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Finding and Retaining Talent at Non-DoD Agencies
Haydn Wadley, University of Virginia, and Teresa Clement, Raytheon Technologies, moderated a session on finding and retaining talent at non-Department of Defense (DoD) agencies. The first speaker was Charles “Chip” Blankenship, Montgomery Distinguished Professor of Practice in Materials Science and Engineering at the University of Virginia. A panel discussion expanded on the topic, featuring Om Nalamasu, chief technology officer and senior vice president at Applied Materials; Charles Kuehmann, vice president of materials engineering at SpaceX and Tesla Motors; and Ann Bolcavage, engineering associate fellow at Rolls-Royce.
RECRUITING AND RETAINING TALENT
Chip Blankenship, University of Virginia
Blankenship shared insights on recruiting and retaining a talented workforce, enabling success at every segment of a company, and applying lessons from past crises.
Recruiting and Retaining Talent
Recruiting and retaining talent is more than just finding the best people. Companies also have a responsibility to provide substantive career development programs that support talented workers in order to retain them, Blankenship said. Employee resource groups and professional opportunities are also important to
develop and retain talent, because employees who have opportunities to learn, and feel like they belong in a company, are more likely to stay.
Success at Every Segment
Successful companies require successful employees at every job level, where workers have vastly different education levels and career needs. Blankenship discussed key challenges in recruitment and retention for each job segment.
For technology manufacturing companies, Blankenship said finding entry-level operators to make and assemble parts is a significant challenge. To address this need, he suggested companies need to take community-based, collective action to ensure there is a stable, local educational pipeline that will create the workforce that they need to be able to expand.
Skilled tradespeople are critical to key manufacturing metrics like safety, quality, delivery, and cost. This segment is likely to come from community colleges or trade schools, and Blankenship warned that a large talent shortfall is on the horizon if this pipeline is not strengthened. He suggested that the United States can learn from successful models like Toyota’s Advanced Manufacturing Technology program and Europe’s system of apprenticeships and journeymen. A college degree is not necessary for these jobs, despite their high-tech nature, and Blankenship argued that industry needs to counter the cultural preference for college over trade schools or vocational education.
Entry-level engineers are relatively easy to find, Blankenship said, because companies have strong recruiting relationships with universities. However, he said retention is the biggest challenge with this segment. Specifically, these workers tend to need support most around the time when they finish their first big project, Blankenship said.
Finally, Blankenship said doctorate-level scientists and engineers are likely to be in short supply in the coming years. While strong industry–faculty relationships exist, corporate laboratories are getting smaller replacing fundamental research with applied work, which does not typically align with the priorities of most academic laboratories. At this level, companies need well-trained, curious people who can solve complex problems as a team, soft skills that he argued can and should be taught in schools.
Lessons from COVID-19
To learn from the pandemic experience, Blankenship drew parallels from previous crises, such as the impacts of dramatic reductions in force in the 1990s and hardships after 9/11. He argued that what those experiences demonstrate is that even during a crisis, it is very important to nurture young talent and support
suppliers so that when the crisis is over, companies can come back strong. A talented workforce is the key to overcoming crises, he argued, and so companies must continue to create pipelines and nurture every segment of the workforce in order to position themselves for long-term success.
Q&A Discussion
In response to a question, Blankenship observed that far more people move from DoD into industry jobs than the reverse, whereas workers leaving industry are much more likely to pursue academic jobs.
Asked whether COVID-19 will cause workforce gaps, Blankenship expressed his view that most companies have learned from previous crises that they need to preserve the necessary workforce demographics, examining all possibilities and pitfalls before taking action. Business will come back strong, he posited, and they recognize that preserving the workforce is how companies remain competitive. For example, Boeing, which is in the midst of two crises—COVID-19 and the fallout from the 737 Max disasters—has learned that supporting the health of its supply chain is a strategic investment, not an expense, because layoffs at its suppliers would undercut Boeing’s capabilities in the long run. Clement agreed that supporting supply chains and providing resources to employees were both essential ways to support the entire workforce.
A DIVERSE AND RESILIENT WORKFORCE IN A POST-PANDEMIC WORLD
Om Nalamasu, Applied Materials, Inc.
Nalamasu discussed how Applied Materials, which manufactures semiconductors and display equipment, views business opportunities, workforce needs, and future directions against the backdrop of the COVID-19 pandemic.
Digitization is accelerating in every facet of our lives. Artificial intelligence (AI), which Nalamasu calls the largest wave of change in computing yet (Figure 6.1), is further fueling this pervasive digitization and requires specialized hardware, which is good news for semiconductor manufacturers like Applied Materials. Nalamasu said the growth of AI, online learning, and remote work has made 2020 a pivotal year for the semiconductor industry.
The computational needs of AI—cloud infrastructure and data centers—also require incredible amounts of energy. Without changes to device architecture or performance, the total energy demand for computation is projected to exceed
global energy production by 2035.1 To combat this problem, the industry created the power efficiency, performance, area, cost, and time-to-market (PPACt) playbook2 for new devices, which requires concurrent innovation across materials, devices, architecture, and systems to reduce energy needs.
Applied Materials cites diversity and inclusion among its core values. While the company has made modest gains in hiring women and underrepresented minorities, Nalamasu said more work is required. The company has focused on building high school-career pipelines, created programs to encourage female students to pursue science, technology, engineering, and mathematics careers, reserves half of its summer internships for women and underrepresented minorities, and actively recruits from these groups. Despite COVID-19, Applied Materials is still hiring, although recruitment and onboarding are now online. While it is too soon to tell what changes may become permanent, Nalamasu said that creating stronger ways to connect digitally has brought benefits.
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1 Semiconductor Industry Association and Semiconductor Research Corporation, 2015, Rebooting the IT Revolution: A Call to Action, https://eps.ieee.org/images/files/Roadmap/Rebooting-theRevolution-SIA-SRC-09-2015.pdf.
2 The PPACt playbook is described in more detail at Applied Materials, Inc., “Introducing a New Playbook for Process Control,” https://www.appliedmaterials.com/semiconductor, accessed December 14, 2020.
This moment is important for U.S. manufacturers, Nalamasu said. Technological supremacy in semiconductors is directly related to national security and global competitiveness and he urged that the United States must continue to prioritize innovation over cost to remain the global leader, which requires hiring the smartest, most diverse workforce possible.
FINDING THE RIGHT TALENT
Charles Kuehmann, Tesla Motors and SpaceX
Finding talent is critical to supporting continued growth and innovation at companies like Tesla and SpaceX. Kuehmann discussed the companies’ approaches to identifying and recruiting employees with the right skills.
Both companies have strong relationships with universities, Kuehmann said, noting that COVID-19 has actually made it easier to engage remotely with a broader group of schools. SpaceX also uses media opportunities like launch webcasts to attract talent. To find individuals with the right kind of skills and attitudes—hands-on employees who assume new responsibilities quickly—the companies engage with university engineering clubs, sponsor engineering contests, and host internships. Interns, a key workforce pipeline for the companies, are onboarded just like employees. They are assigned to a team and expected to contribute to projects immediately. Kuehmann said that the companies’ internship programs have grown during the pandemic because students have been more willing to pause online learning and pursue different opportunities.
The right kind of talent also has to want the jobs a company has to offer, Kuehmann said. Tesla and SpaceX offer a strong mission and sense of purpose. They also prioritize on-the-job learning, which includes an expectation of room to fail, over retention alone. They support growth and learning through a continuous employee-manager feedback loop. They also have a realistic expectation that a certain number of workers will leave to pursue other opportunities and consider it part of their mission to help young engineers determine their wider career paths, Kuehmann said.
Finally, Kuehmann said SpaceX and Tesla are committed to diversity and not just for the candidate pool. They also believe their selection and interview committees should reflect the diversity they want in their workforce.
DEVELOPING MATERIALS ENGINEERING TALENT FOR A POST-COVID-19 WORLD
Ann Bolcavage, Rolls-Royce
Bolcavage discussed workforce development in the context of materials engineering at Rolls-Royce, a relatively small, diverse, and committed unit within the larger company. Retention is very important in a small unit, where a reduction in force or natural attrition can be damaging, especially in an area like materials where the complex technologies are beyond one person’s expertise. At the same time, Bolcavage said that cultivating new skills is just as important as traditional materials and manufacturing knowledge in order for companies to keep pace with innovation.
Materials are an enabling technology, and students and existing employees are drawn to Rolls-Royce because they can see the life cycle of complex components, from preliminary design to full readiness. Some life cycles are decades long, with parts manufactured years ago still in use. As a result, Bolcavage said it is important for employees to have a firm foundation in traditional materials and manufacturing processes while also being open to new digital tools and techniques.
Materials engineering is also critical to sustainable aviation goals, which will require innovations in power, lightweight materials, composites, additive manufacturing processes, safe engine electrification, and alternative propulsion methods. These goals align well with the motivations of today’s students, who increasingly desire to work for companies with thoughtful sustainability goals, Bolcavage said.
Bolcavage emphasized the value of creating deep, robust ties with universities, including reaching beyond materials engineering departments. Schools supply entry-level engineers, often through co-ops, sponsored research, or internship programs. Senior and junior staff are encouraged to engage with these students and reflect the company’s diversity and inclusion.
It is also critical to accelerate career development opportunities for existing employees. Rolls-Royce’s rotation program enables new workers to broaden their exposure to every aspect of the business while gaining a fuller understanding of the diversity of engineering work. Employee resource groups and internal training are also very beneficial to career development. In addition, Bolcavage said the traditional hierarchy is flattening, and more senior engineers are sharing their experience with the newer generation.
PANEL Q&A DISCUSSION
Clement moderated a broad discussion following the panelists’ remarks. Panelists were asked what DoD can learn from these non-DoD contexts to maintain a
strong workforce after COVID-19. Bolcavage replied that while this is a challenge for everyone, DoD has a unique mission and should advertise the challenging, innovative, and fulfilling nature of its work, as well as ensure competitive compensation. Nalamasu agreed and noted that DoD’s strong job security and deep resources make it an attractive place to work. He suggested that DoD reassess its value proposition to dynamically respond to change, interact more with industry, and enable more entrepreneurial thinking. Recent graduates want to do cutting-edge research in a dynamic, interdisciplinary, learning-rich environment. Blankenship added that DoD should also focus on identifying and supporting employees’ needs. Listening to employees, communicating openly, and helping team members chart their career paths and build leadership skills can be very beneficial, he said.
Lori Graham-Brady, Johns Hopkins University, asked panelists to share best practices for virtual onboarding, which can be a barrier to success for some workers. Kuehmann suggested that companies should take advantage of the fact that students are already well versed in virtual interaction, in many cases more so than the companies they are joining. Many companies are too slow to add new tools, for fear of making mistakes. Being open to new tools, and less regimented in general, helps new and existing employees learn new skills quickly, he said.
Wadley asked if the training students currently receive is sufficient for the roles they play once they enter their first job, especially given constant changes in technology. Bolcavage replied that the candidates she has seen know the fundamentals and also have the right soft skills, such as good teamwork and communication. She said it is often up to their workplaces, whether in industry or government, to teach the more technical skills they will need.