Paper ID #21133 A P-20 Learning Assessment for Manufacturing Organizations Mr Sidney E Martin III, Murray State University Mr Sidney Martin, P.E., is a lecturer in the Institute of Engineering at MSU He is a doctoral student within the college of Education Prior to arriving at MSU he worked for companies such as General Electric, International Rectifier and SynQor Sid Martin was responsible for employee training and education This experience allowed Mr Martin to utilize many learning techniques that include traditional lecturing, but also nontraditional methods of active learning, problem based learning, story based learning and active learning methods of teaching Dr Randal Wilson PhD, Murray State University Dr Wilson has over 27 years of experience in higher education at the community college and university levels in both faculty and administrative roles His 17 years of leadership experience have been in workforce development and academic affairs Prior to his career in higher education, he was in the manufacturing sector He is currently an assistant professor and director of the Ed.D in P-20 and Community Leadership program at Murray State University He has presented at numerous state, regional, national, and international conferences c American Society for Engineering Education, 2018 A P-20 Learning Assessment for Manufacturing Organizations In the United States (U.S.), there is a need for the industry to be able to assess their employees’ education and knowledge Engineering educators and industry representatives referred to as Chief Learning Officers (CLO) are determining methods to assess and improve their employees’ education and skills [1] This paper provides an explanation on how the industry can assess the employees’ knowledge and skill levels The manufacturing environment in the U.S has changed from transferring high volumes of manufactured devices to low-cost production centers outside the U.S to returning these products to be manufactured domestically [2] The transfer to China of manufacturing occurred in the 1990s and beyond resulting in loss of jobs in the U.S The numbers of jobs that were lost between 2001 and 2011 are estimated to be 2.1 million [3] The result of this job loss is the loss of talented individuals with knowledge to produce products This paper is an introduction to the literature describing the role of the CLO The engineering educators and students need to be aware of the role of the CLO and the importance of this position in organizations The CLO position is a position in which an engineer can thrive while benefiting their employer Twenty years of job loss at the operator, supervisor and low-level management, has created a knowledge gap for the ability to build new products A knowledge gap has developed in manufacturing Manufacturing organizations require education and training to regain the competitive advantage with respect to their international competitors To determine why organizational learning is required, an assessment method is needed to determine the present needs of the manufacturing organization The assessment method should be comprehensive in nature and assure not only job-specific aptitude but also a fundamental aptitude with regards to interactions with other sectors By employing a P-20 approach to assessment development, a more holistic understanding of aptitude can be obtained P-20 education is an effort to bring leadership and collaboration between education, business and community organizations Engineering is responsible for finding and implementing innovative solutions to aid institutions and society Effective communication methods for engineering are required to successfully improve learning The letter P and the number 20 have specific individual meanings Discussions in various P-20 doctoral classrooms indicated that the P in P-20 is representative of preschool The 20 can be thought of as representing lifelong learning Slater and Narver [4] outlined the learning requirements of an organization The organizational learning process involves information acquisition, dissemination of this information and sharing information with staff in the manufacturing organization Acquiring information is performed by collecting information through the employee experiences, direct organizational experiences, and historical recordings The distribution of information occurs through informal and formal methods within the manufacturing organization and the employees of the company Once gathered, having this information results in a shared and organized, learning environment Organizational learning results from the shared interpretation and understanding of the information Starting the learning requirements inventory is the first step of assessment The manufacturing organization must have a consensus as to the information required and document the meaning of the information and how the information will be used A white paper was supplied by the Society of Manufacturing Engineers (SME) [5] The SME stated there is an assessment of the manufacturing organization learning requirements There are advanced methods to allow digital based, 3-D learning environments and online courses that can be adapted to organizational needs The paper outlines the standard manufacturing knowledge core The report indicates a shortage of trained professionals and faculty to design, develop and implement this requirement because of the loss of talent in recent years in U.S manufacturing Manufacturing organization learning curriculum needs to be developed, and these manufacturing focused methods need to result in credentialing, certification, and higher education degrees Partnering with institutions of higher learning will help address the shortage of trained curriculum development personnel These partnerships should extend beyond colleges of science, engineering, and technology to include representatives from colleges of education, business, and a few others Additionally, representatives from the pK-12 sector should be included to provide perspective on foundational education preparation These partnerships exemplify the essence of a P-20 model [6] The model addresses the development of the student from pK-12 through higher education to participate in the workforce Recent decisions for bringing back manufacturing sent overseas have been based on the realization that manufacturing in the U.S is only slightly more than the cost of manufacturing in China, and less than the cost of manufacturing in eastern Europe [7] Firms established in the U.S have decided to keep manufacturing here in North America (N.A.), and countries in Europe have decided to move to U.S manufacturing organizations In N.A there is a return of manufacturing, though not strong The reshoring pattern does not reflect the reported trend by the media and politicians, but this may indicate increased decisions to not send existing production to offshore facilities Manufacturing organizations should take an active role in improving their workforce through P-20 life-long learning approaches [8] Manufacturing organizations are facing an aging society Countries with aging workforces will have employees needing lifelong learning opportunities as their companies will need to retrain and reskill their existing workforce Companies can consider using technologies, such as online training, to help to educate their workforce Businesses should consider working with local school systems to aid in the development of a curriculum which will help to support their future employment needs In some cases, employees could be sent to attend engineering programs to improve their design and critical thinking skills The term CLO in manufacturing represents an organizational position that has not often been utilized The position often reports to the CEO with a dotted line to the Human Resource officer The success of the CLO is aligned with the strategies and business philosophy of the manufacturing organization [9] Organizations may expect that the CLO will be responsible for all learning within the organization The CLO needs to fit into the culture and become a part of the business to be successful General Motors realized that the path to success was to involve leaders in developing, teaching and assessing the talent that their employees’ possess [10] CLOs will use survey data, employee feedback and assessment techniques to determine their employees’ skills inventory [12] The CLO should understand the corporate culture and business strategies and how the corporate culture needs to evolve to support the manufacturing organizations’ growth The organization leaders are the ones who coach to influence and transform the organization [12] The CLO needs to focus on the competitive skills of the organization, which creates value for the organization and check on the needed core competencies [13] The goal for the CLO is to create an agile, fast and effective method to instruct individuals with the latest skills These learning methods could incorporate videos, photos, job aids, and other agile communication methods The CLO will need to understand talent management when recruiting new talent [14] The CLO is the lead for establishing programs to help engineers improve skills by setting up retraining programs The CLO could consider implementing e-learning material, as engineers and computer scientists could easily review this information at their desk or on their portable devices For engineers who need to have a strong understanding of technology, the intense training can be interactive and can create a boot camp training approach to learning a new technology [15] The CLO is required to work with the manufacturing organization executive team to create and develop strategies to improve the capabilities of the organization’s talent The CLO partners with external business and educational leaders using the P-20 paradigm, to understand the needs of their customers and available external education resources to ensure that the organization is focused on the long-term talent capabilities and organizational environment The CLO assesses the organization’s requirements and aligns the people and business strategies such that there is alignment to the goals and objectives of the organization The CLO establishes strategies that allow talent to move throughout the organization that not only benefits the organization's needs and requirements but also benefits the individual’s career development and advancement The CLO needs to work to develop a culture of learning where the learning resides with each team and employee [16] In a learning culture, the employees are driven to find this learning when the skills and knowledge are needed In a learning-centered cultural environment, learning occurs all the time, often through mentors or coaches This action learning happens socially, and experimentally, from smartphones and tablets The organization is engaged in supporting and facilitating learning Learning can be obtained from both inside and outside the manufacturing organization The important aspect is applying the learned skills to improve the performance on achieving the strategic goals of the organization For a manufacturing organization to be world-class, there is a need for an assessment that determines the skills, attitudes and the knowledge required for the employees A CLO understands the strategic plan and the relationship to the strategic plan Taking an inventory of the employee skills presently held, and reviewing those skills, is a task that is to be performed The difference between what is needed to be world-class is compared to the internal assessment, and the gap is the knowledge area that must be mitigated [17] The inventorying and listing of the types of training is needed in order to assess what assets exist to aid in training This information is needed while developing a plan of action for the manufacturing organization This assessment of different areas within the firm will help to identify strengths and gaps The assessment will aid in filling the critical holes identified with targeted training programs The improved functions in the organization will result in improved competitive performance A required activity to be performed quickly is to assess employee job functions at all levels and their associated tasks There should be an analysis of the primary skills, work activities and the competencies required by the employees to perform their job function Implementing the analysis of skill, primary competencies, and tasks will allow the efficient and effective performance of work tasks Reviewing establishes the detailed skills inventory, job descriptions, and competencies which are required to perform the work tasks Performing a gap analysis of the existing process and continuous improvement skills required will aid in the reduction of process costs [18] Assessment of the engineering talent pipeline is important as talent is an important aspect of manufacturing competitiveness [19] Skilled talent is the key to the success of a manufacturing organization, as strong talent allows organizations to innovate new technologies, improve business models and rapidly improve processes Developing systems that aid in training employees as new equipment is added, infrastructure changes that need to be made, or process changes that need to be implemented Employees with unique skills, or the only individual with certain experience need to be identified to determine how the skill could be replaced if the individual retires, or leaves the organization Long-term investment needs to be made in learning A strategic assessment of learning must contain the results of speaking with individuals from all aspects of the organization who help to identify the learning needs Designing of the learning methods will then take place to quickly identify the learning objectives of the instruction, so the knowledge can be deployed to the organization [20] Assessment data and competencies need to be available to understand the competencies that exist within the organization If this assessment information does not exist, interviews can be conducted to determine personnel educational gaps in various departments that span receiving to production to operations Employees in marketing, sales, engineering, procurement, accounting and other similar departments will also be assessed The results of these interviews will allow the identification of gaps between the needed performance levels and the current skills that employees have The learning needs of the organization can be assessed either by survey or in-person interviews Questions can be asked to operators that can assess their needs The responses to these questions will allow the requirements for organizational learning to be developed Questions that can be asked are as follows: • Is there training or education that you are aware of that would help you to perform your daily tasks? • What educational or training experiences have you had in the last year? • Are there any aspects of your job that you have suggestions to improve the process or make things flow better? Questions that can be asked to supervisors and managers can be: • What are learning requirements needed to improve the productivity of your department? • Is there specific training that your organization requires? • How could the learning experiences best be integrated into your employee’s day to avoid interruptions in their schedule? Questions to the company executive leadership team can be: • What learning needs are there for the organization with respect to team building and lean process improvement? • What learning solutions are needed to improve leadership skills across company locations? • Is cultural awareness training needed? • What problem-solving skill development is needed in the organization? Future actions will be to contact manufacturing organizations to assess the methods used for training requirements A survey will be sent to the manufacturers to learn about the organizational needs and to what extent employees are obtaining the educational requirements The results of these surveys will be reported To conclude, the CLO will aid in supporting cultural changes within the organization Because of the engineer’s systems analysis abilities, the CLO is a position in which the engineer will excel and aid their organization P-20 education approaches will help organize the education needs of the company through joining efforts with local schools, community organizations, and government agencies The organizational learning assessment will be an important guide to organizational improvement The corporation benefits from the education improvements that occur within the workforces The employees benefit from the outcome of the learning objectives of the training and courses that they attend Changes to employee job descriptions will be made to show that individuals are responsible for maintaining their educational level to be able to meet the changing needs of their employers This education and the employee’s adaptability will affect the hiring of employees, their promotions that they receive, any bonuses and incentives that they receive Therefore, the employees will recognize the impact of learning The CLO has a strong impact on the organizational learning to improve the organization’s competitiveness and also works to retain this newly developed talent The CLO will have an impact resulting in a reduction in cost by reducing waste and improving the innovation opportunity References [1] M Barger, R Gilbert, and H Jack, “A Quiet Revolution: Growth of Credentialed-Based Manufacturing Education in Florida,” ASEE, 2017 Annual Conference, June 2017, as retrieved from file:///C:/Users/smartin29/Downloads/0_2017_growth_credentials_asee_paper.pdf [2] H Sirkin, M Zinser, and D Hohner, “Made in America, again: Why manufacturing will return to the U.S.,” Technical report, The Boston Consulting Group, August 2011 [3] D Kurtzelen, “Report: America lost 2.7 million jobs to China in 10 years,” U S News, Aug.24, 2012, [Online] Available: https://www.usnews.com/news/articles/2012/08/24/report-america-lost-27-million-jobsto-china-in-10-years [4] S Slater and J Narver, (1995) Market orientation and the learning organization Journal of Marketing, 59, 63-74 [5] Society of Manufacturing Engineers (2012) Workforce imperative: A manufacturing education strategy Dearborn, MI [6] P Pitre P-20 education policy: School to college transition policy in Washington State Education Policy Analysis Achieve, 19, (2011) [7] M Cohen, S Cui, R Ernst, A Huchzermeier, P Kouvelis, H Lee, H Matsuo, M Steuber and A Tsay, “Off-, On- or Reshoring: Benchmarking of current manufacturing location decisions,” The Global Supply Chain Benchmark Consortium 2016, [Online] Available: http://pulsar.wharton.upenn.edu/fd/resources/20160321GSCBSFinalReport.pdf [8] K Schwab and R Samans, “The future of jobs: Employment, skills and workforce strategy for the Fourth Industrial Resolution 2016, [Online] Available: http://www3.weforum.org/docs/WEF_Future_of_Jobs.pdf [9] M Soehren, “Lifecycle of a CLO,” in Learning Leaders Fieldbook, B Concevitch, Ed., Saratoga Springs, NY: Masie Learning Consortium, 2009, 23-25 [online] https://masie.com/images/pdfs/LearningLeadersFieldbook-1.pdf [10] D Ramellie, “Building world-class talent,” in Learning Leaders Fieldbook, B Concevitch, Ed., Saratoga Springs, NY: Masie Learning Consortium, 2009, 26-30 [online] https://masie.com/images/pdfs/LearningLeadersFieldbook-1.pdf [11] T Kelly and M Radhakrishnan, “Unlocking the potential of learning management technology,” in Learning Leaders Fieldbook, B Concevitch, Ed., Saratoga Springs, NY: Masie Learning Consortium, 2009, 26-30 [online] https://masie.com/images/pdfs/LearningLeadersFieldbook-1.pdf [12] H Huntley, “Core principles to guide the actions of a CLO,” in Learning Leaders Fieldbook, B Concevitch, Ed., Saratoga Springs, NY: Masie Learning Consortium, 2009, 26-30 [online] https://masie.com/images/pdfs/LearningLeadersFieldbook-1.pdf [13] D Ramelli, “Set the direction of the future- fast, learner-centric, hot skills-focused,” in Learning Leaders Fieldbook, B Concevitch, Ed., Saratoga Springs, NY: Masie Learning Consortium, 2009, 26-30 [online] https://masie.com/images/pdfs/LearningLeadersFieldbook-1.pdf [14] A Zhou, “Key qualities to look for in AI and machine learning experts,” in Women@Forbes, November 1, 2017 [online] https://www.forbes.com/sites/adelynzhou/2017/11/21/key-qualities-to-look-for-in-ai-andmachine-learning-experts/#492e93d965e8 [15] Chief Learning Officer, “Cisco: Engineering success through learning,” in Chief Learning Officer, August 29, 2006 [online] http://www.clomedia.com/2006/08/29/ciscoengineering-success-through-learning/ [16] S Gill, “Training culture vs learning culture,” in Torrance Learning, April 1, 2016 [online] http://www.elearninglearning.com/clo/culture/?open-article-id=4853280&articletitle=guest-post training-culture-vs learning-culture&blogdomain=torrancelearning.com&blog-title=torrance-learning [17] D Goetsch and S Davis, Quality Management Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice-Hall, 2000 [18] T Pajaron, “How to identify training needs at your organization,” (2017) [Online] Available: https://www.trainingindustry.com/leadership/articles/how-to-identify-trainingneeds-at-your-organization.aspx [19] A Vayuvegula, “5 tips for assessing training needs of manufacturing employees,” 2018, [online] Available: https://blog.commlabindia.com/elearning-design/assessing-trainingneeds-in-manufacturing-sector [20] D Basarab, “Developing an enterprise learning strategy that produces results,” 2011, [online] https://www.clomedia.com/2011/10/28/developing-an-enterprise-learningstrategy-that-produces-results/