The Manufacturers’ Guide to 

Finding and Retaining Talent 
Table of Contents

Introduction 

Build Your Workplace Strategy With a Systems Thinking Approach

It’s Time to Approach Attraction and Recruitment Differently

Training and Development Will Improve Retention and 

Business Value

How to Become an Employer of Choice 

Your Local MEP Center Can Help You Find and Retain Talent

01

02

06

11

16

21

Thank you to the experts across the MEP National Network whose work inspired this document.
THE MANUFACTURERS’ GUIDE TO FINDING AND RETAINING TALENT | 1

As part of the annual NIST MEP survey, we ask clients from the 51 MEP Centers to identify the top three challenges 

their companies will face over the next three years. We use a predetermined list of challenges, which allows us to 

track responses over time. We’ve asked this question for over a decade and thousands of clients have taken the 

time to give us their thoughts. 

Not surprisingly, manufacturers continue to report that employee recruitment and retention are their greatest 

challenges. In fact, these concerns have heightened during the COVID-19 pandemic and subsequent workforce 

disruptions. The market forces driving these challenges are not likely to improve soon. Based on a Manufacturing 

Institute and Deloitte study, the National Association of Manufacturers estimates that manufacturers will need to 

fill 4.6 million jobs by 2028. 

In this guide, we outline steps that will help you improve and enhance your employee recruitment, retention and 

engagement. We’ll look at: 

z Strategy

z Attracting and retaining talent

z Training and development 

z Workplace culture

Manufacturers are experiencing incredible workforce disruptions – 

some unthinkable just a couple years ago. 

Some manufacturers have seen a brand new employee fail to return from their first meal break on their very first 

day on the job. If this happens, you have to ask yourself how your hiring process resulted in someone who was such 

a poor fit. Besides figuring out what went wrong when someone leaves unexpectedly, it’s important to consider the 

other side of the equation – what about your firm makes people stay.

This guide will show you how to become an employer of choice that lives up to the adage that your people are 

your most important asset.

Introduction 

 

Manufacturers will need to fill 

4.6 million jobs by 2028. 
2 | THE MANUFACTURERS’ GUIDE TO FINDING AND RETAINING TALENT 

Build Your Workplace Strategy With a 

Systems Thinking Approach

Your shop had to become more adaptive and responsive in operations during the pandemic. 

Take a similar approach to hiring and developing your people. The principles that apply to lean 

manufacturing and continuous improvement in production processes also apply to recruiting, 

managing and assessing your employees’ performance. 

What Is Systems Thinking?

Systems thinking focuses on how different parts interrelate and how systems interact through various connections 

and feedback. Systems thinking helps you see connections holistically through:

z Feedback loops

z Direct and indirect relationships

z Interactions and influences

z Systems within systems

Barry Richmond, a leader in systems thinking and system dynamics, emphasized that people embracing systems 

thinking will position themselves so they can see both the forest and the trees – and keep an eye on each.

What does this look like? Let’s consider a common example: when a manufacturer experiences a higher attrition 

rate in one department than others. You might naturally assign blame to the hiring process or failure of the talent 

pipeline. You might look at what’s different about the front-line oversight or working conditions. But there could be 

many other factors that influence the negative outcomes, such as:

z Inadequate feedback loops. Is clarity lacking between what the training programs are capable of and 

what the recruiting efforts should be looking for? 

z Informal onboarding process. Are too many shortcuts taken, missing opportunities to engage new 

employees early in their career journeys?

z Vague goals during interviews. Is the definition of what makes a good employee vague, leading to the 

interview process failing to identify good matches?

z Bland job postings. Are job postings not compelling enough to attract the raw talents that the training 

program can transform?
THE MANUFACTURERS’ GUIDE TO FINDING AND RETAINING TALENT | 3

A Systems Thinking Approach Must Be Holistic

The reality is that people working within systems frequently miss the signals these systems rely upon. They may not 

be as apparent as one machine’s impact in a production line. Look at how people and systems communicate with 

each other. What signals does training send to recruiting – and vice versa? 

More questions to consider:

z Is there a systematic approach to filling a staff position?

z Does the training program establish a common understanding for what kinds of mindsets and skill sets 

make for a good match?

z Does the onboarding process, which really begins during recruiting, leverage the training program to 

ensure that new hires are actively engaged from the start?

z What data is collected and reviewed from recruiting and onboarding?

Address Long-Term Issues to Solve Short-Term Challenges

Systems thinking and culture change are long-term commitments. Systems thinking helps you grapple with both 

operational and strategic challenges. Here are some persistent challenges facing many small and medium-sized 

manufacturers: 

OPERATIONAL CHALLENGES STRATEGIC CHALLENGES
4 | THE MANUFACTURERS’ GUIDE TO FINDING AND RETAINING TALENT 

Continuous Improvement in Five Key Areas

If a culture of continuous improvement exists in your company’s operational side, it should be easier to break down 

the silos and look at your employee development as a system as well. Just as you collect data on the operational 

side, you can identify feedback loops and system structures, and begin collecting data to improve your employee 

development system. There are five interdependent functional areas to consider:

1. Training

2. Recruiting

3. Onboarding

4. Performance management

5. Retention

For example, a well-structured training program will allow you to generate development pathways. If you give your 

people – both new recruits and seasoned staff – clearly articulated development pathways and career ladders, 

they’ll have a common understanding, which ties into performance management and retention. This will drive 

demand and expectations in many areas, such as:

z Frequent and consistent systematic performance feedback

z Support for front-line managers in terms of motivating employees and mitigating issues

z Structured training that drives improvement

Help Implementing a Systems Thinking Approach

Seeing your employee development as a whole helps identify the causes leading to your long-term pain points 

and workforce problems. You can provide your people with a systematic approach based on data instead of 

assumptions and emotions. You can influence the choices people make. By anticipating issues, you can work within 

systems to avoid them.
THE MANUFACTURERS’ GUIDE TO FINDING AND RETAINING TALENT | 5

It takes time to build a pipeline of skilled workers, but with hard 

work and a solid plan, you can find and train the talent you need. 

Where should you start? Assess your current talent management 

efforts and build a plan that gets you where you want to be. 

1. Identify desired goals and outcomes: Get serious about planning 

innovation and growth strategies. Define specific outcomes you 

want – and how your workforce will support those outcomes. 

2. Review internal human resources and training processes: Create 

an environment of continuous learning. Your company culture 

should reinforce workforce development. Develop career ladders 

and conduct employee satisfaction surveys annually.

3. Communicate expectations: Do your employees understand 

how their performance impacts your business goals? Generally 

speaking, the more employees understand how their roles fit into 

your company performance and customer satisfaction, the more 

ownership they take.

4. Provide honest feedback: Are employees getting the feedback they 

need to do the best job possible? Good front-line managers provide 

regular feedback and opportunities to listen to the staff.

5. Gather data to evaluate efforts and quantify successes: We all 

know the saying that what gets measured, gets managed. Analytics 

are a must. 

5 Tips for 

Developing 

Effective Talent 

Management 
6 | THE MANUFACTURERS’ GUIDE TO FINDING AND RETAINING TALENT 

If dozens of job seekers viewed your most recent job listing but few applied, it means either your 

listing wasn’t attractive to them or you didn’t reach a broad enough audience. 

Every job posting and interview is a chance to tell prospective employees why they should want to 

work at your company. Every step from the way you post open positions to how you conduct exit 

interviews presents an opportunity to cultivate your company’s reputation as a great place to work 

– a place that attracts and retains employees. With a shrinking talent pool and more competition for 

skilled workers, how your company is perceived by job seekers is more important than ever. 

Tips to Successfully Attract Employees

Cast a wider net

Diversity, equity and inclusion play a critical role in attracting and retaining employees. Diversity takes many forms 

– race, ability, age, gender, nationality, socioeconomic status and more. The case for increasing diversity in every 

industry is clear. As McKinsey has written extensively, “Companies in the top quartile of gender and ethnic diversity 

were 25% and 36% more likely to financially outperform those in the bottom quartile, respectively.” Moreover,

the pandemic has disproportionately displaced workers of color, and connecting displaced workers to higherpaying job opportunities in advanced manufacturing is a win for the worker, for the company, for our economy 

and for our society overall.

Sell your company to potential employees

Potential employees need to know why your company is a great place to work. Don’t simply list position 

requirements on a job posting. Instead, describe your company’s culture. Describe why a potential job seeker 

will find meaningful employment with your firm while becoming part of an engaged and mission-driven team. 

Conduct an objective assessment of how your company is described on websites such as Firsthand, Glassdoor and 

LinkedIn. It is important to update and refine how your company appears to applicants.

Talk about career paths with potential hires

When writing job descriptions and spreading awareness of career opportunities, companies must articulate the 

potential for career advancement. Candidates are more engaged when they see their career path provides room for 

growth and consistent improvement.

Make recruiting a priority

Even when companies are not searching for new employees, hiring managers should always keep an eye out for 

new recruits. This should be an ongoing process for companies looking to attract prospective candidates.

It’s Time to Approach Attraction and 

Recruitment Differently
THE MANUFACTURERS’ GUIDE TO FINDING AND RETAINING TALENT | 7

Raise awareness of the manufacturing industry

The major talent gap in the industry exists because most college students and young professionals are unaware 

of attractive career paths in manufacturing. Many college graduates don’t realize the opportunities that exist and 

what today’s manufacturing jobs pay. 

To overcome the shortage of qualified workers, companies should promote manufacturing career opportunities 

throughout their community. Manufacturing Day, the first Friday in October, is a great way to showcase the reality 

of modern manufacturing careers by opening doors to students, parents, teachers and community leaders – to 

give a glimpse at what today’s manufacturing really looks like and inspire the next generation of skilled workers.

Create a Competitive Advantage Through Diversity, Equity and 

Inclusion

Diversity is a key ingredient for better decision making. Homogenous groups may be susceptible to groupthink, 

while diverse teams draw from a greater variety of perspectives. Diverse teams likely consider information more 

thoroughly and accurately. Research also shows that diverse teams:

z Solve problems faster

z Produce more and higher-quality intellectual property such as patents

z Manage group conflict better

z Maximize creativity among team members

Let’s look at strategies for how to expand your workforce pipeline and break down barriers to reach underserved 

and underused talent pools.
8 | THE MANUFACTURERS’ GUIDE TO FINDING AND RETAINING TALENT 

Rethink Why You Exclude Certain Groups From Consideration

It’s natural to hire people you think will be a good fit based on procedures, environments and cultural norms. 

Unfortunately, this often ends up excluding good people. For example, do you eliminate prospects who rely on 

public transportation or have child care needs? Do you require new hires to be fluent in English? If they can be 

trained to do the job, should it matter? Do you exclude applicants who were previously incarcerated? Many people 

turn their lives around and become contributors to society when given the chance.

Sometimes companies abide by outdated policies or rules that have unintended consequences. For example, some 

manufacturers check applicants’ credit to reduce the risk of theft. However, job seekers may think their poor credit 

disqualifies them for the job – so they don’t even apply.

Rethink What Makes For a Good Fit Through the Lens of Inclusion and Access

Rethinking “good fit” through the lens of inclusion and access will expand your potential employee pipeline.

It opens up more places for you to look for employees.

Remember the other side of the coin – a good fit is also important to prospective employees. If they don’t see 

people like themselves, will they be comfortable sharing their ideas or concerns? If management lacks diversity, 

will they see a viable career path?

Rethink the Rules About Qualifications

Two of the most common required qualifications in job posts are a college degree and professional experience 

related to the position. This is a prime example of how the old rules of employment have limited prospect pools. 

Earning a college degree requires a large investment of time and money that many people can’t afford. Education 

requirements eliminate many potential workers, especially from underserved communities. 
THE MANUFACTURERS’ GUIDE TO FINDING AND RETAINING TALENT | 9

1. Create a strategy team: Your diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) 

strategy team should include the internal stakeholders whose buy-in 

will be crucial to advancing racial, ethnic, gender and other areas of 

equity in your organization. They will take the lead on implementing 

the equity actions.

2. Assess your current DEI state: The first step of an assessment 

process is to break the concept of DEI down into more concrete, 

measurable dimensions. There are many ways to do this and firms 

should consider their context, goals and experiences. 

3. Identify meaningful metrics: Identify intended outcomes and the 

metrics you’ll use for them. Set your benchmark with a survey based 

on your metrics. From there, set a target improvement for each 

metric. Since the DEI process evolves over time, you may need to 

identify new outcomes as things change. 

4. Create a plan: Use the previous steps as a foundation for addressing 

DEI goals and assessing your baseline performance regarding 

employee outcomes, corporate commitments and vendor 

engagement. 

5. Perform and disclose: Once you have created a strategic plan for 

advancing racial and ethnic equity, implement your plan and share 

your progress. Use your framework and feedback loops to collect 

information and adjust accordingly. 

5 Tips for 

Creating 

a Diverse, 

Equitable 

and Inclusive 

Workplace
10 | THE MANUFACTURERS’ GUIDE TO FINDING AND RETAINING TALENT 

Ask yourself if those credentials are really needed. Many of today’s excellent job training programs teach careerbased skills such as CNC machining in as little as 16 weeks. Higher education institutions offer programs for career 

paths in marketing, analytics, IT and cybersecurity with similar timeframes. If employees can learn these skills in the 

equivalent of a college semester, why limit your prospect pool from the start with an education requirement?

Similarly, requiring related experience can be extremely limiting in today’s job environment. Instead, look for 

transferable skills and what can be taught in-house. 

Rethink the Rules for Workplace Structures, Incentives and Perks

Research shows people are not just looking for a job – they want a career. Companies that offer training and 

professional development during work time send a clear message that they value their employees’ futures.

Research also shows that employees value flexibility. Consider offering remote opportunities when possible 

and options like four-day work weeks. Offer shorter work days that accommodate your employees’ child care – a 

common employment hurdle for many parents.

Employees value incentives and perks that help subsidize their personal expenses such as transportation, food and 

tools. Consider providing:

z Breakfast for an early shift. It makes it easier for people to get to work on time, offsets expenses and 

provides nutrition to start the day.

z Laptops, phones and any tools required to do the job. Provide whatever employees need – work 

boots, safety equipment, etc.

z Help with transportation expenses. Provide mileage reimbursement for employees in rideshare 

programs or informal carpools. Pay for bus passes. Provide incentives for workers that carpool.

z Partner with a child care provider. 

Rethinking the old rules is essential to meet current and future hiring needs. Seeking, recruiting and hiring a more 

diverse workforce will add value to your organization.
THE MANUFACTURERS’ GUIDE TO FINDING AND RETAINING TALENT | 11

Training and Development Will Improve 

Retention and Business Value

Employee turnover is a reality for every business. However, intentional employee training and 

development practices help minimize the impact of turnover. At the same time, these practices help 

make your company more profitable and your managers less stressed.

Why is this so important? Numerous studies document the cost of employee turnover – as much as 

50-150% of base salary, depending on the level of the position in the organization! Consider this:

z Replacing an hourly employee with an annual salary of $40,000 costs approximately $20,000 on average

z Replacing a salaried employee with 4-5 years of experience, such as an Accountant or Quality Engineer 

earning an annual salary of $80,000 costs about $80,000

z Replacing a manager or leader with an annual salary of $150,000 costs about $225,000 or more!

Employee Development Starts on Day 1

The first 90 days are the most vulnerable period of the employer/employee relationship. Effective onboarding 

of new employees helps create an engaged workforce from day one. Give your onboarding program a structure 

that provides useful milestones, mentoring and maybe even wage progression. Once you have hired people, it’s 

important to work hard to keep them.

To create a successful onboarding program or enhance your existing program, examine how new employees are 

trained when they join the company. Identify 5-7 new hires who have at least 6-9 months experience with you. 

Ask them to identify things that were the most difficult to learn. Ask for ideas about how to make the training less 

complex so they could achieve higher productivity levels sooner. 

Create a mentoring program. Mentoring is a proven approach that enhances learning and development for both 

mentees and mentors. Make sure each new employee is teamed up with a more experienced person in the same 

department – someone who is a strong supporter of the organizational culture.

Have a Career Development Plan in Place

Investing in your workers’ professional and personal growth demonstrates that you genuinely care about 

their future. From certification programs to associate degrees, there are many affordable options for providing 

educational opportunities for your employees. 

The first step is asking each employee how they want to grow professionally. From there, develop a personalized 

plan aligned with the organization’s goals. Finally, match that plan with both internal and external training 

opportunities. Talk to your employees and get to know where they want to be in the next five years. Be sure to 

offer development opportunities to allow employees to learn what they need to know to advance within their 

career path.
12 | THE MANUFACTURERS’ GUIDE TO FINDING AND RETAINING TALENT 

Other keys to a successful training and development environment include:

z Provide easy access. Offer training and development through a variety of platforms. Training is only 

effective if it is used. By providing a mix of opportunities – on-demand, virtual, on-the-job, and classroom 

instruction – you make it easier for employees to participate.

z Attract tech savvy people. If you use advanced manufacturing technologies like simulation or 

augmented reality (AR) for your training, be sure to share this with potential employees during the hiring 

process. It can help you recruit a more tech-savvy workforce.

z Track employee progress. As mentioned earlier, what gets measured, gets managed. Analytics 

are a must. A great way to do this is through a learning management system (LMS). These platforms 

allow employees to manage their own learning journey while enabling you to monitor and manage 

their progress.

z Start an apprenticeship program. Apprenticeships help create new streams of talent while adding 

much-needed bench strength. Career development can begin with apprenticeship programs. Collaborate 

with high schools that can identify students with good problem-solving skills and interest in relevant

 subjects. Apprenticeships can be the cornerstone for creating a learning organization. 
THE MANUFACTURERS’ GUIDE TO FINDING AND RETAINING TALENT | 13

As manufacturers struggle to recruit skilled workers, more are 

turning to apprenticeship programs to develop and grow skills they 

need for their internal talent pool. Apprenticeship programs combine 

on-the-job learning with related instruction in technical areas. This 

combination produces qualified, highly-productive employees ready 

for careers requiring precision skills. Apprenticeship training ensures 

workers have the knowledge and competencies companies need for 

today and the future.

Apprenticeship programs are popular and effective – 97% of 

employer sponsors recommend apprenticeship programs, 91% of 

apprentices stay at the job where they’ve received training, and 

employers receive an average of $1.47 of increased productivity

for every dollar spent on apprenticeships. In short, apprenticeship 

programs lead to lower turnover and more engaged employees – 

always a good thing.

Modern apprenticeships often accommodate on-demand e-learning 

in addition to or in place of traditional in-class learning. Many 

apprenticeships now are competency-based instead of time-based, 

allowing people to progress at their own pace. 

Attending traditional classroom training can be a barrier for people 

due to lack of transportation or time constraints. Program flexibility 

can open career pathways to higher-skilled positions for many 

people – especially women and underrepresented populations. For 

example, a young parent might have child care challenges that make 

even a full-time job difficult to manage. Attending evening classes 

in person at a community college would be beyond reach. Now they 

could do the curriculum at home whenever it is convenient, such as 

nights and weekends. 

Apprenticeships 

Can Be A Path to 

Growing Talent 
14 | THE MANUFACTURERS’ GUIDE TO FINDING AND RETAINING TALENT 

Link Training to Continuous Improvement Through Proven Processes

Align existing skills in your workplace with skills needed for current and future business growth. By mapping 

operations to the workforce, and then to your business plans, your company will have a clearer understanding of 

the investments you need to make in your workforce. There are proven workforce training programs to do this, 

including:

z Lean overview: The best path to process optimization for a group of new employees who have 

never been in a manufacturing environment may be a program that covers the fundamentals of lean 

manufacturing and workplace organization.

z Training within industry: A TWI program will not only provide the efficiency and speed required to get 

people into the right job roles and adopt new technology, but will also help top performers grow into 

supervisory roles.

z Toyota Kata: The big wins in improving processes will come from a program that guides people through a 

problem-solving process to discover root causes of issues and stop the cycle of putting out fires with quick 

fixes. Grow your team while you grow the business.
THE MANUFACTURERS’ GUIDE TO FINDING AND RETAINING TALENT | 15

Succession planning means preparing the next generation of leaders 

so your company thrives in the future. It provides a strategy for passing 

leadership roles to other employees gradually over time. 

Succession planning involves cross-training your employees to develop 

leadership capabilities, multidimensional skills, company knowledge, 

and a holistic understanding of the organization. Careful succession 

planning helps ensure that your business continues to run smoothly and 

your operations aren’t critically attached to the presence of one specific 

person.

There are many reasons to consider succession planning for your 

manufacturing company. The process empowers your employees to 

envision possible career advancement – they’ll take more ownership of 

roles that might be theirs in the future. 

Succession planning enables supervisors to mentor their employees 

effectively. Internal operations strengthen when they share their 

knowledge and expertise. This affirms your manufacturing company’s 

vision and values by demonstrating that your managers value all 

employees. Cultivating new leaders also assures stakeholders that your 

organization has plans for future growth!

1. Identify key positions: Look at your organizational chart and identify 

people that will likely retire soon. You should also identify positions that 

might turn over for reasons other than impending retirements. The effect 

of losing one key person can ripple across the whole organization. This 

exercise enables you to map successors by identifying future gaps. 

2. Capture institutional knowledge: Begin by updating process 

documentation, standard operating procedures and standard work 

instructions. An updated training library helps ensure seamless transitions 

for skilled workers. 

3. Select high potential employees: Identify key contributors that 

consistently outperform their peers and consider how their career 

development could fit into your succession pipeline.

4. Create development plans: Once you’ve identified your high potential 

employees, assess their skills gaps. Create a learning plan for each person 

that addresses gaps and includes leadership training. They’ll be prepared 

for higher positions within your organization when the opportunities arise.

5. Do not overlook ownership succession planning: Whether you’re 

planning to transfer the business to your children, to an Employee Stock 

Option Plan (ESOP), or selling the company outright, an ownership 

succession plan can take 3-5 years to complete. Develop individual 

objectives and milestones, and communicate that plan to appropriate 

stakeholders to ensure a smooth transition. 

5 Tips on 

Leadership 

and Succession 

Planning
16 | THE MANUFACTURERS’ GUIDE TO FINDING AND RETAINING TALENT 

How to Become an Employer of Choice 

An employer of choice is a company that candidates seek out for employment opportunities.

The defining characteristics of an employer of choice are:

z Strong leadership

z Competitive pay

z Engaged workers

z A company culture that employees believe in and are excited to be part of

Creating a positive workplace culture that successfully attracts and retains talented people will not happen by 

chance. The best employers truly believe that employees ARE their number one asset – without exception. Local 

workers choose to work there over other options.

How do you know if you are an employer of choice? Your employees tell you through their loyalty, high retention 

rates, and especially when they encourage others to work for your company.

You are competing with many industries and companies to fill entry-level positions. How are you positioning 

yourself? How does your entry-level pay compare to other industries? How often do you measure employee morale 

or satisfaction?

Here are five best practices for becoming an employer of choice (you’ll recognize many of these tips from other 

sections in this guide).

Conduct Cultural and Engagement Assessments

Gathering the information to build a great company culture involves collecting both quantitative and 

qualitative data.

You can use a third-party survey to collect quantitative data. Survey topics can give you a wider company 

perspective – for example, whether people are held accountable for low performance. Surveys can also give you 

insight into your employees’ personal views – for example, whether they find personal meaning and fulfillment in 

their work.

Surveys are important, but you may find even greater value comes from the qualitative data you get from focus 

group interviews, where facilitators can dig into the responses. Focus groups can provide both context and 

examples that everyone can relate to. Culture is about common expectations and behaviors, and focus groups 

often reveal subtexts and drivers of the current company culture.
THE MANUFACTURERS’ GUIDE TO FINDING AND RETAINING TALENT | 17

Employers of choice tend to take these follow-up actions after conducting surveys and focus groups:

z Own the results. Position the results of the assessments as a report card for top management.

It’s essential for company leadership to own the results.

z Commit to change. Commit to changing the organization based on feedback. Doing surveys or focus 

groups and ignoring the results is worse than not doing them in the first place.

z Make it routine. Collect employee feedback annually.

Meet Employees’ Personal Needs

There are two essential types of employee needs and these aren’t mutually exclusive:

z Personal needs – the human aspect that people bring to their work and to an interaction

z Practical needs – objectives accomplished through an interaction

Here are five key principles to meeting your employees’ personal needs, according to Development Dimensions 

International:

z Esteem: Focusing on facts, respect and support will help employees with their sense of self-worth, enabling them to be motivated, confident, innovative and committed to their work.

z Empathy: Acknowledging people’s feelings of success, failure, pride and frustration defuses negative 

emotions and encourages positive emotions.

z Involve: Show you value your people by asking for their input. Greater commitment and success is likely 

when ideas belong to the people who carry them out.

z Share: People work best with leaders they trust. Leaders should appropriately disclose thoughts, feelings 

or rationales.

z Support: Providing coaching, training, guidance and mentoring builds people’s sense of ownership 

and confidence.
18 | THE MANUFACTURERS’ GUIDE TO FINDING AND RETAINING TALENT 

Provide and Receive Meaningful Feedback

Just as you can measure overall equipment efficiency, there are now tools for collecting “people analytics” that you 

may find very useful. For example, Rhabit Analytics provides tools to measure work culture for cross-functional 

teams. This is a simple, sustainable feedback loop with a visual dashboard that brings a data/operational mindset 

to individuals, departments and the entire company. Tools like this can lead to positive change for everyone 

from hourly workers to executives. The process is not punitive – it’s more of a continuous improvement mindset 

designed to reward positive actions.

Two other considerations:

z Provide more feedback. Supplement annual performance reviews with frequent coaching/feedback 

sessions. Companies that encourage regular one-on-one sessions are more likely to create organizational 

alignment with performance goals.

z Ask “stay interview” questions. Exit interviews tell you why employees leave. Why not consider asking 

why employees stay? Questions like these prompt meaningful discussions:

• When you travel to work each day, what things do you look forward to?

• What are you learning here?

• Why do you stay here?

• When was the last time you thought about leaving our team? What prompted it?

• What can I do to make your experience at work better for you?
THE MANUFACTURERS’ GUIDE TO FINDING AND RETAINING TALENT | 19

1. Articulate your core values: Have your management team present a long 

list of values to your employees and take a vote on the core values they can 

get behind. By being part of the process, they will own it. Make the top five 

part of your performance review process or accountability sessions with 

individual employees. 

2. Recognize employees: Regularly acknowledge employees whose actions 

or behaviors reflect one of your core values. Make it part of monthly 

companywide or daily shift meetings. At first it may feel awkward, but stay 

the course and celebrate these victories. Your team will appreciate it.

3. Lead by example: As a leader, it is important that you live by the ideals 

you promote. When you fail to live up to those standards, acknowledge 

it, pledge to do better, and ask your team to hold you accountable to that 

promise. 

4. Identify your cultural ambassadors: We all have team members who are 

amplifiers and influencers – people who other employees listen to. Engage 

them and make them your cultural ambassadors. They are usually pretty 

adept at winning the hearts and minds of fellow employees. 

5. Treat your people right: It sounds simple, right? But you probably 

often find yourself too busy putting out fires to stop and listen to your 

employees. Make the effort. Walk the floor, talk to your team members. Tell 

someone to cut out early to go to their kid’s game. A simple gesture or a 

thank you goes a long way

5 Tips for 

Building 

a Positive 

Workplace 

Culture
20 | THE MANUFACTURERS’ GUIDE TO FINDING AND RETAINING TALENT 

Attracting prospects 

and candidates

• Positive job postings

• Expand the labor pool

• Competitive wages

• Robust onboarding

Training 

• Job modules

• Standard work

• Developing paths

• Upskilling trainers

• Training tracker

• Effective onboarding

Engaging employees

• Career ladders

• Pay increases

• Promotions

• Performance-based pay 

systems

• Company growth

What You Can Control

Use Effective Job Postings

Many manufacturers don’t realize how important the wording of each job posting is for attracting applicants. 

Research competing job postings, not just in manufacturing but in other industries competing for the same 

people. Ask your marketing team to help with the postings.

Employers of choice often include these elements in their job postings:

z Sell the job like you’re selling a product or service

z Include what makes your company a great place to work

z Describe your culture

z Tell your company story

And by all means emphasize continuous improvement in job postings. How do these two examples sound to you? 

Where would you rather work?

“Setting objectives and reviewing shift’s performance versus objectives” or “Fostering an environment of 

continuous improvement by inspiring employees to problem solve within their work cell.”

Prioritize Your Actions Around What You Can Control

Things like the local labor market are out of your control. But other employers are dealing with the 

same challenges.

What’s in your control? Create a culture of learning where training is foundational. Create development pathways 

so employees see themselves on a journey and feel confident that there is a role for them.
THE MANUFACTURERS’ GUIDE TO FINDING AND RETAINING TALENT | 21

Your Local MEP Center Can Help You 

Find and Retain Talent

The MEP National Network has a holistic suite of workforce development services that are tailored to 

the needs of smaller manufacturers. If you need skilled workers but are finding it difficult to identify, 

attract, develop and retain qualified people, contact your local MEP Center to talk with a workforce 

specialist about becoming an employer of choice.

Contact your local MEP Center
The MEP National Network is a unique public-private 

partnership that delivers comprehensive, proven solutions 

to U.S. manufacturers, fueling growth and advancing U.S. 

manufacturing. 

Focused on helping small and medium-sized manufacturers 

generate business results and thrive in today’s technologydriven economy, the MEP National Network comprises 

the National Institute of Standards and Technology’s 

Manufacturing Extension Partnership (NIST MEP) and 

51 MEP Centers located in all 50 states and Puerto Rico. 

100 BUREAU DRIVE M/S 4800

GAITHERSBURG, MD 20899

PHONE: (301) 975-5020

EMAIL: MFG@NIST.GOV

WEB: WWW.NIST.GOV/MEP