and technical skill is enough to see workers rise
through the ranks of an organisation, but these
new challenges require a range of skills that are
difficult to learn without additional support.”
Hill agrees, adding that senior managers
mustn’t be afraid to ask others for advice. “Many
of today’s leaders will have come through a
‘traditional’ route to get to where they are now,”
he says. “An often-heard phrase is that ‘the pace
of change will never be as slow in the future as
it is today’. In such an environment, are you and
your leadership team in possession of the right
leadership skills and therefore driving the vision
of your business in the right way? Probably not –
unless you are a trailblazer.
“Companies will have to become more agile.
If you’re currently worried about how to upskill
your leadership team with a more future-looking
mindset, make sure they get sufficient support
from those who are at the leading edge of the
industry. The next senior management team
coming through will also need to be brought into
that process. Not doing so all the way through
the business would be a huge failure. A lot of your
younger, more tech-savvy workers will be the ones
who can facilitate the most change, so to cut this
mindset off would be a mistake.”
Moreover, there is the argument that
tomorrow’s shopfloor operators – those coming
through school or apprenticeships right now –
will expect a different style of management to the
current generation. Rob Hiron, account director
at Kronos, says that technology will play a key
role in ensuring this. “The future generations of
manufacturers will certainly expect a different
approach,” he says. “Our children will expect to see
technology being utilised in the workplace. They
will expect people to be walking around the factory
with tablets, because that’s what they do in their
everyday life. As a result, they will want to see their
managers doing the same, to get the best out of
their staff. Technology is shaping every part of our
lives, both at home and at work, from Christmas
shopping to banking to checking on the status of
our production lines. Employees will expect to see
that from their managers – and if they didn’t, they
would have question marks over the outlook of the
entire organisation.”
This is a paradigm shift when compared to
the path the current generation would have
taken, continues Hiron. “Traditionally, the ops
director would sit in their office, overlooking the
shopfloor, and their eyes were the key management
tool – they could see where people or processes
weren’t performing properly,” he says. “Today’s
management teams don’t have the time to do that,
so they want the opportunity to glance at live data
on a tablet as they walk into a meeting, and see in
30 seconds how the business is operating – either
at the factory they are in or another one of the
company’s sites globally. Life has changed, but
they’re still able to see the real-time information
from the shopfloor without having to spend time
walking around. Now, they can see the whole
Automation on the shopfloor
brings a new type of leadership
challenge to the factory
JANUARY 2019 COVER STORY
Will a factory of the future actually need managers?
There’s an argument to say that, with
a largely automated workforce, the
need for ‘managers’ in the traditional
sense may be limited. If we were to ever
approach – or even get close to – a
fully ‘lights-out’ factory, what would
be the point of having people making
decisions? One person who doesn’t think
this is the case is Kronos’ Rob Hiron.
“In the world of AI and machine
learning, there is a perception that it will
one day turn into Terminator: we’ll have
factories that are run by robots and just
look after themselves with no need for
humans,” he says. “I can confidently say
that will never happen. From talking to
manufacturers, no matter how much
automation happens on the shopfloor,
the biggest source of intelligence and
innovation is people. In any business,
managers need to work alongside their
teams and technology, and enable the
business to move forward. That will never
be possible without human involvement.
“Elon Musk recently had to shut down
his fully automated Tesla production
plant and acknowledged that excessive
automation was a mistake, and that
humans are underrated. If even one of
the most innovative companies in the
world can realise this, what chance do
the rest of us have of going human-free!
“Our CEO recently said that ‘people
will innovate, and technology will
facilitate’, which sums up the importance
of how people – and good management
teams – will continue to be important. in
the factories of tomorrow.”
www.manufacturingmanagement.co.uk 21
Kadmy /stock.adobe.com
/www.manufacturingmanagement.co.uk
/stock.adobe.com