Machines Are Easy, People Are Hard

The comment going around is that customers are starting to ask, “Does that machine come with a technician?” There are some vendors who do need supply operators and technicians for major pieces of equipment but I am not aware of any in packaging, yet. One problem is that the builders are having as hard a time as anyone else finding qualified people.

Despite high unemployment rates, they are still rather thin on the ground.

So if you can’t hire qualified skilled people, perhaps you can hire “qualifiable”, semi-skilled people and train them.

Training is expensive. When people are in training, they are generally not doing productive work but they continue to get paid. You’re looking at the cost of instructors, materials, managerial overhead and more.

Once trained, your protégé may jump to somewhere else with better pay because now they are skilled.

You can repeat the old mantra “It is better to train someone and lose them than not train someone and keep them.” It might make you feel better but it doesn’t put the beans on the table.

What is needed is a two pronged focus. Training alone is not enough because you may lose the trained worker. You must also focus on keeping that trained worker. That is probably the more difficult of the two. It is relatively straightforward to determine what training is required and then deliver it.

Retention requires identifying what motivates the person and then providing it. This is difficult to do because no two people are alike. Everyone has different motivators and de-motivators. A common belief is that everyone is motivated primarily by money. Money is certainly part of it, but research shows that it is seldom the most important part. What most people want is “a good place to work”. Provide that, with competitive compensation, and you should have less problems with retention.

What is “a good place to work”? I don’t know. That is going to be different for each person and each workplace. What I do know is that you need to figure it out for your people and your workplace.

When you have trouble finding new people, keeping the ones you have becomes much more important.