What the hell are we doing?
Seriously....Do you know what you are doing?
The industrial workforce is changing just as fast as those horny soldiers were making babies in the late forties. The silver tsunami is crashing and industry is picking up the pieces. How? Shortcuts.
There was a golden age of trades when manufacturing was at its peak. There was a diverse workforce from a variety of challenging industries and from it grew an incredible advantage to our economy.... Mad skills.
Fast forward to the 90s..........
When I was in high school the local pulp mill had almost 200 tradespeople. Guess how many apprentices? 2. There was no need to pass on the knowledge gained from years of building and maintaining world class equipment. Industry had a highly skilled workforce, with a ton of union seniority. No one was going anywhere. Suddenly the housing market grew exponentially and people set sail into the sunset sooner than expected, and industry was caught with its.............well...Industry was not prepared. Everyone assumed that they could find the people they needed. Train the apprentices they wanted and life would go on. Hit the easy button.
The result of this complacency towards skill training was an aged workforce with bad knees, blown discs, and more light work accommodations than the Hilton's. Surprise, surprise, not all old dogs like to teach tricks and what we lost in terms of knowledge was invaluable.
Now that we all have the story. How did industry adapt?
TECHNOLOGY. Lots of amazing technology. We have lasers, optical tools, sensors, and all types of amazing new tools and computer maintenance management systems. Its all great stuff. However I fear what we have done is hand a bunch of calculators to grade students without first teaching how to multiply or divide. If you cant explain the principles that the tool works on then it is just MAGIC. Not having a full grasp of what the tool is doing for us is a slippery slope to climb when the latest and greatest buzz word in maintenance is reliability. Without understanding, mistakes will be made, details will be missed, and our economy will suffer. Industrial trades will go the way of the automotive "part changer" if we are not diligent in learning our trades and challenging the way things are maintained. In conferencing with a fellow Provincial Instructor in training, who refers to himself as an old dog, he relayed to me his observations in the oil patch. Andrew saw a large portion of the millwright workforce unable to use dials to align equipment, or use proper rigging practices. The abilities which add our value to industry. See his Reflections here
So next time you align something bring the laser, but take a second and do some long division first.
I don't believe in magic.
Pride and precision
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