The Industrial World Needs Everyone

Solving the industrial labor shortage means bringing new faces into the industry.

Recently there has (thankfully) been a renewed discussion about the value of a career in the trades.

And as you may surmise from my previous posts, I am a huge advocate for blue collar careers.

I have a deep passion and respect for the trades—the men and women who build America and then keep it running.

But while the need for industrial employees is often presented as an opportunity for the trades, we really need EVERYONE.

For as much as I talk about the value of the trades and how fulfilling a career in these industries can be, the truth is that there IS value in “desk jobs” too.

For every business that produces things, be it lightbulbs or highways, there are accountants, engineers, secretaries and many others working in the background to help keep the lights on.

This describes me. Although I have some experience working in the trades, I ultimately went to school for accounting and supply chain. I’m passionate about the industrial world, but I am not a tradesman.

Rather, my role at HFW Industries, Inc. supports the trades -men and -women in our business. Our tradespeople make the business money, and the team I work within finds ways to:

1) Find more work for our production team to perform (an overly complicated way of saying “sales”)

2) Make life easier for our production team so they can successfully complete projects for our customers.

Any good business needs both the people actually doing the work and the support allowing those people to get the work done.

Someone needs to process payroll (you’ll lose employees quickly if you don’t), just as someone needs to plan operations (you’ll lose customers quickly if you don’t).

The support functions in a blue-collar company may not be as obvious as the great tradespeople that are the economic engine of the business, but they’re still essential.

So as we see massive layoffs in the tech and banking industries, my hope is that some of these bright people with backgrounds in accounting, engineering, sales, marketing and other similar fields might consider a career working for an industrial company (and conversely, that industrial companies might consider taking a chance on them).

If you are looking for a mission-driven environment that is not altogether that different from the world of technology and startups, you might just be a great fit working for an industrial world company.

We need everyone we can get in the manufacturing space, and our continued success as a country may very well depend on the industrial world's ability to attract talent in both the trades AND the office.