For the Love of ... Manufacturing?
February is the month of romance – flowers, chocolates, romantic dates…..and a prosperous manufacturing economy in the state. You read that right. In addition to celebrating those that we love and adore at this time of year, I propose we show a kind of “love” to the state’s manufacturing sector. It’s not at all difficult to demonstrate why that “love” is so well deserved.
I’ve mentioned in past articles and blogs some supportive stats, but let me again highlight some of the more prominent and relative numbers:
- Almost 3,200 manufacturers across the state, as defined by the KDOL
- 160,417 workers in these manufacturing companies
- 3rd highest ratio of manufacturing workers to total workers of states west of the Mississippi
- Average wage of $54,184
It is with this group of manufacturers that MAMTC routinely works, either directly or through one or more of our many partners across the state. Traditionally the work has been centered on lean strategy and implementation, workforce training and development, continuous improvement, and energy management and sustainability. Important topics all, most certainly, and a key to a company’s strategy for growing. Additionally, we realize that manufacturers, in their continuous challenges to growth require help in any of a number of areas. These may include succession planning, strategic planning, marketing, human resources, finance, technology acceleration, among many others.
In an effort to better serve our market, MAMTC has developed a business model to address these areas of need for manufacturing decision makers. This business model, aptly named “Hub and Spoke”, takes our current model and extends it to include a continuously developing 3rd party resource network. We have defined key aspects of a manufacturing operation that often require areas of specialization. Further, we continue to develop a list of well vetted resources with capabilities in these areas – thus offering our clients choices for solutions to these growth challenges.
This business model was not developed in a vacuum. We listened to you, the manufacturer, as to what is important to you in your challenges to growth. We listened to our partners and government agencies across the state, to identify opportunities for greater market penetration and assistance. Lastly, we worked with our national partners within the NIST MEP system, employing many of their successes into our new model.
Recently MAMTC received notice we had been awarded the national contract from NIST MEP to continue as the state’s liaison to Kansas’ manufacturing companies. The new Hub and Spoke model was a key part of the award, and we are busily implementing the strategy to better serve the manufacturing community of Kansas.
We are proud of the last 25 years of service rendered to companies across the region, but we also realize that we cannot rest our future work on the successes of the past. Now more than ever if you are a manufacturer, we want to hear from you. If you are a supplier to the manufacturing community across the state, we want to hear from you. If you are a service provider interested in working with manufacturers across the state, we want to hear from you.
We look forward to implementing this new model, and to serve you in a greater capacity. We will be hosting regional events across the state, updating our website and marketing materials, and providing free assessments in order to more fully assist manufacturers, no matter their size, location or challenge. Stay tuned for additional information on our successes, or better yet, be part of one of the successes by giving us a call. We look forward to hearing from you and your challenges to growth.