National Manufacturing Day is an opportunity to showcase modern manufacturing and inspire the next generation to build careers in the industry
By Timon Solimon, VP and Head of Northern Europe Supply Chain at Procter & Gamble.
National Manufacturing Day is an opportunity to celebrate our industry but also to confront one of its biggest challenges: inspiring the talented people that will power its future.
After nearly 30 years at Procter & Gamble, I am still motivated by the varied opportunities this industry offers and the brilliantly creative minds that power it. But that is not always what people see when they think of a career in manufacturing. While the industry has transformed, outdated perceptions of manufacturing starting and ending with manual work and production lines have proved harder to shift. If we want to attract a new generation of talent, we need to show young people what modern manufacturing really looks like.
Technology is an important part of that story. Earlier in my career, I might have spent time working out which truck needed to go where or similar process-driven logistics, whereas today, technology can take on much of that heavy lifting, allowing me to focus my expertise on tasks where I can add greater value. This is not only fulfilling as it gives me and my work a purpose, but it is transforming what people in manufacturing can achieve. Human skills are becoming even more important and therefore, the workforce we need is changing – and so too should our definition of who can build a successful career in the sector.
Across P&G’s UK operations, no two careers in manufacturing look the same. For example, at our Reading site, where Gillette products are created, around 20,000 men visit our Innovation Centre each year to take part in shave tests, helping our teams understand details such as pressure, angle, and skin movement. For someone building a career there, that means being part of an environment where scientists, engineers, researchers, manufacturing teams, and supply chain specialists work together to solve real problems and continually improve products that people use every day.
That same breadth exists across our other UK operations, from producing Pampers in Manchester to helping make Fairy in London, where people and advanced technology come together to keep familiar products moving into homes across the country. At P&G, we want people to build a career, not just have a job, with the opportunity to develop new skills, take on meaningful responsibility, and even build multiple careers within one company.
Attracting the next generation of talent should not, however, mean overlooking the expertise already within our industry, in fact, one of manufacturing’s greatest strengths is the knowledge that passes between generations. Across sites that have been rooted in their communities for decades, people who have built careers over many years work alongside colleagues just at the beginning of theirs, allowing hard earned experience to combine with new perspectives. That combination and knowledge sharing will be critical to the next era of manufacturing.
The challenge now is visibility because we cannot expect young people to choose careers they rarely see or fully understand – and in all honesty, simply waiting for the brightest minds to discover manufacturing is not good enough. As an industry, we need to be much more deliberate about meeting young people where they are, whether that is in schools and colleges, through apprenticeships and early career schemes, online, or in the communities surrounding our sites and encouraging them to pursue a manufacturing career. I want new talent to see our industry as a winning choice, not a fall-back option.
That also means opening our doors and allowing the people already working behind the scenes to tell their stories, showing not only the big machinery at our sites but the professionals using it every day to deliver for each and every household. If we want the next generation to see a future for themselves in manufacturing the responsibility sits with us to make that future – and all its brilliant possibilities – seen.
About Procter & Gamble
P&G serves consumers around the world with one of the strongest portfolios of trusted, quality, leadership brands, including Always®, Ambi Pur®, Ariel®, Bold®, Braun®, Daz®, Fairy®, Febreze®, Gillette®, Head & Shoulders®, Herbal Essences®, Lenor®, Olay®, Oral-B®, Pampers®, Pantene®, Tampax®, Venus® and Vicks®.
Although headquartered in the US, P&G was founded by an Englishman and an Irishman in 1837, and heritage lives on through the work of Research & Development Centers, Manufacturing Plants, and business sites across the UK & Ireland.
https://www.pg.co.uk/blogs/pg-products-made-delivered-uk
