Manufacturing 2.0
Rock River Valley manufacturing experts discuss the many facets of manufacturing: technology, education, training, events, people and any other aspects of this important segment of our economy. They’ll use this blog to get the word out and solicit feedback on local and global manufacturing. They hope to better engage our employers, employees and our future work force and increase their understanding of manufacturing.

Archive for July 24th, 2008

Stop Talking-Start Doing

Add comment July 24th, 2008

The IBM commercials with Innovation Man are a hoot. They portray a middle-aged guy in a makeshift super hero costume going on about innovation. The commercial ends with the on-screen text, “Stop Talking. Start Doing.”

For the last year, District 205 has quietly been doing what it said it would do: start a career-focused high school. The Academic Career Education High School (ACE High School) will begin its 2008 school year with 55 adventurous sophomores interested in myriad technical and health care careers. A hallmark of ACE will be its attention to work-related issues like safety. ACE students will go through OSHA 10-hour General Industry training. Our reason: We want our ACE students to DO. And in order to do they need to be safe in work environments. We see it as “doing” our part to build a qualified workforce for our community.

So go ahead and click on the link for the Innovation Man spot and know that District 205 is poised for more “doing.”

Export Sales Falling?

Add comment July 24th, 2008

Ever wonder why export sales in the summer fall off for a while?

Europe has a practice of closing their factories from 2-4 weeks each summer so all employees can enjoy that period of time.  By all employees doing this at the same time, no one is pressured to “stay in touch”.  My Italian customer closes for a 4 week period in August so we typically don’t ship orders for a 4 week period.  France has a different time period.  The Netherlands has a system that divides the country into thirds and each year they rotate which third goes on vacation, each third doing it at a different time.

So if you want to get confused about vacation times in Europe, try shipping to each country!