Manufacturing success – don’t hide it away

I was interested to read Anthony's recent article on "Manufacturing Success"....at 63 years young and spent a life time in manufacturing, mechanical, electrical and plastics a thought crossed my mind to put something back into society; as part of my career was in training and personnel management. It came as a bit of a surprise when I spoke to my young daughter who teaches at a special school for severely disabled children that I would have to go through a CRB Check before I could even contemplate coming into any school to talk about school leavers and looking to a career in manufacturing industry !!! Shame...and we wonder why we have a problem of attracting youngsters into a fantastic industry.

- 12 July 2012 - Peter Silvester

Don't forget that the R in PRW stands for Rubber, and it may be that the plastics industry are unwilling to release information that might be of interest, but if the PRW bother to attend conferences such as DKT in Germany last week or the Oil Industry & Polymers conference that will take place in October run by MERL then I am sure they would be able to illustrate how much of the rubber industry have a different view of sharing interesting technical information to gain new business

- 11 July 2012 - Chris Wheeler

Anthony, it was a pleasure to welcome you to our facilities here in Leicester and most certainly we shared some fascinating and compelling discussions. I have to agree with your sentiments in that “we don’t blow our trumpets” enough in the UK, Europe, the Middle East, the Far East and the America’s. UK PLC Manufacturing is competing in a fierce international market that today is highly adoptive, flexible and importantly innovative in its ability to provide worldwide solutions. Yet the desire to run to the top of the roof and scream “we did it” is somewhat muted and tempered down. So the question would be why? Throughout the manufacturing industry the subject will be broached at all levels, yet the reality is that providing innovation would actually entail disclosing those very details and creating an upbeat atmosphere, allowing the ability to showcase highly innovative technological solutions but importantly signalling to the competitive forces a desire to succeed, engineering intelligence and prowess. Of course we have external micro and macro factors to consider, complex trading laws, cultural barriers to entry, supply chain management, pricing issues, old traditional market places as compared to the new international market place. The reality is that UK PLC manufacturing has been highly successful from the turn of the last century in its ability to conquer and provide complete turn-key engineering solutions, yet the irony is over 100 years ago new inventions, new ideas, new finds were plastered on every sign post around the world and today with the advent of advanced communications systems, sadly we remain silent. The outlook is not determined by growth as indicated by market analysis and the powerful financial city folk, but by a group of individuals whose organisations allow them to “think”, “engineer”, “design” and ultimately “produce” products that drive solutions and deliver value to create sustainability and future development. And UK PLC manufacturing has an abundance of those very organisations, let us climb the hillocks and raise the flag and show our leadership for future generations to come

- 10 July 2012 - Tanver Ali