Welcoming women into the manufacturing world

“Why don’t you go back to the kitchen where your kind belongs,” said the letter, which hung outside the cubicle of a co-worker for several months.

The letter wasn’t asking a chef to get back to doing what he or she does best. The letter writer was chastising the editor—a woman—for actually writing editorials and features in The FABRICATOR’s sister magazine, Practical Welding Today. This writer obviously didn’t think a woman could comprehend the technology and technique necessary to deliver a good weld when her mind also was processing the dinner menu for the rest of the week and what she planned to wear to the country club for the weekend soiree.

In all honesty, that letter came almost 10 years ago, but most of the editorial staff remembers it quite well. In fact, it also contained some other not-safe-for-work references that helped the letter and its writer earn legendary status around the office.

That was the work environment that dominated manufacturing facilities several years ago—and still does to some extent today. It’s a man’s world, in the eyes of the men running these operations, and women are not welcomed.

That’s slowly changing, thankfully. As gray-haired workers face retirement and leave key roles in manufacturing companies across the U.S., these businesses have an opportunity to bring in new blood. With 250,000 U.S. citizens turning 65 every month, that’s paving the way for a huge influx of new thinking for manufacturers.

As companies look for that next generation of manufacturing workers, they shouldn’t be concerned about gender. If U.S. manufacturing is to thrive in the coming years, it needs the best and the brightest to seek out the most efficient production practices and eliminate waste from all processes. This isn’t a man’s job; it’s a job for everyone—not just robots.

“People are still going to be needed. We just have to ensure they are ready for what they’re needed for, and it isn’t going to be the unskilled stuff of the past,” said Traci Tapani, owner and co-president of Wyoming Machine Inc., Stacy, Minn. “You can’t just sit there, not do anything, not change, and not learn new skills, because you will be left behind.”

Skills development is a huge focus for Tapani and her sister, Lori, the company’s other co-president. They see it as an important investment for their 55-employee company, U.S. manufacturers, and society overall.

Now, attention to employee growth and engagement is not something that was regularly discussed in manufacturing circles 10 years ago, but it has been very much en vogue in recent years as people want to put manufacturing in a different light. Some of the biggest supporters of this push in metal fabricating are women. They offer a new perspective to an image problem that has been dogging industry since Upton Sinclair wrote The Jungle at the start of the 20th century.

Does it really matter that female voices are part of the mix supporting the push for skills development for the next generation of manufacturing workers? It certainly can’t hurt. The more important point is that women are voicing their opinions and putting their business beliefs into practice. That’s significant. Women are not just participating in the manufacturing economy, they are also influencing the evolution of it.

A recent study from The Manufacturing Institute, Deloitte, and APICS Supply Chain Council suggests that women in manufacturing are seeing a real shift in the way they are accepted by industry peers. The survey, which reached out to 600 women in manufacturing, revealed that 51 percent indicated they have witnessed “positive change” in manufacturing’s attitude toward female workers over the last five years. Two-thirds of survey respondents said that they would endorse a manufacturing career—albeit with 42 percent offering up some caveats—for their daughters or family members.

The times are changing, and this is good for the future of manufacturing. Fabricating environments aren’t the place for boys’ clubs—that’s for the locker room or the neighborhood tap.