Enterprise Minnesota Magazine June 2012

MSU-Moorhead’s Fast-Track Degree • WW Johnson Goes Paperless • Elk River Machine Transports Hastings Bridge

Helping Manufacturing Enterprises Grow Profitably

June 2012

creating

a winning

workforce

in minnesota

MnSCU’s Chancellor Steven Rosenstone shares candid insights on closing the skills gap and keeping the MnSCU system relevant to manufacturers.

Also: Training its future workforce may be manufacturing’s most challenging task. 16 Foldcraft Company, Medtronic and Xcel Energy explain the business case for green and lean. 22 Absolute Quality transforms its entire company with Enterprise Minnesota’s Pathways to Business Growth program. 28

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contents JUNE 2012

Features 12 Creating a Winning Workforce in Minnesota

Minnesota State Colleges and Universities Chancellor Steven Rosenstone shares candid insights on closing the skills gap, the importance of partnering with industry, and his plan for making and keeping the MnSCU system relevant to Minnesota businesses.

16 Building the Next Generation of Manufacturing Employees

Of all the items on the endless to-do lists of manufacturing owners and executives, creating the future workforce may be the most challenging – and most important.

20 Leaner and Greener

Instilling green and lean as cultural cornerstones helps manufacturers realize significant savings, attract top talent and keep one step ahead of the competition.

26 Absolute Transformation

One year into Enterprise Minnesota’s Pathways to Business Growth training program, Absolute Quality is primed for growth with a new and expanded plant layout, UL certification and a recharged marketing plan.

Subscribe to our e-Trends newsletter today! Get updates on the people, companies, and trends that drive Minnesota’s manufacturing community. To subscribe, please visit http://www.enterpriseminnesota.org/Resources/ Magazine-eNewsletter/Subscribe.aspx.

Ryan Bruers, field sales engineer, Xcel Energy

Visit the Enterprise Minnesota Web site for more details on what’s covered in the magazine at www.enterpriseminnesota.org.

in every issue:

Bob Kill:

Innovations:

Innovations:

Final Word:

In Minnesota, manufacturers, educators and government work together to train manufacturing’s next generation.

Page 2

Minnesota State UniversityMoorhead’s Operations Management degree program responds to manufacturing’s qualified worker gap.

Page 8

Elk River Machine Company’s signature Hydra-Steer trailers transport sections of the new Hastings Bridge with ease.

Page 10

A focused, strategic marketing plan is essential for business growth and profitability.

Page 32

ENTERPRISE MINNESOTA JUNE 2012 1

bob kill

Preparing for the Future Bob Kill

Helping Manufacturing Enterprises Grow Profitably Publisher Lynn K. Shelton

A large and growing collection of new market

conditions suggest American manufacturers are poised to make a roaring economic comeback. But each of these favorable conditions is balanced by manufacturers’ growing anxiety that they won’t have access to an adequate number of qualified workers to meet the increasing demand.

Manufacturing is benefiting from the nation’s economic turnaround, even if it may be a little slow. The U.S. Bob Kill is president and CEO of Enterprise Minnesota.

Labor Department reports that from February 2010 to February 2012, U.S. manufacturers added jobs at a faster pace than the rest of the economy.

It is easy to see why. Smart manufacturers used the downturn to bring leaner, more agile efficiencies to their sectors as well as their shop floors. OEMs are reassessing their early affection for the low-cost foreign suppliers and increasingly are home-shoring those relationships, to regain more control of quality, proprietary security and improved turnaround times.

Here in Minnesota, our established manufacturing environment is especially favorable for growth. Minnesota’s 8,000 manufacturing companies (5,200 of which are in the metro area) account for 15 percent of the state’s jobs and 18 percent of its wages. The sector’s $1,120 average weekly wage -- about $58,000 per year – is a 22 percent multiple over the average weekly wage across all industries. And our State of Manufacturing® poll revealed that 82 percent of manufacturing executives are confident in the future of their firms.

The poll also revealed that concern over lack of qualified workers has doubled among manufacturing executives between 2011 and 2012. Minnesota’s Department of Employment and Economic Development reports that in the fourth quarter of 2011, there already were 4,748 vacant full-time jobs in Minnesota’s manufacturing industry – more than any other industry.

This issue of Enterprise Minnesota magazine highlights what Minnesota is doing to meet this challenge. We feature the proactive collaboration between manufacturers and educators to cultivate a new talent pool (page 16). We show how Minnesota State University-Moorhead is helping technical degree graduates earn their B.S. in Operations Management in two years instead of four (page 8). And most encouraging of all, we get key insights about the future of workforce training in an insightful Q&A with MnSCU Chancellor Steven Rosenstone, who has launched a statewide listening tour to ensure MnSCU courses teach the skills manufacturing companies need, both today and in the future (page 12).

In this same thematic vein, I recently testified about Minnesota’s response to manufacturing’s ongoing shortage of qualified workers before the U.S. Senate Subcommittee on Competitiveness, Innovation and Export Promotion. Senator Amy Klobuchar, chair of the subcommittee, wisely uses the bully pulpit of Congress to emphasize the needs of manufacturing that don’t necessarily require legislation.

She understands that our success depends in part on introducing the needs and opportunities of the next generation of manufacturing to America’s teachers, students and their parents as the clean, high-tech, high-paying career it has become.

2 ENTERPRISE MINNESOTA JUNE 2012

Editors Tom Mason tmason@mason-publicaffairs.com Andrea Lahouze andrea@mason-publicaffairs.com

Contributing Writer Kate Peterson Photographer Patrick Kelly Art Director Amy Bjellos

Contacts To subscribe subscribe@enterpriseminnesota.org To change an address or renew ldapra@enterpriseminnesota.org For back issues ldapra@enterpriseminnesota.org For permission to copy lynn.shelton@enterpriseminnesota.org 612-455-4215 To make event reservations events@enterpriseminnesota.org 612-422-4239 For additional magazines and reprints contact Lynet DaPra at lynet.dapra@enterpriseminnesota.org 612-455-4202 To advertise or sponsor an event laura.cohen@enterpriseminnesota.org, 952-393-9166 To pitch a story andrea@mason-publicaffairs.com

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All rights reserved. Reproduction encouraged after obtaining permission from Enterprise Minnesota magazine.

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INNOVATiONS

Less Paper,

Leaner Process

In Minneapolis, ground beef processor WW Johnson Meat Company saves time and improves accuracy with its new paperless production management system.

WW Johnson Meat Company COO Kent Mogler

is on a mission to keep up with customer demand.

WW Johnson is a leading producer of ready-fresh hamburger patties for national distributors like Sysco and US Foods. The Minneapolis business began in 1946 as a local supplier, serving primarily the Minnesota and Wisconsin markets before its reputation for consistently fresh and high-quality ground beef helped it to expand across the

country. Today, WW Johnson offers a variety of custommade fresh ground beef products.

Working with a perishable product means the company must be extremely quick in its processing time. For the past decade, WW Johnson has maintained a strong reputation for freshness by vacuum-packaging its orders, and shipping them within 48 hours to provide the maximum 25-day shelf life for its customers. But as sales have in-

photograph by PATRICK KELLY

WW Johnson’s Jose Patino and COO Kent Mogler get real-time information about production orders with the company’s new HMI system.

4 ENTERPRISE MINNESOTA JUNE 2012

creased between 10 and 15 percent each year, production speed has had to follow suit. Mogler found the company’s traditional paper production report system was holding back its ability to efficiently keep up with sales.

“Obviously paper quickly becomes obsolete, because once it’s printed, a customer may change an order,” Mogler says. Republishing production order reports multiple times per day took time, and handwriting changes on outdated reports was a method for miscommunication.

Communicating changes verbally also ran the risk of details lost in translation.

To accommodate the steady increase in sales while maintaining its quick order turnaround time, the company opted to forego its traditional paper production reports in favor of a digital system. The customized system is comprised of a series of computers, called HMIs, which sit at each production work center to provide work instructions for filling each order, and order updates as they occur. The system also records and measures completed work, which gives employees a way to view their progress throughout the day, and provides a digital snapshot of all production activity at any given time to accurately gauge efficiency levels in each area.

Instead of making a “one-time, radical change,” Mogler and his team decided to implement the system gradually, moving through the plant from its grinding operation to

its receiving, packaging and shipping areas over three years.

“A key to our success is that we took a journey through our production area, versus trying to change everything at once, because we built upon our lessons and our successes,” Mogler says.

With the system now installed across the production floor, benefits abound. Where last-minute order changes used to spark a flurry of manual communication and handwritten updates between departments, they are now immediately and seamlessly communicated to each production work center throughout the plant, minimizing miscommunication and stress, and improving workflow. Mogler says the entire investment has had a payback period of two years or less due to reduced reworks and increased efficiency.

“Instead of the starting and stopping and reassessing process, it has become a flow process, and a flow process is much more exciting for employees to participate in,” Mogler says.

“Being more in control of what you need to do, and then seeing the accomplishment of that work measured throughout the day is much more satisfying to all employees.”

In the true spirit of continuous improvement, the company is already planning its next project. “We have a vision of becoming a paperless office,” Mogler says. “We will embark upon that in the second half of this year.”

To learn more about WW Johnson, visit www.wwjmeat.com.

ENTERPRISE MINNESOTA JUNE 2012 5

INNOVATiONS

Blazing Pathways to

Business Growth

photograph by PATRICK KELLY

Enterprise Minnesota’s Pathways to Business Growth program enters its second year with three new companies and a multitude of past-year successes.

Enterprise Minnesota kicked off year two

of its Pathways to Business Growth program on March 14 with a celebration of Enterprise Minnesota business growth advisors and program participants at Padilla Speer Beardsley in Minneapolis.

Pathways “is about assessment, discovery, where to start and what can really help an individual company the most,” said Enterprise Minnesota President Bob Kill, speaking to kickoff attendees. “Pathways to Business Growth really does represent the entire state of Minnesota. It’s a great connection, which I think shows the power of the publicprivate collaboration.”

Enterprise Minnesota administers the Pathways program with a $515,000 grant from the National Institute of Standards and Technology Manufacturing Extension Partnership (NIST/MEP). Its mission is to help participating companies achieve profitable growth by working with Enterprise Minnesota advisors on training initiatives such as strategic planning, innovation and idea mining services, business assessments, organizational and leadership development, and marketing strategy. As part of the grant, Enterprise Minnesota is also using lessons learned from working with each company to develop industry-wide best practices for helping manufacturers drive growth within their companies, which NIST/MEP will share with MEP centers nationwide.

In 2011, Enterprise Minnesota worked with 10 companies on the Pathways grant, including The Aagard Group, Absolute Quality Manufacturing, Alexandria Pro-Fab Company, Akkerman Inc., Automated Equipment, Fiserv Solutions Inc., Ideal Aerosmith, 6 ENTERPRISE MINNESOTA JUNE 2012

From left to right: Karlo Goerges of Pequot Tool & Manufacturing; Rikk Schaehrer, Sarah Richards, David Richards and David Olson of Jones Metal Products Inc.; Duane Petersen and Jason Zoubek of Absolute Quality Manufacturing; Roger Paul of Panels Plus; Doug Olson of Lou-Rich Inc.; Larry Beavens of Almco Inc.; Randy Eggum of Exact Manufacturing, a division of Lou-Rich Inc.; Kathy Silvernale of Hutchinson Manufacturing Inc.; Don Tomann, Mary Pettit and Roxann Wardarski of UMC Inc. Seated: Bob Kill of Enterprise Minnesota and Thomas Norman of Norman Development Consulting.

Innovance Inc., Pequot Tool & Manufacturing and Ultra Machining Company. This year’s companies include Jones Metal Products, Harmony Enterprises and Hutchinson Manufacturing.

Jason Zoubek, sales manager at Absolute Quality in Minneapolis, says Pathways has reinvigorated his company with a new web site, new marketing plan, and newfound clarity around its mission and vision. It has also transformed Absolute Quality’s perspective on employee empowerment.

“Now, what we’re seeing is more interaction between our employees and management. They’re not as afraid,” Zoubek says. “We’re really drilling down to the lowest appropriate level to make decisions within the organization.”

Thomas Norman of Norman Consulting, who serves as the independent evaluator of the program, considers the program “uniquely effective, and uniquely trusting,” and commends its focus on individually tailored solutions.

Kill agrees: “I think this program plays a part to make companies better suppliers and better partners, and we’re really proud of all of the companies that were in it, and pleased with the three companies that are coming into it this year.”

To learn more about the Pathways to Business Growth program, visit http://www.enterpriseminnesota.org/about-us/newsroom/ press-releases/pathways-to-business-growth-launches.html.

Qualified Labor Gap Gains

National Attention

Testifying before a U.S. Senate subcommittee, Enterprise Minnesota President and CEO Bob Kill brings the manufacturing sector’s qualified worker shortage into the national spotlight.

In April, Enterprise Minnesota President and CEO Bob

To learn more about the Growth Acceleration Program, visit http://www.enterpriseminnesota.org/resources/growthacceleration-program.html.

Photograph courtesy of U.S. Senate

Kill told a key Senate panel that manufacturing’s chronic shortage of qualified workers poses a significant and escalating challenge despite high national unemployment rates.

Kill traveled to Washington, D.C. to testify before the Senate Subcommittee on Competitiveness, Innovation and Export Promotion, chaired by Senator Amy Klobuchar.

Kill’s testimony used data collected from this year’s State of Manufacturing® poll to illustrate that anxiety over attracting qualified workers has more than doubled in the past year, with 31 percent of Minnesota manufacturing executives saying it is a concern, up from 14 percent in 2011.

Nearly six out of 10 (58 percent) manufacturing executives also say it is a challenge to attract qualified workers to their companies, up from 45 percent in 2011.

“Rapidly changing technology... widens the gap between the sector’s existing workers and the skills that are needed in today’s manufacturing environments,” Kill told Senators.

In the fourth quarter of 2011, the skills mismatch left 4,925 jobs unfilled in Minnesota’s manufacturing sector, accounting for 9.8 percent of the state’s job vacancies, he said. Nationally, there are approximately 600,000 vacant positions in manufacturing.

Kill said that Enterprise Minnesota has attempted to help narrow the skills gap in Minnesota by offering discounted services to manufacturers through the state-funded Growth Acceleration Program (GAP). GAP provides up to $1 of state money for every $3 a company invests.

Participating companies have realized a $30 return for every $1 spent on GAP, and have created or retained a collective 1,700 jobs in Minnesota.

Kill concluded that attracting more students to industry careers will depend on the effectiveness of using public/ private partnerships in exposing them to career opportunities in manufacturing.

“Public/private collaborations of manufacturers—with the community leaders, with the educators, and with the parents—will lead to us creating the next generation of manufacturers,” Kill said in an interview held minutes after delivering his testimony. “The visibility Sen. Klobuchar is bringing to that topic is very important.”

“

Enterprise Minnesota President and CEO Bob Kill testifies before a U.S. Senate subcommittee on April 17.

“It is essential to attract more young people to manufacturing by making them and their parents aware of the great opportunities that exist in manufacturing, and to create a better image of what manufacturing can offer as a career. Building publicprivate collaboration between communities, schools and businesses is key to closing the skills gap.”

”

Bob Kill,

president and CEO of Enterprise Minnesota, excerpted from his testimony to the Senate Subcommittee on Competitiveness, Innovation and Export Promotion ENTERPRISE MINNESOTA JUNE 2012 7

INNOVATiONS

Fast-Tracked Talent Pool Minnesota State University-Moorhead’s Operations Management degree program responds to manufacturing’s qualified worker gap.

For manufacturers looking to fill open management positions, Pam McGee says the right peo-

ple for the jobs may be their current employees.

McGee is program coordinator and an assistant faculty member of Minnesota State University-Moorhead’s Operations Management 2+2 program, a fast-track degree program that helps two-year technical degree graduates to complete a Bachelor of Science degree in Operations Management in just two years. Its goal is to give students with an existing technical background the education they need to lead the operations of a business—without having to start over as college freshmen. The program accepts a

“block transfer” of each student’s technical degree credits, meaning it applies all of them towards the baccalaureate degree.

“We take employees that have a two-year technical degree, and over time, they can be built into people who could potentially be general managers, operations managers and directors,” says Ken Karr, assistant professor of Operations Management. “I tell students, ‘you’ve [already] got a degree that’s going to get you a job. If you come into our program, we’ll get you promoted. We’ll give you the tools and skills you need to move up the corporate ladder.’”

Minnesota State University-Moorhead Assistant Professor Ken Karr teaches an Operations Management course at North Hennepin Technical College.

photograph by PATRICK KELLY

8 ENTERPRISE MINNESOTA JUNE 2012

Karr says approximately half of the 100 or so students in the program have just completed their technical degrees. The others are working adults returning to school to advance their education, many with support from their companies. Courses focus on the business side of manufacturing and include accounting, project management, process leadership, technical report writing, cost analysis, and production and inventory management, among others. Students can opt to take courses in person at MSUMoorhead or North Hennepin Technical College, or online, or both.

McGee believes program graduates are uniquely qualified for industry leadership positions because they have both technical and business education.

“They are able to think about the business a little more broadly than someone who just has a technical degree. So, they’re not just technical, and they’re not just management. They’re both of those together,” she says. Companies see the value in program graduates, too. “I have more companies contacting me right now than I have graduates that can fill their need,” McGee says.

Karr agrees, and says the program is beneficial not only for manufacturers seeking qualified new hires, but also for manufacturers that want to build their bench strength as current managers retire, without having to look outside their organizations.

“

Innovations

“I have more companies contacting me right now than I have graduates that can fill their need.”

”

Pam McGee,

program coordinator and an assistant faculty member of Minnesota State University-Moorhead’s Operations Management 2+2 program

“The manufacturing employers get exactly what they’re looking for: people with the skills and the knowledge to take over for mid-level management and above. They get people that have both the technical skills and the management capability so that they can move the business forward in the future. I think it hits a home run everywhere,” he says.

To learn more about Minnesota State University-Moorhead’s Operations Management degree program, visit http://www. mnstate.edu/om/bsinoperationmanagement.aspx.

ENTERPRISE MINNESOTA JUNE 2012 9

INNOVATiONS

Bridging the Mississippi Elk River Machine Company’s signature Hydra-Steer trailers transport sections of the new Hastings Bridge with ease.

If you’ve traveled between Elk River and Hastings in the past few months, you may have

spotted trucks carrying some extraordinary cargo. Fortyfive enormous pre-stressed concrete bridge beams, called girders, are making their way to the Mississippi River, where they’ll form the new Hastings Bridge.

The four-lane bridge on Highway 61 is scheduled to open in 2014 and will replace its two-lane steel trestle predecessor, which was constructed in 1950 and is considered functionally obsolete. Its main span, a 545-foot, free-standing arch, will be the longest in North America.

Manufactured by Cretex in Elk River, the bridge girders are record-breaking length among bridges constructed by the Minnesota Department of Transportation. The largest weighs 212,000 pounds and measures 174 feet long. Paul Gill, senior designer at Elk River Machine Company, a division of Cretex, is the principal man behind their transport.

In his 26 years at Elk River Machine Company, Gill estimates he has helped design approximately 250 HydraSteer trailers for bridge beam transportation, ranging from two to nine axles in size. The custom manufacturing company, which began in 1961 as a small blacksmith shop, started making Hydra-Steer trailers in the 1970s when bridge beams grew longer than 80 feet, exceeding what a typical stretch hauler could handle. The trailers are unique because they are controlled wirelessly and completely independently of the truck, each sporting its

own gas engine and hydraulic power source.

Gill’s latest Hydra-Steer trailer design, an eight-axle model, was developed specifically for the Hastings Bridge project. It features three fixed axles and removable and self-steering front and back axles, as well as multiple drive options for controlling groups of wheels separately or together, giving it enough flexibility to handle the curves and turns on the one-hour journey from the manufacturing facility to the bridge site. Once at the bridge site, a barge carries the truck and trailer into the Mississippi River to meet another barge carrying a pair of cranes, which unload the girder and place it into position on the bridge supports.

Larry Ebert, sales manager, says the drivers transporting the beams are extremely experienced -- “some of the best in the country” -- because they are driving both the truck and the trailer simultaneously.

“We get a lot of excitement out of just watching our equipment at work,” Ebert adds. So, too, does the general public. At last check, YouTube videos featuring the eightaxle trailer have amassed more than 9,200 views.

Gill agrees, and says seeing the trailer in action is rewarding.

“For me, it’s just [about] working on a project and being successful and going down the road. It’s that simple for me,” Gill says.

To learn more about Elk River Machine Company, go to www.ermc.com.

photograph by PATRICK KELLY

photographs courtesy of Elk River Machine Company

Clockwise from top right: Cranes remove a bridge girder from the Hydra-Steer trailer to place it into the bridge supports; each Hydra-Steer trailer is wirelessly operated and runs completely independent of its truck counterpart; Senior Designer Paul Gill stands next to the eight-axle Hydra-Steer trailer of his design.

10 ENTERPRISE MINNESOTA JUNE 2012

Innovations

Innovations Steve Tourek Position: Senior Vice President General Counsel, Marvin Windows and Doors, Inc.

Questions

Role: Oversees responsibility for ethics, internal audit, legal and regulatory compliance, corporate governance, risk management and legal affairs.

What are the different components of the wellness plan at Marvin Windows and Doors?

Our plan took root in 2000 when our leadership observed the ever-increasing cost of health care and resolved to become proactive in positively affecting, if not reversing, the direction of the trend. We collaborated with Blue Cross Blue Shield of North Dakota (BCBSND) in creating a valuebased incentive plan for our employees and their spouses.

To help our employees understand their health risks, we provide on-site biometric medical screenings. They include height, weight (BMI), blood pressure, blood sugar, and lipid/cholesterol measurements, and are performed every two years across the entire organization. We also offer five advanced medical screens (cervical, breast, and colorectal cancer screens, lipid test and glucose test) for employees and spouses based on medically recommended criteria for age and gender. Knowledge fuels the participant’s motivation and resolve to make positive change.

We offer several programs for the treatment of chronic and rare conditions. Our employees also have access to a comprehensive Disease Management program, which focuses on total treatment if someone is diagnosed with a complex or rare condition. In addition, we encourage healthy lifestyles through numerous initiatives like reimbursement for exercise memberships, on-site programs focusing on healthy behaviors, cessation of tobacco use and lifestyle classes. We are currently working with BCBSND to secure an on-site wellness consultant as part of the Marvin team.

What value does the wellness plan bring to Marvin Windows and Doors and its employees?

Our healthcare costs continue to run well below the national averages. There are numerous examples at each location of individuals who discovered life-threatening conditions during a screening exam, which enabled them to receive early treatment. They are either fully recovered or under continued treatment, and are very thankful that

we provided the screenings. Others have changed their lifestyles, resulting in dramatic improvements in their health, and better quality of life for them and their families.

Outcomes like these reinforce our commitment to the wellbeing of our employees and that the Marvin companies care, which contributes to higher employee satisfaction, better employee retention and greater productivity.

What challenges should companies expect when starting a wellness plan or program?

The initial challenge most companies are likely to face is securing the commitment from the senior leadership team. We were extremely fortunate to have immediate and visible support from senior leadership from day one, and we continue to enjoy strong support to this day. That support is critical to the success of any wellness initiative and acceptance by the vast majority of eligible participants. We continually strive to encourage and support those individuals who have yet to fully engage. They all know it makes sense, but the challenge is securing their individual commitment to make a change in a lifestyle, and to stick with that change.

What advice would you give to manufacturers when it comes to building and maintaining a culture of wellness?

Don’t try to implement everything you hear or read about wellness immediately. Start small and build support and momentum. If you try to do too much right out of the chute, you might overwhelm your audience. Focus on little changes which are relatively easy to adopt by employees, and which can add up to big results. Take the first step and make something happen. Do what fits your people and your organizational culture. Finally, don’t be overwhelmed. Start where you are, use what you have, do what you can.

To learn more about Marvin Windows and Doors, visit www.marvin.com.

ENTERPRISE MINNESOTA JUNE 2012 11

photograph by PATRICK KELLY

Q&A

Creating a Winning Workforce in Minnesota

When Steven Rosenstone was installed as Chancellor of Minnesota State Colleges and Universities last August, workforce was the first thing on his mind. “Students, families, businesses and communities across our state are counting on the Minnesota State Colleges and Universities – more than ever – to meet Minnesota’s pressing need for a better-educated workforce,” he said, adding that by 2018, 70 percent of the jobs in Minnesota will require postsecondary education.

In a recent interview, Rosenstone sat down with Enterprise Minnesota President and CEO Bob Kill to discuss the current skills gap, the MnSCU system’s diverse and growing industry and community partnerships, and his unfolding plan to transform the MnSCU system to continually serve the specific and evolving needs of Minnesota businesses.

12 ENTERPRISE MINNESOTA JUNE 2012

Enterprise Minnesota: In your leadership of MnSCU, what are the challenges of running this very large and complex organization, while also maintaining its community connections?

Chancellor Rosenstone: Well, I’m not a command

and control guy. It doesn’t work. Centralizing more decisions in this building and trying to micromanage the innovation and creativity and quality that needs to exist on every single campus is not a path to success.

Instead, all of us must be pointing in the same direction. We have agreement about the direction we’re pointing in, based on the consensus that was built with all the presidents from all the campuses. We need to create the incentives and rewards for people accomplishing what it is we’re saying we’re trying to accomplish, and then let people do their thing. The needs of Northwest Min-

Minnesota State Colleges and Universities Chancellor Steven Rosenstone shares candid insights on closing the skills gap, the importance of partnering with industry, and his plan for making and keeping the MnSCU system relevant to Minnesota businesses.

Part of it is just the whole approach to the complexity and magnitude of the system: 420,000 students under 31 presidents at 54 sites around the state. I can’t micromanage it. I have to have great trust in great leaders and great presidents, incent them to do the right thing, make sure the rewards are aligned with the outcomes we’re trying to produce, focus aggressively on the outcomes, and let them do their job.

EM: Sometimes, it appears that some of the two-year and four-year institutions are competing instead of collaborating. How can you help these schools work together more closely for the benefit of students and local businesses?

Chancellor Rosenstone: Well, I think they are

nesota are not the same needs as in Rochester or in the metro area. The industry mix is different; the employer mix is different; the students are different; the resources and densities are different. And, what it means to meet workforce needs or provide extraordinary education will be fundamentally different. It’s important to hold the presidents accountable for getting there, for sure, but don’t try to run it all.

I think the other part of the puzzle is, how do we work together better as a system? If there is going to be a big difference between what MnSCU was like when I arrived in August and what MnSCU will look like in four or five years, we’ll be playing more as a team than we have ever done. That teamwork comes in how we run all the business side of the operation so that it’s one team and many campuses, as opposed to many campuses and many teams.

working more closely. St. Cloud and Bemidji would be examples where I think we have tremendous collaboration. Of those that graduate with a baccalaureate degree from one of our seven universities, 49 percent of those students have been in more than one institution by the time they graduate. One of the whole founding philosophies of the system was, let us create this seamless pathway between those who start in a two-year institution and those that will finish with a baccalaureate or masters or applied doctorate degree.

I think the real opportunity lies in how we put the pieces together more powerfully. For example, in St. Cloud, the students that are at the university in mechanical engineering have some of their classes at the technical college because of the kind of facilities that are in place at a technical college that don’t exist at the university. If we can take some of the more theoretical work that’s being done with the university and put it together with the applied work being done with the technical colleges, then we can make magic happen, because students are going to have an understanding of both worlds, not just an understanding of one set of knowledge. But that’s still a project in the works. We’re not there yet.

EM: You recently initiated a statewide listening tour. What drove you to do this, and what will you do with the results?

Chancellor Rosenstone: It became very clear to me as I went on my own listening tour over the past year, doing now over 8,000 miles around the state, that a core business—if not the core business—of Minnesota State Colleges and Universities is preparing people for the work that needs to be done in Minnesota.

We look at our responsibility for preparing the work-

ENTERPRISE MINNESOTA JUNE 2012 13

Q&A force of professionals to lead Minnesota going forward.

How are we going to close the skills gap? How are we going to make sure that we’re preparing the workforce with the skills and talents—both fundamental skills and applied skills—that are necessary for a prosperous Minnesota? We could sit back and try to make up the answer to that question and pretend we know our faculty and academic leadership knows the answer to that question, or we could actually ask our partners. So, the starting place for making sure we’re doing it right is to make sure we have a much deeper understanding than I think we currently do of what those needs are. In many places, we do. But I think in other places, we need to deepen those partnerships.

It’s more than looking at the DEED projections of worker supply and demand going forward. We need to have a more nuanced understanding of what the precise skill sets are, where people see their industry going, where people think the demand is going to rise faster than what’s on the radar screen, and where they see certain sectors not growing, perhaps, as fast as others. When we have that kind of nuanced understanding, in addition to the data from DEED, we’re in a position to realign our academic programs, both the number of programs we have, what they’re doing, and the quality of the graduates that they’re turning out in a way that will meet the mandate that we have from the good people of Minnesota.

This is not a one-shot deal. It’s a new way of doing business. These conversations have to both deepen the ongoing relationships and be ongoing conversations because it’s going to be changing faster that any of us can imagine. If we’re not there with a relationship that allows us to have the kind of ongoing understanding of what the changing needs are, we’ll be skating to where the puck was, rather than where it’s going to be.

EM: If you could leave one message about your listening tour for the business community, what would it be?

Chancellor Rosenstone: Tell us what’s on your

mind. By the end of this listening tour, I don’t want any business in Minnesota to say, ‘Well, no one asked me what we need.’ If we can’t get feedback on where the gaps are, then we can’t deliver. The people best equipped to tell us are the people out there in the business industry trying to get the job done.

EM: You were quoted as saying that you don’t lead by anecdote but by a “systematic assessment.” Is the listening tour a part of that systematic assessment?

14 ENTERPRISE MINNESOTA JUNE 2012

“

“A core business—if not the core business—of Minnesota State Colleges and Universities is preparing people for the work that needs to be done in Minnesota.”

”

Chancellor Steven Rosenstone,

Minnesota State Colleges and Universities

Chancellor Rosenstone: All of the results we get out

of this listening tour will be posted in an organized assessment from the business community for each region and each sector. The information will be available to all of our institutions and all other higher education institutions. It will be available to all policymakers and legislators. It’s not just a private MnSCU deal. It’s meant to be a resource for the entire state.

I can’t tell you right now whether it leads to new policy, either by our board or by the state of Minnesota. It will lead to new behavior on our part, and the changes we’ll dig in and start making this coming fall. Legislators are welcome to listen, and we’ll certainly be sharing all of the results in a very public way, so that everybody in Minnesota has an appreciation of what we need to try to accomplish.

EM: What is MnSCU’s role in making high school students aware of the great careers out there for which they do not have to have a fouryear degree?

Chancellor Rosenstone: Eighty-five percent of all

the new jobs being created between today and 2018 will require post-secondary education, with less than half of them requiring a baccalaureate degree, to your point.

We’ve got to make sure that the information that we’re gathering from these assessments gets back into the high schools. Because if we don’t solve the pipeline problem, we could have a great understanding of what the needs are; we could have all of the right programs and the right facilities, and empty classrooms. That’s one of the dilemmas we face right now.

In many places where there is a desperate need for talented workers, it’s not a problem of us not being able to increase the capacity to deliver. It’s a problem of not having bodies to fill those classes. So, one of the things that I’m working on with Commissioner Brenda Cassellius and with Director of Minnesota Office of Higher Education Larry Pogemiller is a different alignment of grades 11, 12, 13 and 14.

There are a couple of pieces there. One is to make sure that we have a better assessment of the academic readi-

ness of students earlier on. Right now, the measure of high school readiness completion and the measure of academic readiness for higher education are not even talking to each other. That’s why we have all this remedial education going on at the college level that really should have occurred earlier on. As you would say in manufacturing, you can either correct the problem after the manufacturing process has been completed, or you can design the process to get it right the first time. So, we’ve got some redesign to do to get it right the first time.

In addition to an academic assessment of college readiness, let’s also do an assessment that alerts students to their skills, passions and interests and then align those skills, passions and interests with the kinds of jobs that are available in Minnesota that are going to be well-paying, life-sustaining jobs. Not everybody should be on the path to a B.A. in philosophy. Minnesota will be in deep trouble if we have everybody getting a B.A. in philosophy. But finding the right path for each student based on a deeper understanding of her passions, interests and skills, as the kind of work that needs to be done in Minnesota, I think, is part of the alignment that we need to create.

The other part of it is that technical education has fallen off the radar screen of high school students as it has been decimated in high schools around the state. The answer is not to go rebuild it. The answer is to build deeper partnerships between our technical colleges and those high schools.

In many cases, our technical colleges are partnering already with the high schools. They’re running summer programs, they’re running weekend programs, and they’re bringing students to campus to get their appetite whet for this kind of work. I think that’s a terrific place where we can be partnering with industry to create a one-week workshop where students are brought into industry to see what the robotics of manufacturing look like, to get them interested in how they can get that kind of job.

EM: Do you think the listening tour will be helpful in creating new programs to create a passion around new careers for working adults, as well as careers for students?

Chancellor Rosenstone: Yes, absolutely. We also

hope that we’re going to learn from our listening tour where the hot, new industries are likely to grow in Minnesota, where the startups are, and where we want to be thinking about as a system. How do we take some risks, along with the risks that businesses are taking, to invest in the kind of training programs necessary for those new industries to take off? Certainly, some of the green industries in Minnesota over the last decade are good examples.

But we also have a huge responsibility through programs like FasTRAC to take displaced workers and get them

ready for the new careers that will be out there. That’s a place where we must work very aggressively in partnership with business.

The other piece of this lies in customized training programs. We have 6,000 partnerships with businesses around the state to provide off and on-site training to about 125,000 employees every year. We need to make sure that we continue to be very responsive to the specific needs that a business has, so that their workers are ready for the new equipment that’s coming online, and we’re there to help do it in a very proactive way.

EM: In business, there is always a balance between immediate versus long-range goals when responding to a challenge. How will you strike that balance in your efforts to improve the MnSCU system?

Chancellor Rosenstone: What I’m hearing from em-

ployers is that it’s not just about the immediate skills to do the job of today. It’s about having these deeper capacities— these more fundamental skills—that will allow workers to grow and retool to take the four or five different jobs and careers they’re likely to have over the course of their lifetime. I think we need to be very sensitive to that deeper set of skills—the ability to think creatively, to work in teams, to understand the complexities of problems, to connect the dots of things that come together, and to be the innovator in the firm, not just the person running the machine in the firm. I think firms are also very interested in that kind of talent. Sometimes it’s called ‘soft skills,’ but I would call it more fundamental skills. Just going to the quick fix of turning out the person that can run today’s machine is not, I think, delivering what I also hear businesses looking for, which is these deeper, more fundamental capacities. That’s a little harder to turn on a dime, but I think it’s a part of what our responsibility is: to turn out people that will be there for the long run, and have the capacities to reinvent themselves as work changes.

If you think about just the changes in the last decade, and then imagine that those changes are going to occur at not just 10-year intervals now, but at two or three-year intervals, and then at one-year intervals, that’s the pace at which people need to have agility. Otherwise, a firm will just be recycling people, as opposed to allowing people to grow, and they won’t be the kind of asset that I think they need to be.

EM: Will you personally attend some of the listening sessions?

Chancellor Rosenstone: Yes. I have two or three on the calendar so far. I plan to be there in the back of the room listening like everyone else.

ENTERPRISE MINNESOTA JUNE 2012 15

Building the next

generation

of Manufacturing Employees

By Kate Peterson

Of all the items on the endless to-do lists of manufacturing owners and executives, creating the future workforce may be the most challenging – and most important.

Though both are still in their thirties, Andrew Freyholtz and Eric Sether could be part of a dying breed of manufacturing employees if certain trends continue. While the two men followed different paths to manufacturing careers, both pursued machining early in their work lives, advanced quickly, and are now critical employees in their companies. Unfortunately, the routes they took are not always available or attractive to the next generation of manufacturing workers.

Sether was drawn to manufacturing after taking shop class in high school; he began working for M&M Precision Machining in Elk River immediately after graduating. M&M’s owners, brothers Matt and Mike James, helped train him on the machines used by the firm to do the wide variety of contract machining that constitutes the core of their business. Sether has been setting up computer numerical control (CNC) machines for several years. Matt James, M&M’s president, describes Sether as one of the company’s top machinists.

Freyholtz took a different approach to manufacturing.

16 ENTERPRISE MINNESOTA JUNE 2012

As he neared the end of high school, he knew he wanted to live in a rural community for the rest of his life, so he studied the employment situation and determined manufacturing was his best bet. For the next two years, he studied machining at Central Lakes College in Staples.

Upon graduation, he took a job with Douglas Machine Inc. in Alexandria.

Douglas designs and manufactures custom packaging equipment, primarily for the food and beverage industry.

Freyholtz began his career there at the bottom of the heap in the company’s machine shop. “I was stamping parts, tapping holes and cleaning steel,” he says. Because he’d gone to school, within a couple of months Freyholtz was working on CNC machines. That was in 2000. Since then, Freyholtz has earned another degree and a diploma, moved to a different department within Douglas, and is now a mechanical designer—creating the plans for the complex packaging equipment customers specify.

In recent years, CNC machines have become the backbone of manufacturing firms and machine shops because

“

once programmed, they are efficient, safe, can run with little oversight and are not prone to mistakes. Experienced CNC set-up experts program specifications into a computer, which in turn tells a machine how to cut, stamp or fabricate a part.

One custom-built Douglas packaging machine has 2,000 parts that are custom designed, explains Chris Haugen, vice president of supply chain for Douglas. The parts are made of a variety of materials, including stainless steel, aluminum and plastic. “Each of these needs to be fabricated, and the majority are made with CNC machines.

These parts are the heartbeat of the machines we manufacture,” Haugen says.

CNC machines play an equally critical role at M&M. Of the company’s 23 employees, all but four work on the machines in different capacities. “There are the high-end people, the set-up people who program the machine, and then the operators who keep the machines running and do the production runs. The operators still need to know how to adjust the controls,” says James.

Because of the need for knowledgeable CNC operators and programmers, Minnesota manufacturers would love a steady source of employees like Sether and Freyholtz.

But finding qualified CNC operators and programmers presents an enormous challenge. Randy Pelletier is the founder and president of Pellco Machine, a contract machine shop in St. Michael that produces industrial parts.

Right now, Pellco has 25 employees, and though he’s not actively seeking additional staff, Pelletier says, “If there were a good CNC machinist available, who knew our machines, I’d hire him in a heartbeat. I wouldn’t pass on him.”

Often companies hire inexperienced high school graduates, hoping to train them to run and set up the machines, as M&M did with Sether. In other cases, companies hire technical college graduates, who, like Freyholtz, typically learn quickly once they’ve started working.

But, the paths Sether and Freyholtz took to careers in manufacturing aren’t as easy to follow as they were as recently as 10 or 15 years ago. Sether was exposed to machining in a high school shop class and encouraged by his shop teacher to apply for a machine shop job. Shop classes and programs at many high schools have been cut in recent years.

Many technical colleges have faced similar cutbacks.

Lower enrollment in past years led some technical colleges to eliminate certain programs, including those in machining and welding, and it is difficult and costly to restore those programs once they’ve been cut. That means potential employees like Freyholtz may have fewer options and end up bypassing manufacturing altogether.

The result is a growing shortage of qualified workers, particularly in areas like machining. The impact on Minnesota companies—and their potential for future growth—could be profound.

Fortunately, the reverse is also true. Because manufacturing is so critical to Minnesota’s economy, if employers

“If kids aren’t introduced to [manufacturing] early on . . . it’s not a career path they’re going to be considering.”

”

Randy Pelletier,

founder and president, Pellco Machine

can develop a steady source of quality employees, the potential for future growth is enormous. Equally encouraging, a number of companies are taking initiatives to increase interest in manufacturing careers and help high schools and technical colleges shape courses to develop the skills needed.

How Did This Happen?

While pundits, politicians and journalists focus on the need for job creation, many Minnesota manufacturers must wonder why, when so many people are out of work, they cannot find qualified workers for the positions they have open. The answer is a yawning gap between the jobs available and the skills needed to do them well.

In addition to the shortage of CNC operators and programmers, welders and those trained in mechatronics—which combines electronics and mechanics—are also in high demand. Kevin Kopischke, president of Alexandria Technical and Community College, says new industry demands as well as changes in the education environment have aggravated, if not caused the worker shortage. “When the manufacturing business fell off, and some operations were shifted overseas, the industry really looked for ways to improve efficiency, and in some cases downsized,” Kopischke says. “As it’s been rebounding, the industry has been more efficient, with more sales per employee. As we start to rebuild the employee base, we need employees with different skills.”

In other words, those employees who were downsized when manufacturing was struggling do not have the skill sets that are needed today. You can’t simply hire those people back, Kopischke says. Unless they went back to school to update their skills, they do not have the background needed in today’s manufacturing climate.

Industry insiders say other factors have also contributed to the shortage. Pelletier says cuts in high school shop classes have taken a toll. “If kids aren’t introduced to it early on, if that seed isn’t planted at an early enough age, it’s not a career path they’re going to be considering,” he says.

One key reason kids need early exposure is the math involved in a manufacturing job. “Math is obviously a huge part of being a machinist. It’s all about numbers, and computers and programming the software,” Pelletier says.

“Maybe if they are good in shop, the shop teachers ENTERPRISE MINNESOTA JUNE 2012 17

explain how important math is going to be to their career, and they stick with math a little more, and work a little harder at it, and get a little better education,” Pelletier explains.

James, of M&M, says shop classes are critical to identifying and cultivating future manufacturing employees. “When I was in high school, there was a large shop class, and once you completed a full year of the one-hour course, the next year you could take a course that was two hours of shop every day,” he says. “A lot of people went into manufacturing with that background.”

Rick Paulsen, president and COO of Douglas Machine, adds that part of the problem is inadequate support for technical colleges. While Alexandria Technical College’s machine tool program is full with a waiting list, other programs around the state have shut their programs and it’s expensive to restart them, he says.

What drove some of those changes was dwindling enrollment, Paulsen says, and that stems from a shift in attitudes. “There was the hype in the media that manufacturing was dead—that it was all going overseas. That’s when a lot of this started happening. That’s when we got away from recommending that for the sharp kids who learn better with their hands, a technical degree was the best fit,” he says.

“Career counselors started discouraging kids from going that way, so they didn’t think about manufacturing.

They were sending some of the best kids in other directions,” Paulsen adds.

Even if sharp high school students show an interest, experts say parents are often an obstacle to the rewarding careers in manufacturing. “To parents, they think working in a machine shop is a dirty job—grungy, dark, smelly and bad pay. It’s 180 degrees different from that—clean, well-lit, and machinists can make a really good living,” Pelletier says.

Even if they are able to hire qualified students out of high school, manufacturers like Pelletier and James face another dilemma. Providing additional training to young

“

“By reaching out to local high schools and technical colleges, manufacturers can help shape programming, and connect with the students they hope to hire someday.”

”

18 ENTERPRISE MINNESOTA JUNE 2012

workers makes them attractive to other companies, and the larger ones can often pay more than they can.

“We can train other CNC set-up guys, and we’re always considering it, but it’s a struggle,” says James.

“We can train somebody, and pay them along the lines of someone who can do CNC set-up and then they have the experience that other companies want, and they get hired away.”

Pelletier faces the same problem. “We can hire somebody who’s young and hasn’t developed any bad work habits, and train them from the bottom up,” he says. “Within a couple of years, they can be setting the machines up. But it doesn’t always work out—sometimes they’ll stay for a short time and then get an offer for a dollar an hour more and leave.”

Closing the Gap

While the dearth of qualified manufacturing workers has reached a critical level in recent years, it isn’t new. Haugen says Douglas has had openings for CNC operators since he joined the company five years ago.

Pelletier recalls running an ad in a local paper a decade or so ago that said, “If you can breathe and walk in the door, we have a job for you.” He had no applicants.

As the economy rebounds, the problem is worsening, and that, combined with the manufacturing industry’s long-term experience with the skilled labor shortage, has led many manufacturers and educational institutions to approach the situation with renewed vigor and innovative strategies.

Paulsen says Douglas Machine implemented a scholarship program last year that provides students full tuition at a community college, plus a part-time, paying job while they are in school. Once students earn a degree, they are obligated to work at Douglas for at least three years.

They are likely to stay even longer; Douglas is employeeowned, which Paulsen says is an extremely effective retention tool. Freyholtz explains that others who started working for the company in 2000, as he did, typically have $50 to $100 thousand in Douglas stock.

Douglas also has a generous tuition reimbursement program, which is how Freyholtz gained the background he needed to move from the machine shop to mechanical design. Pellco and M&M prefer to move employees through the ranks as well, promoting and providing additional training to those who show promise.

The problem for all these companies, though, is a small pool of entry-level employees. That’s why many have started to join together to spread the word about the quality of manufacturing careers. Among manufacturers, a common approach is engaging local high schools and technical colleges. By reaching out to these institutions, they can help shape programming, and connect with the students they hope to hire someday.

The Central Minnesota Manufacturers Association, an alliance of regional manufacturers and institutions that support the industry, coordinates a number of programs

to help build the skilled workforce in future years. Pelletier, a CMMA board member, says his company has adopted a school through “Project Lead the Way,” a provider of science, technology, engineering and mathematics curriculum to middle and high schools across the U.S. “We bring in the shop kids and tour them around, show them the software, show them how the CAD system works. They can really see how the full process works and get a good perspective on what a machine shop job would be like,” Pelletier says.

“We’ve launched a team of area manufacturers in the last six months,” says Haugen of Alexandria area manufacturers. “We’re coming up with a collaborative plan to engage high school students,” he says.

One result of the group’s efforts: the new high school in Alexandria will feature a prominently placed shop class area when the building opens in the fall of 2014. The principal of Alexandria’s Jefferson High School, Chad Duwenhoegger, explains, “We call it storefront property.

In the middle of the building, there will be a commons area, and right off that area will be what we are calling the design-build area – what is traditionally called shop class.

It’s right across from the performing arts theater, visible through huge windows.”

The shop class’s elevated status in Alexandria isn’t as much a response to increased student demand as it is a hope for more student focus. “We want kids to become more aware of all the career opportunities they have,” Duwenhoegger says.

Community input drove much of the building’s design, with the local manufacturing community deeply involved.

“We’ve had community input in all areas, but this has been extensive input. We have an advisory committee with local manufacturers and representatives from Alexandria Technical and Community College,” Duwenhoegger says.

In addition, the manufacturing community is involved with programming. “Part of the advisory team is looking at equipment and helping develop curriculum,” Duwenhoegger says. They are taking time to restructure and change current courses that can be offered to help prepare students for careers, he adds. The group is also looking at how to attract more females to the program, and how to build math and science into the industrial arts curriculum and still meet standards. “It’s a great partnership,” Duwenhoegger says.

Industry input has also been a critical part of Alexandria Technical and Community College’s success in developing programs that attract and prepare students for manufacturing careers, evidenced by high demand for the college’s graduates. “The job market for graduates has never been better,” Kopischke says. Students in mechatronics, for example, are getting a minimum of three, but up to six or seven job offers. Some are earning $40 to $45 thousand per year right after graduation, he says.

That kind of placement success makes the college very attractive to students, driving demand beyond what some

Help Wanted?

Think Non-traditional

Manufacturers in search of skilled employees might want to consider the pool of talent available among mid-career changers, particularly those outside manufacturing. Employees who haven’t worked in manufacturing before bring other skills to the workplace, and can advance rapidly from entry-level positions.

Consider Mitch Brandsted, for example. Four and a half years ago, Brandsted took what he describes as “a leap of faith” when he left his position as the manager and operator of the McDonald’s restaurant in Alexandria because he felt he’d progressed as far as he could.

Brandsted was familiar with Alexandria-based Douglas Machine, Inc., which designs and manufactures custom packaging equipment for the food and beverage industry, because of acquaintances who worked there. He interviewed for a position and toured the company’s facilities. “I was willing to take a step back to come to Douglas, and I was willing to do it because of the potential for growth. The opportunity here is so vast,” says Brandsted, who was 35 at the time.

While Brandsted had no educational background in manufacturing, he had some electrical and mechanical experience because of the maintenance issues he dealt with at McDonald’s. “I was very interested in the electrical area,” he says. “I began work as an electrical assembler at the lowest level you can be.”

At the same time, says Rick Paulsen, Douglas’s president and COO, Brandsted brought other critical skills to the company.

“McDonald’s provides excellent supervisory training and some financial business literacy training that were both beneficial to Mitch,” Paulsen says.

In the first year, Brandsted “tapped holes, ran cable and worked on schematics,” he says. He progressed quickly and was soon travelling with the machines—going with teams of Douglas employees to install and commission new machines for customers. “When we get really busy, they sometimes pull people from assembly to help out, so I went on quite a few trips,” he says.

After two and a half years in electrical assembly, Brandsted applied for a supervisor position, which he was given; he currently has 22 employees on his shift. Douglas’s investment in Brandsted’s on-the-job training is likely to pay off for many more years. “I see myself staying in this field for the rest of my career. It’s so exciting to work around this kind of stuff, and to be around such incredibly smart people,” he says.

ENTERPRISE MINNESOTA JUNE 2012 19

programs can handle. Kopischke says the school has the capacity for 24-36 students in the machine tool training program, depending on the machines needed for the specific classes. Now the program is full, and the college is turning students away or wait-listing them.

Kopischke credits ongoing input from local manufacturing firms, combined with a faculty that is dedicated to staying abreast of industry changes and needs, with the college’s success. “This college is built on the principle that we are committed to communicating better with the business community than any other college in the country,” he says.

At the same time, the college works with local industry to attract the next generation of employees. “One of our initiatives is called ‘Careers in Demand’ and what we did

20 ENTERPRISE MINNESOTA JUNE 2012

was open the doors of regional manufacturers so young people and their parents could learn about careers and then move through the plant to get an idea of what clean manufacturing is like,” Kopischke says.

Freyholtz thinks a dose of realism might help students recognize the value of a manufacturing career as well. “I teach a ninth grade religion class and I’m a volunteer firefighter, so I have a lot of interaction with young people,” he says. “You’d be amazed at how many of these kids want to live in a rural community, but their plan is to somehow work with professional sports teams.”

Citing the tendency to push all kids to get four-year degrees and do what they are passionate about, Freyholtz says, “In the ideal world, I would be a professional deer hunter—that’s my dream job. But there’s not much of a

“

market for professional deer hunters.”

Instead of trying to find a job they are passionate about, young people should think about where they want to live, and the job market in those areas, Freyholtz says. “If you have a hundred thousand dollars in debt and a degree in sports management, you’re probably not going to be able to live in a rural area,” he says. “I have a great career and an interesting job. My wife and I have four kids, and she is a stay-at-home mom. We have 80 acres. I love my job, but it’s not my passion. My passions are my faith and family.

You have to look at the whole picture.”

Opportunities Ahead

The success of efforts to attract and train future manufacturing employees is critical – not just for the companies who hire them, but for all of Minnesota. Manufacturing remains the cornerstone of the state’s economy, responsible for 13 percent of all jobs – nearly 300,000—according to state data published in 2010.

Manufacturing’s multiplier effect is significant, with each job supporting 1.9 jobs elsewhere in the economy.

A report recently issued by the Brookings Institution shows that while manufacturing represents 11 percent of the U.S. GDP, the sector is responsible for 68 percent of spending on research and development.

The industry is also characterized by above-average wages and benefits. The average wage in manufacturing in Minnesota is $56,315, which makes it 20 percent higher than the average wage for all industries. Wages paid to manufacturing employees accounted for 16 percent of all wages paid in the state.

For some of the state’s medium and small-sized cities, manufacturing constitutes an even bigger portion of jobs. Paulsen, of Douglas Machine, says Alexandria is considered the “Silicon Valley” of the packaging equipment manufacturing industry. More than 1,000 people in Douglas County work for packaging equipment manufacturers, he says. That’s 17 percent of the county’s workforce—just in packaging equipment, not including other manufacturing jobs.

While the lack of skilled workers hasn’t impacted growth at Douglas Machine yet, Haugen says, “We have some pretty aggressive growth plans over the next five years that could be affected by the shortage of CNC machinists.”

In the meantime, the shortage does impact the company’s profitability. “We have had to outsource—we can only handle about half of the machining we do, so obviously that’s an issue that adds to cost and time,” says Haugen. “We would love to have another 30-40 machinists, especially for the off-shifts – afternoon and night shifts. CNC equipment is expensive, and we want to run it as much as possible.”

Douglas isn’t alone; manufacturers across the state have consistently expressed concerns about the skills gap. The 2011 Minnesota Skills Gap Survey, conducted by the state’s Department of Employment and Economic Devel-

“We opened the doors of regional manufacturers so young people and their parents could learn about careers and ... get an idea of what clean manufacturing is like.”

”

Kevin Kopischke,

president of Alexandria Technical and Community College, on the college’s Careers in Demand initiative

opment (DEED) to assess issues facing manufacturers, revealed that almost half of respondents had unfilled positions due to lack of qualified applicants. The workforce shortage was most severe in skilled production, where 58 percent had some degree of shortage. Enterprise Minnesota’s most recent State of Manufacturing® survey confirms these sentiments, with the number of executives expressing concern about the skills gap doubling between the 2011 and 2012 surveys.

But the skilled labor shortage isn’t just an issue for the moment. Participants in the DEED survey indicated that while the skills shortage has improved slightly since 2007, they expect it to intensify in coming years.

In addition, many experts are predicting a surge in manufacturing in coming years because of sweeping changes in the industry. Advances in critical processes such as 3D printing and innovative materials could fuel what the Economist recently dubbed “The Third Industrial Revolution.”

At the same time, as wages continue to rise in countries like China, and shipping costs reduce profitability, many manufacturers are bringing jobs back to the U.S., where many of the high-end manufactured products are ultimately sold. To compete for these so-called boomerang plants, economic regions will need to show they have a deep pool of qualified employees.

On the upside, the basic infrastructure is in place to build the workforce to the level needed. Clearly, employees like Sether and Freyholtz gained the educational foundation they needed before they joined the manufacturing industry. If they hadn’t, they wouldn’t have progressed in their careers as rapidly as they have.

In other words, the traditional avenues to careers in manufacturing—high school shop class plus on-the-job training and well-designed technical college programs— provide an ideal foundation for a manufacturing career.

There’s no need to reinvent the wheel when it comes to creating a steady flow of work-ready manufacturing employees. Instead, these avenues just need to be reopened and filled with the sharp kids who once followed them to rewarding careers.

ENTERPRISE MINNESOTA JUNE 2012 21

photograph by PATRICK KELLY

Al Olson and Janice Tobin of Medtronic Brooklyn Park’s Environmental, Health & Safety department hold the Medtronic Sustainability Award the site received in 2011 for multiple projects ranging from lighter, recyclable delivery pallets (center) to baling and recycling polyethylene packaging (bottom).

Leaner and Greener 22 ENTERPRISE MINNESOTA JUNE 2012

Instilling green and lean as cultural cornerstones helps manufacturers realize significant savings, attract top talent and keep one step ahead of the competition.

By Andrea Lahouze Ryan Bruers likes to say that he may be the only

person on Earth compensated to discourage sales of his company’s own product. As field sales engineer at Xcel Energy, Bruers sells electricity. But he also sells conservation.

“The greenest energy we produce is the energy we don’t have to produce,” Bruers says. “If we can get our customer using less energy, that’s fewer plants we have to run, that’s fewer turbines we have to build and put online.

It benefits us all.” In more ways than one.

Bruers is among a growing cohort of manufacturers who appreciate the correlation between green practices and the more traditional procedures of lean enterprise.

Rooted in the famed Toyota Production System, lean practices have long been valued by manufacturers for cost savings and efficiency. “Green” manufacturing practices have popped up in business plans along the way, but usually for reasons based in altruism. Most companies continue to view green and lean projects as separate endeavors.

Brian Kopas, director of supply chain management at food service furnishings manufacturer Foldcraft Company, disagrees. Thirteen years into a lean journey that has dropped lead-times by 66 percent, reduced floor space requirements by 65,000 square feet, increased productivity by 240 percent, and increased the company’s on-time percentage from 95.2 percent to 99.5 percent, Kopas believes green is an inseparable part of lean.

“My favorite definition of lean is, ‘doing things in the least waste way,’” Kopas says. “The more I think about lean and green, the more I realize that it’s impossible to do one without the other. They go together.”

Like Foldcraft, the green experience of global medical device manufacturer Medtronic provides evidence that pairing the two concepts together leads to even greater lean success. In the past two years alone, Medtronic reports that its pairing of green and lean efforts has reduced millions of pounds of waste and saved more than $16 million.

At a recent Enterprise Minnesota business event, speakers from both companies presented snapshots of their green and lean journeys, and, along with Xcel’s Bruers, offered tips for instilling a lasting, results-oriented lean and green culture. Their achievements and insights serve as proof that whether your company is large or small, established or entrepreneurial, you can kick-start, build upon and sustain a culture of lean and green that benefits your employees, your supply chain and your bottom line.

Green-lighting Green and Lean

If you’ve ever stepped inside a Subway, Dairy Queen or Panera Bread Company, you’ve caught a glimpse of Foldcraft’s products. Under the name Plymold, the 215-employee business manufactures upholstered booths, tables, chairs, metalworking, queuing line railings and more for restaurant chains across the world. Its lean journey began in 1998 after Kopas read an Industry Week magazine article that described how Iowa-based window and door manufacturer Pella Corp. reduced waste through a series of more than 1,000 Kaizen events in one year. Intrigued but skeptical, Kopas arranged for a small group of employees, including the company CEO, to travel to Pella to see their lean efforts in action.

“We were blown away by what they had accomplished.

A lot of it resonated because half of our business is woodworking and half of our business is metalworking, so we saw the same kinds of processes being done vastly better by them than by us,” Kopas explains.

Foldcraft immediately began reworking the production process for making one of its best-selling items, contour seats, all in five days. In doing so, the company produced 25 percent more product in the same amount of time. It also decreased its floor space by 50 percent, and removed 66 percent of the work in process, as seats moved through production without as much lag time between process steps. Its success inspired a multitude of lean production projects, which improved efficiency so much that the company could soon make most products in a matter of hours—faster than it could quote and enter the orders into its system. Foldcraft has since instilled lean in every area of its facility, including the front office.

Foldcraft’s focus on efficiency yields green benefits as well. Recent acquisitions of two companies in Brooklyn Center and Eden Prairie were followed by a series of Kaizen events that reorganized existing space and brought both companies together under one roof. In doing so, Foldcraft eliminated the need to rent, light and heat at least 35,000 square feet of space, saving $634,000 in utilities and even more in avoided truck traffic between multiple sites.

In embarking on a green and lean journey, Kopas stresses that active leadership involvement, like the company CEO’s willingness to learn from Pella, is essential, but adds that leaders should be attentive to the pace of change.

If you move too fast, “lean very quickly equals mean,” Kopas says. “People will hate it … and folks will start ENTERPRISE MINNESOTA JUNE 2012 23

photograph by PATRICK KELLY

Brian Kopas, director of supply chain management at Foldcraft Company, with a handful of the company’s wood waste, which helps heat its facility in winter months to save the company an annual $100,000.

to work against what you’re trying to accomplish. You only move as fast as what you’re able to sustain. It’s really critical that you help people work through this process so that you’re doing this stuff with them and for them, not to them.”

Kopas recommends empowering employees to make improvements. “The folks that are driving your organization forward have to know that they don’t have to look over their shoulder for permission to do things that make sense,” he explains.

Medtronic’s lean and green culture stemmed from both internal and external forces. “It was driven from the employees asking for it, it was driven from our customer base and shareholders … and, most importantly, it linked in with our mission … to ensure that we are good citizens to a wide variety of stakeholders,” says Janice Tobin, senior operations manager in Medtronic’s Environmental, Health & Safety department.

With more than 38,000 employees and annual sales topping $15 billion, those requests inspired Medtronic to prepare a companywide sustainability policy in 2006.

It also became part of the FTSE4Good Index, a series of socially responsible stock market indices, and the Dow 24 ENTERPRISE MINNESOTA JUNE 2012

Jones Sustainability Index (DJSI), which evaluates the largest 2,500 companies in the Dow Jones Index on a set of global sustainability benchmarks. Membership in the DJSI was a major step, Tobin says, because it gives the general public a detailed look at Medtronic’s sustainability goals and its progress towards them. It also requires Medtronic to demonstrate continual improvement on an annual basis.

Employees at Medtronic’s Brooklyn Park site launched a sustainability council that dove headfirst into to reducing waste, discovering opportunities for reusing and recycling by literally jumping into its garbage containers to see what it was throwing away. The company has continued to pursue waste reduction in a variety of areas, including water and electricity conservation, and recycling of plastic, cardboard, metal, light bulbs and batteries.

Today, 52 percent of the industrial waste created at the Brooklyn Park facility is reused or recycled, up from 27 percent six years ago.

Tobin advises businesses just beginning their green and lean journeys to form a volunteer group to achieve a few smaller improvements before tackling larger issues. The “quick-hit” successes, she says, will generate excitement

Going GreenLean™

Launched by Enterprise Minnesota last year, GreenLean™ is a training program designed to help companies foster a culture of continuous improvement and growth by eliminating time and energy wastes.

Enterprise Minnesota Business Growth Advisor Samuel Gould maintains that employing traditional lean improvement tools to establish greener business practices can maximize the bottom-line benefit.

“The potential savings are huge for every company when you tie lean and green initiatives together. It’s hard to separate the two. If I am able to stop a ton of metals being poured because I fixed a process issue, then I saved a lot of energy, and that’s green. There are also savings there, so they’re tied together,” he says.

With guidance from Enterprise Minnesota consultants, companies participate in a detailed Value Stream Mapping session to create a blueprint of current processes. The visual allows companies to pinpoint opportunities for GreenLean™ improvements. Companies then prioritize those opportunities, and organize a series of Kaizen events to turn them into realities.

To learn more about the GreenLean™ program, go to http://www.enterpriseminnesota.org/operationalexcellence/greenlean.html.

and build momentum among the employee base. Allowing an employee group to drive improvements can also set the stage for buy-in across the business, because employees can take ownership of making improvements and inspire others in the company to do the same.

“Employees know where their wastes are,” Bruers adds.

“A lot of times, it’s just [a matter of] … listening to them and helping them solve those problems.”

Cultivating the Culture

Kopas advises that sustaining a green and lean culture requires a shift not only in actions but also in thinking.

“It’s culturally about trying to get folks to think about everything they do as an experiment,” Kopas explains.

“Making a table is an experiment with our process and if I get a bad table, or if it takes too long, the experiment didn’t go the way I wanted it to. That’s neither good nor bad. But how can I increase the odds for my experiment to succeed the next time I do it?”

Foldcraft’s management team promotes a mindset of continuous improvement by visiting one business area each day. They ask key employees to assess their production progress and report on the improvements they are

making if they are not meeting or exceeding their quotas.

Medtronic’s Process Improvement Teams employ a similar system for reviewing performance metrics.

Medtronic reinforces the urgency of lean improvements by writing sustainability goals into the objectives of its management team. Tobin says doing so has been key in sustaining Medtronic’s lean and green commitment because it has extended accountability to the entire Brooklyn Park organization.

“Because we do have a separate Environmental, Health & Safety department, sometimes it was viewed as, ‘oh, they’re doing that.’ But you can’t get the full benefit unless you’re all part of the team,” Tobin says.

Xcel’s Bruers agrees that including green and lean objectives in job descriptions drives ongoing improvements.

“Then if the players change, the policies are in place to maintain that momentum,” he says.

Recognition plays a role, too.

“As much as possible, let the employee be the instigator, the implementer, and the one that can claim the credit, and then publicize that,” says Al Olson of the Environmental, Health & Safety department in Medtronic’s Structural Heart business unit.

ENTERPRISE MINNESOTA JUNE 2012 25

To that end, Medtronic hosts a global competition among its 270 sites that rewards innovative improvements with proven bottom-line benefits. Brooklyn Park won the award last year for a collection of projects ranging from recycling more plastics and water within its own plant, to using more environmentally-friendly delivery pallets and working with some suppliers to develop a continuous reuse cycle for packaging materials.

Maintaining momentum has been a team effort not only among its employees, but also among members of its supply chain.

Medtronic Brooklyn Park has worked with suppliers to reduce the amount of packaging on orders, in turn

reducing the weight and transportation cost of each delivery, as well as the space needed to warehouse orders until they are used. It has also partnered with suppliers to switch from wood to corrugated pallets for raw material order shipments. The corrugated pallets are 100 percent recyclable and weigh 65 to 75 percent less than their wood predecessors. The change has reduced wood waste by 97,825 pounds each year, and has contributed to lower shipment costs and saved floor space.

At Foldcraft, Kopas appreciates suppliers’ honesty when they see inefficiencies in Foldcraft’s processes—even when it’s something that may seem obvious. He tells suppliers to have no fear suggesting ways that Foldcraft can improve.

Xcel Energy Field Sales Engineer Ryan Bruers shows that small changes, like using high-efficiency light bulbs, can add up to big energy savings.

photograph by PATRICK KELLY

26 ENTERPRISE MINNESOTA JUNE 2012

“The things that you are afraid to tell us are the things that I want you to tell us because that’s where the good stuff is,” he tells suppliers.

The resulting candor has helped Foldcraft reduce freight damage by working with its carrier to understand the delivery process. Instead of adding more packaging, Foldcraft now loads orders onto its carriers’ trucks according to their final destinations, minimizing the number of times they have to be handled. A similar project has reduced freight damage on Foldcraft’s trash receptacles, which are now packaged in clear stretch wrap so that the carriers can see what’s inside and be more cautious.

“We had to invest in a $13,000 stretch wrapper, but we save $45,000 each year. It was a huge improvement for us,” Kopas says.

More Benefits

There’s no question that there is a substantial business case to be made combining lean with green. Bruers of Xcel Energy reports that the average manufacturer could use green practices to save about a third of its energy bill each year. By simply cutting the running time of a dust collector in half, Foldcraft Company has saved $25,000 in electricity over the course of a year. The company also invested in technology to remove the nails and other contamination out of its wood waste so that it can be burned

safely to heat its facility during the winter months, saving more than $100,000 per year on the cost of natural gas.

At its Brooklyn Park facility alone, Medtronic has saved 1.5 million gallons of water, reduced wood and packaging by 200,000 pounds, and has sustained an annual savings of $215,000 through its green and lean efforts.

Though it’s harder to quantify, Tobin believes a commitment to sustainability is also helpful in attracting both new customers and the next generation of top talent.

“Our customers and our potential high-caliber employees are asking us, ‘what are you doing for lean and green? Show us.’ That [demand] is giving us a competitive edge,” Tobin says.

Enterprise Minnesota Business Growth Advisor Sam Gould says employees benefit, too, because improved efficiencies help them work smarter, not harder. “I boil it down into a simple statement: GreenLean™ will give you more energy at the end of the day to take home to your families,” he says.

For Medtronic and Foldcraft, the journey is continuous. “The more you learn, the more you realize how much opportunity there is for you to work on things,” Kopas says. “Everybody, everything, every day. What waste can we find today and make it go away? That’s what it’s all about.”

ENTERPRISE MINNESOTA JUNE 2012 27

Absolute

Transformation Congressman Keith Ellison (center) studies Absolute Quality’s wire products with (from left) Jeff Zoubek, executive vice president and production manager, and Duane Petersen, president and general manager.

28 ENTERPRISE MINNESOTA JUNE 2012

One year into Enterprise Minnesota’s Pathways to Business Growth training program, Absolute Quality is primed for growth with a new and expanded plant layout, UL certification and a recharged marketing plan.

photograph by PATRICK KELLY

In April, Congressman Keith Ellison was wide-eyed as he toured the Absolute Quality facility in Minneapolis, stopping to ask operators about the inner workings of machinery along the way. “I was struck by the efficiencies and innovations that were introduced,” he said in an interview following the tour.

Ellison has good reason to be impressed. For the past year, the custom wire harness, cable assembly and panel build manufacturer has undergone a complete transformation, from its layout to its certifications and marketing strategy.

Absolute Quality builds to the custom specifications of a multitude of customers across the nation, ranging from communications and electronic displays to agricultural, industrial, marine and utility. Its wires are behind the high-definition displays at Target Field, freeway amber alert signs and electronic billboards across the country. The company is an extension of Stark Electronics, which got its start in 1938 as a radio parts distribution business before making a series of transitions, from radios to television sets to battery packs and cable harnesses. Today, the two companies share a building and some overlapping employees, with Stark Electronics operating as the electronics distribution side of the business and Absolute Quality operating as the manufacturing side.

Last year, Absolute Quality was one of 10 companies selected to participate in Enterprise Minnesota’s Pathways to Business Growth program. The program is funded by a grant from National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) Manufacturing Extension Partnership (MEP) and deploys an array of training solutions to kick-start innovation and sustainable growth.

Absolute Quality first worked with Enterprise Minnesota to complete a companywide Value Stream Mapping (VSM) project, which helps pinpoint inefficiencies by mapping processes throughout the business.

VSM was an integral part of Absolute Quality’s recent expansion into a 15,000-square-foot section of its building which had previously been rented to a longtime tenant. Enterprise Minnesota Business Growth Advisor Mike Braml and Absolute Quality’s operations manager worked together to solicit layout ideas from employees in each department, then developed a layout to maximize the value of the new space.

Throughout the production floor, VSM has resulted in layout changes large and small, from point-of-use equipment storage and extra printers, copiers and email terminals, to a centralized receiving department and a new computerized system for tracking customer orders and production efficiency. President and General Manager Duane Petersen says the ENTERPRISE MINNESOTA JUNE 2012 29

“

“Everything that we discussed early on with Enterprise Minnesota regarding the goals that we wanted to reach has happened. It’s really nice to see it all come together.

Now we’ve got to go out and get the customers.

It’s a great feeling.”

”

JEFF ZOUBEK

executive vice president and production manager, Absolute Quality

30 ENTERPRISE MINNESOTA JUNE 2012

new layout requires employees to take 80 percent fewer steps, and has helped the company to avoid passing on recent cost increases to its customers.

Absolute Quality’s customer-oriented focus also extends to a new UL certification for wire re-spooling. Though UL listings are expensive, requiring fees, quarterly audits and the addition of an on-staff electrical engineer, Executive Vice President and Production Manager Jeff Zoubek says the benefits far outweigh the cost.

“Customers feel secure with the UL listing because they know you’re going through the right steps to manufacture that product to the level [of quality] that they need,” Zoubek explains.

To build upon its existing customer base, Absolute Quality’s next Pathways project was participation in Proactive Marketing training. Developed by Enterprise Minnesota last year, the three-month program helps companies to define and identify their ideal target markets, their competition, and how they can differentiate themselves from that competition to provide the greatest value to their customers. For Absolute Quality, the training has resulted in a brand-new website and a decision to pursue new customers and markets by bringing in four outside sales representatives from an independent organization—a move that proved more cost-effective than bringing one salesperson on board.

“

Zoubek says the main challenge in instituting so many changes over the past year has been making the necessary time.

“To be able to change your company in the right direction and maintain your day-to-day operations without losing your mind is a lot. It’s like having two or more fulltime jobs,” he admits.

Petersen says a piece of advice from Enterprise Minnesota’s business advisers has guided their success: “[They told us to] ‘Delegate, delegate, delegate, and then delegate,’” he says with a laugh. “And that’s what we did. We were involved in every piece of it, but we would delegate and then have employees come back and report to us.”

More task delegation has allowed some Absolute Quality employees to rise through the ranks, as extra responsibilities allowed their talents to shine. In one case, a former inside salesperson has been promoted to operations manager. Petersen says hiring from within the existing workforce is ideal because employees are already familiar with the business and staff. It also shows a long-term commitment to employees.

“That’s one of the things that we’ve learned from Pathways: to look around within [your business] and talk to your people and see what they strive to do,” Petersen says.

Despite the challenges, Zoubek and Petersen are pleased with their Pathways successes to date, and are

“One of the things that we’ve learned from Pathways is to look around within [your business] and talk to your people and see what they strive to do.”

”

Duane Petersen,

president and general manager, Absolute Quality already looking forward to their next project: ISO certification.

“Everything that we discussed early on with Enterprise Minnesota regarding the goals that we wanted to reach has happened,” Zoubek says. “It’s really nice to see it all come together. Now we’ve got to go out and get the customers. It’s a great feeling.”

For more information about Absolute Quality Manufacturing Inc., visit www.absoluteq.com.

ENTERPRISE MINNESOTA JUNE 2012 31

final word

Market Smart

A focused, strategic marketing plan is essential for business growth and profitability.

By Deb Bly Many manufacturing executives I’ve worked with have told me that their company doesn’t “do” any marketing. You may

To learn more about Deb Bly, visit http://www.enterpriseminnesota.org/ about-us/enterprise-minnesota-team/debra-bly.html.

32 ENTERPRISE MINNESOTA JUNE 2012

photograph by patrick kelly

think the same about your own company. But if you make and sell a product, you are doing marketing. The key to growth is to do it in the most effective way.

Companies have a tendency to focus inward when they develop marketing plans, considering only the attributes of the products they sell.

Proactive Marketing is a service Enterprise Minnesota has developed to help manufacturing companies to look outward and use a strategic approach to grow their business. It helps you to define your ideal target market, your competition, and how you can differentiate yourself from that competition to provide the greatest value to your customers.

Much of the program’s value lies in its group format, which gathers representatives from six to seven different companies for four halfday sessions over three months. Similar to Enterprise Peer Councils (http://www.enterpriseminnesota.org/business-growth/ceo-peercouncils.html), company representatives learn from each other by sharing their experiences and challenges with the group. In between each group session, Enterprise Minnesota travels to each individual business to coach them on applying what they learned. In the fourth session, representatives from each company come forward and present a marketing plan around a specific opportunity that they would like to pursue in their business.

The 20 companies that have completed the program within the past year now have a clear vision of what is important to their customers.

They understand that while growth can come from new markets or new customers, it can also come from winning more business with existing customers. They focus on delivering value, and they do it by looking at their business from the customer’s point of view.

In today’s global marketplace, where your customers and your competition can be down the street or across the ocean, strategic marketing is crucial for sustainable, profitable growth. If you’re unsure whether Proactive Marketing would be a good fit for your business, ask yourself the following: do you know where your growth is going to come from and how you are going to get there? Are you maintaining your profitability? Do you know who your competition is? Do your customers understand and appreciate why and how you are a better choice than your competition? If the answer to any of these questions is no, you may find that Proactive Marketing works to your advantage.

Deb Bly, business growth advisor, Enterprise Minnesota

Enterprise Minnesota Business Growth Advisor Deb Bly works with medium size and small manufacturing companies throughout the state to identify and implement marketing strategies to grow business.

Deb has a background in strategic marketing, product marketing, branding, pricing and channel management. She has more than 20 years of experience in identifying new opportunities to grow revenue through new products and markets with in-depth analysis and interpretation of market segments.

Prior to joining Enterprise Minnesota, Deb served as senior marketing manager, new business corporate, for Bloomington-based The Toro Company, where she also served as director of marketing, commercial products.

Previously, she worked for Fridley-based Cummins Power Generation as director/ general manager of the mobile business group and as director of marketing for the consumer products division.

Deb holds a bachelor’s degree in both business and public administration and a Master’s of Business Administration with an emphasis in marketing and management from the Carlson School of Management at the University of Minnesota.