How can manufacturers hire workers who connect their heads with their hands?

Getting a handle on the engineering technology skills needed for future manufacturing jobs offers insight into how industry - and educational institutions - must develop programming to prepare tomorrow’s workers.

OMI conducted research to understand how “Manufacturing 5.0,” the

digitalization of manufacturing, will exacerbate the profound disruptions that advancing technologies have had on the production workforce. The changing demands for workers who can operate or repair computerized systems and use data to make decisions means that two- and four-year postsecondary educational institutions will need to adapt. 

Based on its findings, OMI advocates for a set of application-based engineering technology or applied engineering degrees with multiple on and off ramps that connect hands and heads in the digitized, integrated manufacturing environment. Such programs will facilitate the growing need for business-oriented engineering leaders to run the factories of tomorrow and will ensure that graduates have the necessary technical and analytical skills, as well as critical soft skills, to succeed in the changing manufacturing workplace.

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