeek.
It’s also an industry category in search of support, disadvantaged relative to other sectors where advocacy and publicity come easier. I suppose economic developers would classify apparel makers as Creative Industries, which of course they are, but business doesn’t stop at conception. Apparel firms understand fully that at the end of the day they’re manufacturers. Their primary barriers to success invariably involve materials and assembly, labor and quality control. They’re manufacturers.
But obstacles to success often inspire innovation and clarity of purpose, and in the case of Pagosa Springs-based Voormi, profiled here last week, the challenges facing American apparel manufacturers inform the company’s vision, its operating philosophy.
Dan English, Voormi’s CEO, explains.
“We’ve got our eyes on a horizon”, he says, “where ‘Made in America’ and ‘Made in Colorado’ become a key driver of commerce within our state. Much as the movement for more sustainable, ethically produced goods finally moved from goal to expectation. A horizon where small batch, agile manufacturing allows for products that meet the needs of today, not needs that were relevant three years ago due to complex global supply chains..”
One hears this a lot, the notion that ‘local-for-local’ will increasingly drive commerce. But the barriers to growth seem more formidable than what ‘buying local’ might overcome. English admits that reaching the horizon, finishing the journey, won’t be easy.
“After the great Asian migration of the 90’s, the technical apparel/textile industry was left extremely fragmented. Those that survived, did so through ‘finding their niche’. Some bet on innovation and quick-turn manufacturing, others relied on the demand of large government contracts.
“Today, this fragmented manufacturing base, in combination with the resurgence of ‘local demand’ leaves brands like ours with a huge challenge: Capacity both in the short and long run. If large brands simply flood the very small amounts of remaining capacity in the U.S., one, there’s no way manufacturers will be able to handle the strain, and two, they’ll be highly exposed in the event those brands move on to their next ‘big initiative’ here.”
They’ll also be farther removed from the singular spark that often fires successful companies, though Voormi’s business seems to be in a good place. But is the industry, collectively, ready to manage ‘good’ problems like excess demand while charting a future?
“We don’t think the industry on whole has yet put together a truly viable plan for the resurgence of American manufacturing”, he adds. “Building a manufacturing base is much more than a story about keeping the lights on in the handful of factories left. We believe it’s about making a bigger and longer-term investment in Colorado. The solution HAS to start with real dollars, real training, and real investment in capital. It has to include a long term plan for re-building an ecosystem of manufacturing here in the U.S.”
English may be a realist, but that doesn’t diminish his enthusiasm in the least. On the contrary. “We’re excited about the energy surrounding a return to local manufacturing. After all, as a company, that’s what we set out to do.”
Yea, but can he make cool cycling clothes?
Why the latest, greatest effort to ‘re-brand’ manufacturing may miss the mark
/in General/by Bart TaylorA common theme that runs through most of our weekly business profiles is the challenge of workforce. Regardless of industry Colorado manufacturers can’t find enough qualified employees. It’s the Colorado jobs paradox: unemployment here remains relatively high, but a lack of qualified occupational workers is a drag on economic growth, or at least on the manufacturing sector.
The reality certainly isn’t lost on policy-makers. Earlier this year, the Colorado Legislature earmarked a million dollars or so in HB1165, career ‘pathway’ legislation that would effectively improve coordination between higher-ed and industry to better match graduates with jobs.
For its part industry is intent on ‘re-branding’ manufacturing, on changing the perception of the sector from the “dirty, dumb, dangerous, and dying” business of old to the modern, clean, ‘advanced’ state of much of the industrial base today. The idea is to fundamentally change the way young people and their families view manufacturing employment.
IndustryWeek columnist Patricia Panchak suggests that so far, the effort has failed, and that the latest iteration of this approach is likewise destined to miss the mark. The effort focuses on changing industry parlance to better reflect today’s workforce.
“The Association for Manufacturing Technology, noting that the term “workforce” doesn’t speak to the more intellectually demanding nature of factory work, has coined the term “smartforce.” Meanwhile…the Reshoring Initiative suggests that we begin referring to the “midskill” occupations as professions and the workers as professionals as is done in Germany and Switzerland. No mother wants her children to grow up to be workers, he says. She wants them to be professionals. Besides, he adds, “as manufacturing skilled workers take on more mental and less physical responsibilities, the terminology is increasingly appropriate.”
Panchak argues the effort doesn’t far enough, that language alone won’t change things. That until the true ‘value of labor’ again becomes the common language of business, re-instilled in today’s workforce, any effort to rebrand manufacturing will fall short.
It’s hard to argue the point, but as a practical matter, changing the perception of manufacturing here seems more straightforward.
Colorado (and the region) has become the poster-child for what’s cool about manufacturing. Young people come to Colorado to live and work, often in that order, and here more employment opportunities are developing around lifestyle manufacturing. We’re birthing a new generation of entrepreneurs and companies in industry sectors that are highly marketable to the workforce of the future, who view employment through the lens of lifestyle.
Our tactics should evolve to catch-up to with what business is already building here. We need to tell the stories of Colorado growth-companies making beer, electronics, energy-efficient anything, skis, clothes, organic food, and iPhone cases – things interesting and important to young people. Inspire a future workforce with stories of today’s entrepreneurs.
Of course that’s our mission here, but a sustained private/public collaboration would also help. The story of regional manufacturing needs more effective stewardship – not only from government but from its own. Colorado is home to global manufacturing brands. They need to be convinced that ‘here’ is worth investing in.
Investment. The most tangible, impactful development in occupational employment would be hyper-growth in new company launches. More successful launches mean more companies to publicize, which in turn creates higher interest in a modern manufacturing career. Want to change the perception of manufacturing? Make it easier for small makers and manufacturers to get financed.
More on that Mt. Elbert-sized challenge later.
Follow industry’s lead to put the goods-producing sector on the fast-track
/in General/by Bart TaylorBehind great brands are often stories of astute decision-making at pivotal times. Osprey, a growing Colorado company and respected global lifestyle brand based in Cortez, was at a crossroads early in life, choosing to stay in business by moving its manufacturing operations offshore. Now a “mature” brand (read Osprey’s profile), the company hopes to build on its success and relocate at least some of its future manufacturing operations here. A difficult decision has in the end paid dividends, with more to come.
A similar moment played out for Pasta Fresca’s management in 2003, when as Eric Peterson describes in his CompanyWeek profile, the Boulder company ‘pivoted to its brand-partner model’. The move fundamentally changed the company, putting Fresca Foods on a path to fast growth. It’s also having a profound impact on the industry.
As Executive VP Liz Myslik describes it, “Fresca’s model is to take on products with an established demand” – and become a ‘supply-chain’ partner with growing food companies by providing manufacturing and production capabilities that Myslik says often inhibit growth. The arrangement allows partners to focus on things like driving sales, marketing, and brand extension.
In retrospect, it was a brilliant idea – the right business strategy at the right time. A company was essentially reinvented and in the process became a much-needed engine for industry growth, providing key services to other growth-minded companies. Fresca’s innovation has helped shape the national reputation Colorado now enjoys as an epicenter for growth in the natural foods industry.
Fresca’s model should inspire similar thinking in other manufacturing sectors here. In the maker and manufacturing space, visionaries and entrepreneurs often bring a singular expertise or passion to a business idea but lack skills or resources needed to scale beyond start-up.
It’s easy to envision a Fresca Foods-like approach in apparel and other soft goods – like packs – where Colorado’s brightest design and lifestyle entrepreneurs might lean on a cut-and-sew operation that provides critical early-and-mid stage manufacturing help. Or a forward-thinking financier might consider a ‘MFG Fund’ to capitalize small business. The struggle for sustaining financing remains acute.
But if Colorado believes a growing manufacturing base is key to more sustainable economic growth, to higher middle-class wages, to economic development tied to industry attributes unique to the state, then taking risks in support of industry is better than losing jobs and influence offshore.
Those who support or service the region’s goods-producing sector would do well to emulate the inspired leadership we’re witnessing in maker and manufacturing businesses and take bold steps. Focusing more sharply on entrepreneurs poised to grow who nevertheless are in need of operational help would be one. Only good things will follow.
Bart Taylor is Founder and Publisher of CompanyWeek.
Gov’t v. MFG: Regulation and political dysfunction threaten growth
/in General/by Bart TaylorGovernment’s never been more involved in business. For Jay Timmons, President and CEO of the National Association of Manufacturing (NAM), this development has few upsides.
Timmons spoke in Denver last week at a business luncheon sponsored by CACI, the Colorado Association for Commerce and Industry, and took on much of the political establishment in recounting federal policy-maker’s lousy recent record of supporting manufacturing.
Refreshingly non-partisan in his takedown, Timmons asserted that neither political party is getting it right for business from Washington. Speaking on behalf of his 12,000-member organization, Timmons took aim at:
– The GOP House strategy to control the legislative agenda not through elections but with threats and political maneuvering.
– Bipartisan embrace of a growing regulatory framework, with over “3000 new regulations” foisted on business the past 20 years by both Republican and Democratic administrations.
– Including a “disappointing” raft of proposed regulations that may stifle shale gas development, which Timmons credited for fueling a manufacturing revival and adding as many as four million new energy jobs to the economy in recent years.
– The impact on competitiveness of the regulatory burden, where U.S. manufacturers pay an average of 20% more to make the same product as international competitors.
– The shortcomings of education and occupational training, where 82 percent of U.S. manufacturers have job openings they can’t fill due to a lack of qualified applicants.
Workforce issues are a widespread challenge here, with most firms profiled in CompanyWeek citing a lack of skilled labor as a challenge to growth. Timmons listed certification and immigration reform as policy priorities for NAM, including support of the immigration bill approved by the Senate earlier this year that remains stuck in the House.
It’s hard to miss how conventional wisdom may be changing with regard to long-standing business and political affiliations. NAM’s support of immigration reform including a “path to citizenship” runs counter to majority Republican congressional support. The dust-up over shutting down the government also strained established ties in a very public way.
How is it, asked someone incredulously, that Apple and others could possibly tilt toward the current administration as they did the past election? Timmons reminded the questioner that voters spoke clearly the past election; that the Republican spokesperson was “ineffective”.
A more accurate assessment is that Apple and other emerging powerhouse American brands view their future to be more closely aligned with important customer demo’s than with the political influence of the GOP. A downside may be that the progressive political agenda on the left often translates into a more activist governmental role in the economy — including an ever-expanding regulatory framework and development bureaucracy.
It’s evident that neither side is capturing the imagination of business, certainly not NAM’s leadership. And for manufacturers in need of regulatory relief, meaningful immigration and education reform, and cost certainty that inspires investors and motivates customers, government and its proxy network can seem more foe than friend at times.
Regional manufacturers to get a much-needed resource from Denver OED
/in General/by Bart TaylorI’ve written previously about the regional push to invest in manufacturing. Colorado and its neighbors, many with similar sized manufacturing sectors, are host to business interests seeking funding, an improved workforce, tools and expertise to drive new manufacturing activity.
Support varies but in Colorado several communities are poised to benefit from active partnerships between industry, trade and government. We continue to report on a quality group of manufacturers in Colorado Springs, where trade and economic development officials increasingly see value in supporting the sector. On the Western Slope, the success and high visibility of established brands and a burgeoning lifestyle manufacturing sector is turning heads. It’s easy to envision a new private/public partnership that would promote the formidable group of lifestyle companies that call the Steamboat-to-Durango corridor home.
Colorado’s largest concentration of makers and manufacturers is of course in Denver, and officials here seem intent on building-out a world-class manufacturing economy. Denver’s Mayor, Michael Hancock, and Paul Washington, his top economic development lieutenant, speak often of the city’s manufacturing assets as they also move to address challenges to growth, like developing a more robust occupational workforce.
Denver’s also beginning work on a much needed to tool to measure and track the city’s progress. I met recently with Bridget Strand, Ph.D, economist and management analyst for the Denver Office of Economic Development (OED) about the project to develop a Denver manufacturing index that would quantify the current state of its manufacturing sector and provide a framework to measure progress. The index will become a regular content feature at CompanyWeek.
“What we’re trying to accomplish,” says Strand who has experience in the financial sector as well as international think tanks in index creation, “is to benchmark the current health of the sector and its underlying industries. We then are able to track the growth or contraction of those industries to determine which areas are driving the growth and health of the overall manufacturing sector in the metro area. For example, sequestration may be impacting the aerospace and defense manufacturing while the locovore movement is driving higher demand in the food and beverage manufacturing industries and is supporting new entrepreneurism in those areas.”
This index will also help support the OED’s business retention, recruitment and small business advocacy goals as it can identify underrepresented areas of high performance and the success and demand for various industry outputs in the region. “The output of small, big, old and new manufacturing companies illustrates a perfect example of what the high tech, highly creative and passionate people in Colorado can create,” says Strand.
Denver’s effort could also become a template for the state and regional Colorado economic development entities, as there’s currently no uniform means to track growth across industry sectors nor agreement even on how to view manufacturing as a whole. I’ve argued that Colorado’s booming ‘lifestyle manufacturing’ sector, for example, deserves more attention in the broad scheme of things, given the alignment of these companies with everything Colorado should be promoting about its business community. Strand, and Denver, seem tuned-in to that imperative.
What’s clear through the weekly profiles in CompanyWeek is that manufacturers from across a dozen or so industry sectors share common challenges and needs, such as a more capable and qualified workforce. What should also be apparent is that collectively, they’re an engine of sustainable economic growth throughout the region. Providing the entire sector the tools to benchmark their current status and track progress is an important development.