The manufacturing industry continues to suffer from an acute labor shortage. By the end of 2021, employment across the industry was down by nearly 400,000 personnel from pre-pandemic levels. Beyond causing stress, the lack of skilled workers has heightened workplace injury, product liability, and property damage risk for these businesses.

And the pandemic isn’t the only cause of the manufacturing labor shortage, despite dominating the headlines. The labor shortage in manufacturing predates the pandemic by a decade, with the large number of baby boomers retiring leading an exodus of workers from the industry. Meanwhile, many younger workers have declined to enter the sector, wooed away by other industries, such as technology and healthcare.

Is there good news on the horizon? The industry will continue to face labor shortages for the foreseeable future. Despite increasing wages, providing more flexibility and improving working conditions, the problem persists. Looking ahead, competition for labor with other industries, planned retirements and reshoring efforts are expected to widen the gap between labor supply and demand.

Despite popular belief, the introduction of automation has increased the number of open jobs. After all, somebody has to operate these tools and they must have the required skills to do so. With the labor shortage, however, came a lack of operators. Technology cannot function in a vacuum, and thus, efficiency in shipping and logistics has significantly dropped. This has certainly been a factor in accounting for widespread supply chain interruptions across the U.S. and abroad.

There is obviously no easy answer to the labor shortage in manufacturing, but here are four ways manufacturers can create more value with fewer people.

1. Increase the level of automation on the factory floor

We’re not suggesting full robotics, that’s not the right decision for a wide variety of reasons. What manufacturers can do is analyze the potential for cobots (collaborative robots) or lightweight automation solutions to reduce the amount of effort required by the team member. This approach provides a couple of benefits – it will reduce labor time and it can broaden the workforce able to perform the work.

At Cass Precision Machining we are currently utilizing a cobot with plans to add a few more. Our cobot reduces labor by picking up and placing steel to feed the machines, reduces repeat production work for employees, and reduces fatigue.

THE CASS COBOT

“A collaborative robot allows us to have our machinists run multiple machines. The cobot is loading machines while our machinists are attending other machines,” said Ted Biorn, Cass Precision Machining Director of Operations. “Bringing the cobot into Cass has helped us free up a lot of our machinists. It allows them to do more with their minds and less with manual labor. Definitely pick and place, very easy to program, we’re definitely going to be purchasing more of them – they’ll help with the tight labor market.”

2. Lay the groundwork for machine learning and artificial intelligence

Over time, team members build knowledge and expertise that enables them to make complex decisions as if it were second nature. In an environment where the staff is stable and has a long tenure, companies can rely on these individuals to effectively run complex operations. However, when turnover is high and skills are limited, there is a need to invest more heavily in building the capability for machine learning.

3. Embrace Worker-Friendly Scheduling

A key labor insight that has emerged during the pandemic is that workers today clearly want a say in when they work. This marks a departure from traditional workforce operations at many production facilities, where schedules are created far in advance using a rigid, top-down approach. To effectively address worker dissatisfaction with shift work, organizations should rethink the way work is scheduled to provide employees more flexibility.

4. Champion Hourly Employee Development

Advancement training for first-level leaders and cross-training programs for the workforce as a whole are two vital components of hourly employee development that pay huge dividends in terms of hourly employee job satisfaction and operational resilience.

Advancement Training — Developing those workers who supervise your frontline staff is an important strategy for building a sustainable workforce. Employees in complex industries tend to get promoted because of their technical skills, but they often have limited training and skills for supervising people. These new leaders may have previously worked side-by-side with people they’re now supervising, so it’s crucial to equip them with the skills they need to lead, train, and discipline their staff in a way that doesn’t erode relationships.

Cross-Training — Another aspect of employee development that reaps broad benefits in the near and long term. Your best employees may not want a traditional leadership role, but they love doing the hands-on work. These workers want opportunities to broaden and deepen their skills on the job. Offering cross-training opportunities helps hourly workers feel valued and keeps them engaged over time, two factors that heavily influence hourly worker perceptions when considering employment opportunities.

Cass Precision Machining announced that it acquired Micro-Fab, a precision machining company based in Brooklyn Park, MN, on July 1, 2021. Micro-Fab will operate as a division of Cass Precision Machining. Serving the aerospace, defense, and medical industries, Micro-Fab has offered precision machining for over 30 years in Brooklyn Park, MN.   They also specialize in microparts for machining used in defense, aerospace, and medical, among other industries.

“It’s a great fit for us,” says Cass President Jim Garvin.  “Micro-Fab expands the market spaces we’re in and there are synergies with the machining and prototyping.  They provide very precise parts with high tolerances and adding such a strong group expands our capabilities at Cass. It also makes us a more diverse company.”

Micro-Fab Director Bob Past added, “At Micro-Fab we deal with more finite orders that are governed by documents,  which is more of a technical niche that we bring to the table for Cass.  It’s a win-win deal for both sides and we’re excited to be a part of such a great company like Cass”.

Micro-Fab works with nine milling centers, ten CNC turning centers, two fully equipped testing centers for quality assurance.  The new acquisition also has CAD/CAM equipment with the ability to download IGES, Parasolid, STEP, and autocad DXF/DWG files.  Their 15 employees will continue working on their site in Brooklyn Park as a division of Cass Precision Machining.

Founded in 1966 and in 2010 began focusing on manufacturing more precise parts and end-to-end solutions.  Mico-Fab specializes in aerospace, agriculture, defense, and medical industries.  They are also an ISO 9001 certified, AS9100 compliant, and NIST cybersecurity framework compliant division.

Read more “Cass Precision Machining Acquires Micro-Fab”

Change can be good for a company – be it small tweaks in the way you do things or big operational shifts. As we said in Part 1 of this blog series, taking an honest look at what’s working for your business and identifying opportunities for improvement is always a good idea. As you approach your annual planning process with an eye on identifying those key opportunities for improvement, one area to consider and assess is the performance of your machined parts suppliers. Switching machining suppliers can be a difficult decision to make, but choosing who supplies your incoming streams of materials, components or sub-assemblies can have a huge impact on your business.

Read more “Part 2: Should You Change Your Machine Supplier?”

What is High-Volume Production?

The term “high-volume production” can mean many things to many people, from both a supplier and a customer perspective. What does “high-volume production” mean to us here at Cass? We’ve prepared an overview (View PDF) that illustrates the types of parts we run on a daily basis. Our hope is that this overview helps you start thinking about potential matches between your machined-parts requirements and our strengths here at Cass.

Our core-machining competencies include screw machining, CNC milling and turning, Swiss machining and precision grinding. When it comes to high-volume production, our capabilities match up best with parts up to 3.5 inches in diameter and under 12 inches long. Over the years we’ve migrated toward making more cylindrically shaped parts than anything else – at times up to 8 inches in diameter and up to 40 inches in length. The best way to leverage Cass’s machining and grinding capabilities is to release orders to us in the thousands of pieces and up. Through strategic investments in automation, we are running parts with EAUs in the millions without losing a beat.

Read more “5 Questions to Ask Your High-Volume Machined Parts Supplier”

At Cass Precision Machining we’ve been humbled and honored to receive our share of recognition and awards over the years. The recognition is always nice, and it makes us proud of our company and our team—but it’s the knowledge that our customers are happy and satisfied with the work we do that gives us the most gratification.

At Cass we take our responsibility to our customers very seriously as evidenced by our robust, proven Quality Management System (QMS) (download PDF). Everything we make passes several inspections, or it won’t go out the door. We also conduct cross-functional quality reviews every month at Cass to assess our QMS performance and results.

Cass QMS Highlights

• Our Quality team develops a control plan that defines exactly how quality will be verified throughout the production process for every order we build.
• Our processes require set-up compliance and verification before we run the first part, and we define specific part measurements and process checks throughout the build of each order. We also deploy roving inspection as an additional compliance support tool.
• We apply Cass baseline quality control standards to every order. Examples of our baseline standards include: all machined surfaces to be 125 maximum finish, flatness to be .005” or less, perpendicularity to be .005” or less, all parts to be clean with no chips and coated with preservative as needed.
• Our QMS requires that we customize our quality control plans to meet your business needs. We do this by seamlessly integrating your additional quality requirements with our baseline standards.

Read more “How the Quality Management System (QMS) Works at Cass Precision Machining”

We recently celebrated Steve Brown’s 51-year tenure at Cass Precision Machining! Cass President Jim Garvin is seen here shaking hands with Steve (the guy with the big smile on the right) following a special presentation that Jim delivered at our year-end meeting on December 18^th 2017.

Steve started at Cass Precision Machining as an inspector in 1966 while attending college at the University of Minnesota. He graduated from the U of M while working full time at Cass, and then served in the US Air Force Reserves. Steve moved from inspection to the machine shop, helping to serve our customers in a number of machinist roles. In the 80’s, Cass recognized his leadership skills by challenging him with a foreman’s position. Steve obviously left a positive mark with the shop team as witnessed by the hearty farewells he received at this retirement celebration. In 1995, Steve joined the Cass sales team as a Sales Engineer, and served in this capacity for the past 22 years. It’s pretty amazing to note that many of us think of 22 years as a career, while in Steve’s case, it was “just a step along the way”.

Read more “Steve Brown Retires After 51 Years with Cass!”

Another holiday season is upon us, which, of course, brings us near the end of another calendar year. While 2017 can only be described as “tumultuous” from a news headlines perspective, we hope the past year has been productive and successful for your business.

It was a big year for us here at Cass Precision Machining as we rebranded with a new name, logo and website that gives our customers a better view of the many ways that we can serve them.

The end of one calendar year and the beginning of a new one is always a good time for any business to reflect on their operations – to take an honest look at what’s working for you and identify areas where you could be doing better. One area to assess could be an evaluation of your machining suppliers. Switching your machining supplier can be a difficult decision to make, but choosing who supplies your incoming streams of raw materials, components or sub-assemblies can have a huge impact on your business.

In the first part of this series, we will discuss two key areas to assess in your relationship with your machining suppliers. If you find that your suppliers aren’t meeting your expectations in these areas, a switch to a new supplier could become a part of your 2018 continuous improvement plan.

Read more “Part 1: Should You Change Your Machining Supplier in 2018?”

Thursday, October 5^th was a fun day for us at Cass Precision Machining. Our participation in Minnesota’s Dream it. Do it. Minnesota Tour of Manufacturing Day resulted in Cass hosting about 100 10^th through 12^th grade students and 10 faculty members from local schools. After welcoming students to the Cass campus, Cass President, Jim Garvin gave opening remarks about career opportunities in precision parts manufacturing. From there, we split into smaller groups for a four-stop tour of selected areas within our five-building campus. Upon completion, we rallied the students around an exhibit that featured a few of our customers’ more exciting vehicular products, along with displays of the parts that we manufacture for each vehicle.

Read more “Cass Participates in Dream It. Do It. Minnesota Tour of Manufacturing Day”