The problem is the leakage of knowledge. As people leave, they take their knowledge with them, and until now there hasn’t really been an effective way to keep that knowledge within the plant or the company.
to train staff on a new upgrade
The Challenge
Megatrends such as the aging workforce are putting increased pressure on industrial companies and their training programs. With as many as half of industrial plant personnel due to retire within the next five years, fast knowledge transfer has become critical and building a pipeline of new talent into the industry has become a necessity.
On average, it takes 12 months to train staff after a technological upgrade. This type of delay leads to 65% of workers feeling held back by outdated and rigid work styles.
The Solution
Many studies on millennials show that they are looking for more experiential learning. This is perhaps not surprising, given that they — and the generations following them — grew up in a digital age. Honeywell not only identified the need to develop training that would attract the kind of new talent their customers were looking for, but also the need to capture the knowledge from decades spent inside the plants.
Honeywell built the AR/VR-enabled Connected Plant Immersive Competency Solution, which delivers an innovative and effective learning method for upskilling the current workforce, decreasing training time and increasing safety. Through a partnership with Gilmore College, they were able to bring this experience and real-life simulations straight to the students, building a strong, sustainable pipeline for the future workforce.
A Problem that Needed Solving
78 percent of workers say that modern technology is important to adopt into the workplace, and as a result of lack of action, 38 percent of workers on average are actively looking for a different role. Employers have a critical role to play in analyzing modernization options as they become available to manage learning dynamics, retain valuable institutional knowledge, and recruit new talent.
Using Microsoft’s HoloLens technology, Honeywell’s AR/VR-enabled Immersive Competency solution makes knowledge and competency accessible at any time while increasing worker safety. Using a VR simulator, they are able to train workers on high-volume assets and high consequence situations with ease and peace of mind.
Not only that, they are able to preserve the institutional knowledge of workers reaching retirement age by tracking their work and day-to-day plant operations to train the next wave of operators.
Learning a Universal Trade
Honeywell is meeting the next wave of the workforce where they are.
Honeywell has partnered with Gilmore College’s Peron Training Centre on a program delivering a Certificate II in Process Plant Operations to students. This selective program includes a plant simulation laboratory, chemistry laboratory, and workshop that provides students access to the types of skills and trades that are needed now and in the future – universal trades that you can take all over the world.
Using Honeywell’s solution in their simulation labs, Gilmore students are able to learn using realistic, dynamic models of industrial processes combined with structured curriculum. Being able to learn and practice on a virtual operation, students gain a real understanding of modern process plant operations and gain experience using cutting-edge technology. This experience nurture’s the talent today to power the future workforce.
Is this a repeatable model?
Though not all employers will be able to bring sophisticated, cutting-edge technology into the classroom to develop a skilled workforce of tomorrow, all employers can take steps to modernize their approach to training, preserve knowledge of retiring workers, and prepare for a new culture of learners.
Honeywell’s competency management offering is not limited to immersive, but offers a wide range of software and services to help any industrial employer bring out the best in their staff, empower them, and retain their knowledge.
The swift pace of change in the workforce of today combined with the technological advancements that the workforce of tomorrow are accustomed to demands employers stay ahead of the curve, proactively preparing for what comes next.