Solve the problem of intelligent manufacturing transformation: how to form a talent super team?

At present, Chinese manufacturing enterprises are in the stage of intelligent transformation and upgrading. In addition to the transformation in the field of hardware, Chinese manufacturing companies generally face another major challenge, namely, the shortage of talents in the intelligent manufacturing stage. According to the analysis and forecast of data from the Ministry of Human Resources and Social Security, in 2025, the demand for talents in the field of intelligent manufacturing will be 9 million, and the talent gap is expected to be 4.5 million. Intelligent manufacturing talents are facing a huge gap. To support the rapid development of the intelligent manufacturing industry, it is imperative to make up for the shortcomings of talents.

"In the past five years, intelligent manufacturing has penetrated into many industries from concept to practical application." Tan Yongchao, global managing partner of McKinsey and head of the Tsinghua McKinsey Digital Capability Development Center, told the CEConlines, "China The development and changes in the status of intelligent manufacturing talents can be viewed from two aspects: on the one hand, acquiring and retaining talents who directly apply intelligent manufacturing related technologies, including data scientists, AI programmers, advanced instrument operators, etc., is a pain point for many enterprises, especially It is in traditional manufacturing, basic materials and other industries; on the other hand, promoting existing personnel to continuously learn new skills in intelligent manufacturing to adapt to new working methods involves a larger group, and the development of such talents is also worthy of attention. Changes in various aspects have prompted enterprises to think about: 1. How to maximize the potential of professional and scarce talents, which requires enterprises to adopt a more agile organizational method to achieve business goals; Manufacturing work style requirements."

For manufacturing enterprises, establishing the talent team required for the transformation of intelligent manufacturing, making the most of the talents, and cultivating the traditional talents to transform into the required talents are the way to effectively solve the shortage of intelligent manufacturing talents. .

Building a talent team

For enterprises, by building a talent team and focusing on a group of diverse teams with different professional abilities, to leverage the intelligent manufacturing transformation of the entire enterprise , is a more feasible approach.

In the "Intelligent Manufacturing Development Plan" issued by the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology and the Ministry of Finance, there is a clear statement on building a multi-level talent team for intelligent manufacturing: to strengthen the training of intelligent manufacturing talents, and cultivate a group of talents who can make breakthroughs. High-level leading talents with key technologies of intelligent manufacturing and driving the intelligent transformation of manufacturing industry, a group of compound talents who are good at manufacturing enterprise management and familiar with information technology, and a group of professional and technical talents who can carry out intelligent manufacturing technology development, technology improvement, and business guidance , a group of high-skilled talents with complete categories, superb skills and dedication.

The diversity of the talent team not only includes high-caliber talents of different majors, but also requires compound talents who are familiar with technology and have management ability. These talents are an indispensable and important engine to promote the transformation of enterprises' intelligent manufacturing. However, how to acquire and nurture such talent? For enterprises, the effective way to break through is to transform original talents into required talents, and find professional talents and compound talents who can adapt to the transformation and development of enterprises.

CIMC Vehicles, as a Chinese manufacturing company, is firmly in the leading position in the global semi-trailer and special-purpose vehicle industry. In response to the external environment in which there is a shortage of talents, CIMC Vehicles mainly adopts the dual-track mode of "internal training" and "external recruitment", that is, according to the personal wishes and abilities of employees, the existing talents are transformed into the required talents; It adopts the methods of cooperation with institutions to obtain talents suitable for enterprise development. It is understood that CIMC Vehicles first established an intelligent manufacturing talent team through internal recruitment, and only publicly recruited when there were still vacancies.

For the cultivation of existing talents, the practice of some leading manufacturing companies is not only to establish academies around intelligent manufacturing internally, but also to actively explore cooperation with external institutions to supply more needed talents for the enterprises. Cultivating talents is a step-by-step process that requires constant iteration and upgrading in "learning by doing". Tan Yongchao gave an example: "In order to improve employee skills, a beacon company in the electronics industry used Mixed Reality technology for real-time gamified employee training. AR glasses were introduced to track and recognize students' gestures and visual directions, and press The production process provides trainees with real-time guidance. In addition, the system assigns factory workers to their most skilled jobs and task lines to reach their full potential.”

On the other hand, for the vast majority of Re-capacity of existing employees and business personnel is more challenging. According to the latest release of "Lighthouse Companies Lighting the Road to Sustainable Growth" (hereinafter referred to as "Lighthouse Companies") co-authored by the World Economic Forum and McKinsey: Lighthouse companies are well aware that improving employee skills is the result of adopting agile working models and fully releasing digital transformation. The key to potential, therefore, they always put employee development as a priority. Initiatives such as training, retraining and upskilling can help employees adapt and integrate into the Fourth Industrial Revolution. By adhering to the people-oriented approach, Lighthouse always focuses on inclusive growth in the process of promoting the transformation of the Fourth Industrial Revolution, and encourages employees at all levels to participate in the restructuring of the industry, so as to jointly create a future full of innovation and creativity. Scale growth requires the strength of the team, and the team is inseparable from the contribution of every employee.

The industrial giant Bosch is a typical example of this transformation. Bosch has more than 400,000 employees worldwide, of which industrial talents occupy the main part, and the proportion of IT professionals is relatively low. In the early stage of the transformation, Bosch quickly filled the gap of professional talents by acquiring an AI company. In order to promote a comprehensive transformation on a wider scale, in addition to absorbing talents from outside, Bosch has actively taken measures to establish a platform for internal traditional talents, so that more employees can learn new knowledge and skills, so as to better meet the era of Industry 4.0.

In addition, talents have different characteristics in different stages of intelligent manufacturing transformation. At the current stage, Tan Yongchao believes that with the change of the application curve of advanced technology, in addition to the continuous updating of capabilities for traditional talents, intelligent development will also constantly put forward new professional requirements for technical talents.

"At this stage, the application of big data technology in industry is more and more extensive, and how to use data analysis tools, quantitative modeling and graphical display of results has become a necessary skill. For example, in the pharmaceutical manufacturing industry , a large number of laboratory personnel need to master the ability of data analysis and real-time step optimization on the basis of assay and recording work. Some leading pharmaceutical manufacturing companies have begun to use 'digital twin' simulation to improve laboratory personnel's operation and analysis work "Tan Yongchao said.

Through internal cultivation, it not only effectively solves the problem of enterprise talent gap, but also is an essential means for enterprises to adapt to different development stages of intelligent manufacturing.

Organization Evolution

In addition to building a diverse talent team, how to effectively maximize the effectiveness of talent is another important way to solve the talent gap.

In this regard, Tan Yongchao believes that the "global lighthouse factory" can be used for reference in promoting the transformation of large-scale intelligent manufacturing. The Global Lighthouse Network is a joint project of the World Economic Forum (WEF) and McKinsey & Company. The "Lighthouse Factory" selected from around the world is regarded as the leader of the Fourth Industrial Revolution, and is an example of digital manufacturing and Industry 4.0.

"They have some common features in organizational and management models: 1. Give front-line employees the ability to use technology and data to innovate, help employees adapt to changes, and cultivate the habit of thinking and innovation. For example, some lighthouse companies adopt a similar 'hackathon' approach, allowing employees to stimulate new ideas and create solutions together through simple methods. Second, they are committed to cultivating employees' technical and data analysis capabilities, and based on employees' needs Customized retraining courses. Some lighthouse companies have introduced gamification training to make digital learning simple and interesting, and at the same time, through instant learning feedback, the learning effect can be greatly improved. Translators, data engineers, IT engineers, industrial IoT architects, data scientists, product managers, and agile mentors, etc.) efficiently connect with business requirements and implementation.”

Tan Yongchao, for example, is one of the top 500 companies in the world. In order to comprehensively promote the application of big data, strong energy and materials companies have established DCOE (Digital Center of Excellence, Intelligent Manufacturing Center) at the group level. DCOE is a team of about 60 people, which brings together big data scientists, programmers and interface design engineers, and provides good support for the Group's subsidiaries to implement big data applications in business and operational manufacturing. This team adopts the agile iterative development method to realize the proof of concept, pilot development, deployment implementation and multi-point linkage of business units, rapid verification and feedback improvement. Through the "agile iteration" business process approach, it maximizes the role of professional teams, and through conducting a wide range of capability transmission, the enterprise gives full play to the maximum effectiveness of talents.

In addition, for manufacturing enterprises, in the process of intelligent manufacturing upgrade, a large number of digital application technologies and automated manufacturing technologies have forced the transformation of their organizational management models.

For example, CIMC Vehicles has carried out a comprehensive organizational change in order to rebuild a new type of organization that adapts to the digital production process. The "teaching group" is its characteristic organizational model. It is understood that the group has only 3-5 members, and the leader of the group is composed of highly-leading compound talents, and then the group leader will form a talent team according to the three aspects of digital and analog design, automated production lines and digital management. Through such an agile organization, CIMC Vehicles can efficiently implement factory projects.

Leading companies have leveraged agile working models to rapidly expand Fourth Industrial Revolution solutions across production networks and value chains, resulting in unprecedented sustainable growth, according to the Beacon Companies report . By increasing the flexibility and adaptability of their operational processes, Lighthouse Enterprises greatly encourages innovative mindsets and dynamic working methods. This allows them to closely track shifts in market supply and demand and customer expectations.

In conclusion, in order to build a "super team" of talents that can adapt to the development of intelligent manufacturing, enterprises need to start from "selection, breeding, and retention". change. On the way to build a talent team, this will be a "protracted battle" that must be invested for a long time.