Inspiring students on Manufacturing Day
October 29th, 2020
Earlier this month, representatives from LINDAL North America took part in the annual Columbus Manufacturing Day run by US non-profit organisation, The Manufacturing Institute.
This year, the event, which is aimed at high school students looking at careers in modern manufacturing, took on a virtual format and along with LINDAL, featured American multinational, Cummins, Inc., forklift manufacturer Toyota Material Handling and French global automotive supplier Faurecia.
The programme included a ‘Day-in-the-Life’ segment and a panel discussion which included Lindal North America’s Production and Continuous Improvement Manager, Mark Hunkele as one of the key speakers. During the discussion, Mark highlighted how LINDAL North America had worked together to build team engagement to develop the efficiency of the plant and improve KPIs. At the end of the session, Mark advised students not to be afraid to reach out, ask questions and to pull together a professional network as early on as possible, to help understand the best career path for them.
A day in the life at LINDAL
The ‘Day-in-the-Life’ videos were compiled by various global manufacturing representatives and addressed directly to students. In his video, LINDAL North America’s Health and Safety manager, Chris Miller described how his role requires him to work at two ends of a spectrum, from hands-on tasks like educating people on behaviours, managing budgets and redesigning equipment, to more creative work such as making new policies, for example, to deal with the ongoing management of COVID-19.
Jonnie Edwards, IT manager, gave an overview of his role working remotely and onsite, assisting co-workers with network issues and managing the realities of working with colleagues in a different time zone.
Speaking about his journey to Senior Maintenance Technician, Ben Morris, who, throughout his career at LINDAL has received certifications in electrical and robotics, as well as Engel training for the injection moulding department, explained his career journey from Set-up Technical in Bag-On-Valve technology, to his current senior role.
Feedback from the event was hugely positive with the Manufacturing Institute reporting almost 300 unique website visitors during the event, along with an impressive number of responses to the manufacturing survey and panel discussion.
Dara Bidwell, LINDAL Human Resources Manager who organised participation in the event said: “I have been involved in the local Manufacturing Education Partnership since 2018, and it has been our ambition ever since to have LINDAL North America participate in the Manufacturing Day. We weren’t disappointed, it was fantastic for our team to engage and inspire students and give them a real insight into how we do things at LINDAL.”