Women In Manufacturing Summit

Save the dates: September 23 - 25, 2015

Attract!

Retain!

Advance!

It is hard to believe that almost four years have passed since I participated in the inaugural Women in Manufacturing symposium. In lieu of a blog post this week, I am passing on information about the upcoming 2015 summit and sharing a #ThrowbackThursday picture of the amazing women who contributed with me on the 2011 Best Practices Discussion Panel:

Women in Manufacturing™ is a nearly 500-member-strong national organization dedicated to the attraction, retention and advancement of women who are pursuing or have chosen a career in the manufacturing industry.  This group encourages the engagement of women who want to share perspectives, gain cutting-edge manufacturing information, improve leadership and communication skills, and participate in sponsoring programs and network with industry peers. - See more at: http://www.womeninmanufacturing.org/

The Women in Manufacturing SUMMIT will be held September 23 - 25, 2015 in Minneapolis, MN. This annual SUMMIT is geared toward women who have chosen careers in manufacturing and want to share perspectives and network with others in the industry. SUMMIT 2015 is expected to attract more than 300 professional women in manufacturing with titles ranging from production to CEO. The agenda includes optional plant tours of Medtronics, Valspar, Pentair, or Caterpillar; a discussion of Generations & Gender; Transforming Your Manufacturing Business for the Digital Age; Smart Girls in STEM; Workforce Development, and much more! – To register: http://www.womeninmanufacturing.org/summit2015/register-now

If you like this post and want to catch up on some of my previous discussions, please visit the full Purposed Work blog at http://ltr-latrobe-mfg.blogspot.com/.

Success in Good Works

I have learned that success is to be measured

not so much by the position that one has reached in life

as by the obstacles which he has overcome 

while trying to succeed.

Booker T. Washington

It's that time of year where prom season quickly transitions into graduation and new beginnings. In our family, my oldest niece is preparing to graduate from high school and head off to college in the fall. My middle niece is beginning to make decisions about whether her post graduation plans include vocational training or university studies. And my son is considering the courses he will take in high school, based on his CAP assessment. Three unique young minds with one thing in common, to answer the question, what do I want to be when I grow up?

When our mom grew up, the conventional wisdom was to get a good job and begin a family. A generation ago, we were told to go to college to position yourself for a long-term career. Our children, Millennials,  have so many options and possibilities, that it is challenging to make a decision today about finding career success in a world that is rapidly changing, that will not be the same a decade, let alone 40 - 50 years from now. So what advice are you giving to children trying to decide on secondary education paths?

Over the years, I have become an advocate of vocational training before deciding on a profession. If I had one regret about the decisions I made immediately after graduation, it is that I did not know how to do anything with my hands. I can solve almost any math problem put before me, but if I had to earn a living, I have no immediate skills to fall back on. Jokingly (and seriously), I always wanted to become a welder. Fast forward to present day and my imagination runs wild with the possibility what I could do in manufacturing if I owned and operated a welding shop!

If you look at the history of several well-known colleges and universities, many began as industrial training schools that met the immediate needs of the workforce during that era. Somehow along the way, industrial, or vocational training, became stigmatized as less valuable that university training, but is it really? When you consider the cost of attending a four-year institution, you have to ask, is the return-on-investment a real value in today's rapidly changing society. I challenge that notion.

Some of the most successful people that I know are entrepreneurs with in demand skills. I have a friend who followed his families' business as a master barber and has franchised beauty and barber shops around the region. By the same token, another friend is a plumber, a vocation whose skills always have and always will be in high demand. What both of these gentlemen have in common is they started with basic skills and transformed their companies into success stories not imaginable a few decades ago.

There are no particular route to finding success in the workplace and in a career. We used to measure success by the education required to obtain the job, or the job title earned. Today, our children have so many more options because the expectation is not to get a job, work for forty years, and retire from that company. Life and opportunity give them so many more options to consider that their measure of success will be different that how we defined it. And that is OK. The thing we have to instill in them is that regardless of the path they choose, it will require hard work and dedication to overcome the obstacles they will face along the way.  How are you encouraging the young people in your life to measure what they consider success in their purposed work? Feel free to comment, or send me an email at latanyua.robinson@gmail.com. If you like this post, and want to  catch up on some of my previous discussion, please visit the full Purposed Work blog at http://ltr-latrobe-mfg.blogspot.com/.

Obedience in Good Works

Obedience is better than sacrifice…

(1 Samuel 15:22)

If you really know me, you know that I profess the Holy Spirit’s grace and mercy by speaking favor over my life. By the instruction of David Frazier, I wave my hand over my head whenever I say the word FAVOR and declare that I believe all that His Word says about me. So when things happen in my life that I do not understand, I know that in the spirit, the experience is for my good. And that faith is what keeps me sane as my family enters a new season and begins a new journey.

When I first learned that we were re-locating again for my husband’s career, my first response was what? My second response…now?  All I could think about were the efforts exhausted during the past three years to become a part of the community. As I tried to reconcile the enormity of a move, everything around me kept reminding me that obedience is better than sacrifice. And that faith, knowing that humble submission to the Father’s will, is greater than any personal sacrifice that I have to make as my family enters this new season and begins our new journey.

When I finally settled down to examine how this change aligned with His Word spoken over my life, He revealed that none of this is a surprise, exposing the rams that He had already positioned for this moment: the teams and infrastructure in place that keep us connected to clients, regardless of physical location; the location of our new home that puts me less than thirty minutes away from a major international airport; and my favorite, the loyalty points that have already been accumulated that can be used to visit the office during the transition months. And that faith, seeing small examples of favor in my life, is what allows me to walk with bolder confidence that this is working for our good as my family enters this new season and begins our new journey.

When I opened my eyes and my heart to see the possibilities in our new community, I realized that I am in a fertile land to expand the purposed work as advocates of educating young people about the 21st century realities of manufacturing and other STEM related careers. I know that I am exactly where I am supposed to be for a time such as this. And that faith, knowing that grace and mercy came before me, is the best blessing of all as my family enters this new season and begins our new journey.

Waving my hand over my head, I speak FAVOR over my life and over my family’s life in our new home. This move is not what I planned, yet, I know that it is for the good of my purposed work. Not my will, but Thy Will be done, thus I submit: obedience is better than sacrifice. If you would like to share your experiences about re-locating while building a business, or being obedient to unplanned events in your good works, let us know by commenting or sending an email to latanyua.robinson@gmail.com. If you like this post and want to catch up on some of the previous discussions, please visit the full Purposed Work blog at http://ltr-latrobe-mfg.blogspot.com/.

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