Manufacturers are investing in technology and systems that help their efficiency or improve profitability, comments Lisa Anderson, out Lisa Anderson, president of Claremont, CA-based LMA Consulting Group, Inc. in Claremont, CA. “They want to automate and provide more visibility about orders to customers.” Customers now expect 24/7 service and the ability to check their order status online, and manufacturers that leverage technology to those ends have an opportunity to differentiate themselves in the marketplace.
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To make it in manufacturing, IT pros need to understand a wide range of technology, from robotics to good old-fashioned electronics.
Is manufacturing IT conservatively behind the tech curve or out on the forward edge of innovation? That depends upon whom you ask.
… there’s a strategic shift that bodes well for domestic IT workers interested in manufacturing. Thanks to rising overseas labor costs and an increase in U.S. efficiency, companies are “re-shoring” — that is, bringing what had been outsourced back to the States. And with new technologies emerging, such as advanced robotics and 3D printing, manufacturers want their factories close to where innovation is evolving.
Manufacturing consultant Lisa Anderson, president of LMA Consulting Group in Claremont, Calif., concurs with Rahaii on all counts, including the re-shoring trend and demand for IT innovation. “Manufacturers are investing in technology and systems that help their efficiency or improve profitability,” she reports. “They want to automate and provide more visibility about orders to customers.” Customers now expect 24/7 service and the ability to check their order status online, and manufacturers that leverage technology to those ends have an opportunity to differentiate themselves in the marketplace.
The upshot, Anderson says, is that “IT is critical to manufacturers. Anything that’s built, sold and moved has to be tracked, so you need IT involved to handle any of the things that can go wrong.”
Characteristics of the ideal candidate
Because the manufacturing industry is evolving from old-school to high-tech quickly, other skills are as important as pure tech expertise. Durbin cites performance management as being key.
Consultants say the ability to make connections is crucial as well. “People who see the connections between the factory floor and the back-end data systems are really valuable,” says LMA Consulting’s Anderson. “It’s hard to find people who understand the interconnectivity between both kinds of systems.”
Published in Computerworld on April 16, 2014