“Less is more” may make sense when you’re talking about limiting unhealthy foods or reducing the clutter in your home, but for Canadian manufacturers the opposite is true.
Whether they’re producing luxury goods or everyday staples, more is more — in other words, increases in production have a direct correlation to boosts in revenue. This in turn leads to greater capacity to invest in tools to enhance the business, hire more people and enter new markets.
Increasing output isn’t just important for individual manufacturers across Canada. Invigorating growth is critical to the sector as a whole because it has a direct impact on the entire economy. If manufacturers prosper, in other words, that means more for businesses of every size to sell and provide to their customers.
This was some of the thinking that inspired an effort that began in 2015 to reimagine what is possible in Canadian manufacturing and to set some ambitious goals.
Through a collaboration with many companies, including Salesforce, the Canadian Manufacturers & Exporters (CME) and the Canadian Manufacturing Coalition have devised a strategy which is known as Industrie 2030. It is based on consultation with more than 1,250 executives and comprehensive research.
At the crux of Industrie 2030 is the idea that, within 15 years from when the initiative began, the Canadian manufacturing sector will double its output and value-added exports. The full details are available in a report, Manufacturing Growth, Innovation and Prosperity for Canada, that serves as a blueprint and action plan.
This may sound ambitious, but Industrie 2030 is based on hard data about how the sector has evolved. Since 2008, for example, manufacturing across the country has been growing at a rate of 4.5%. Doubling output would mean moving up only a couple of percentage points to 4.7%.
If Industrie 2030 is successful, it will have a transformative effect on everything from career possibilities to Canada’s competitiveness on the world stage. According to the report, manufacturers here already employ 1.7 million people and pays the highest in total wages of any other economic segment. With annual sales of $610 billion, meanwhile, manufacturing contributes 10.5% of Canada’s GDP, and exports of manufactured goods make up $348 billion of Canada’s trade balance.
By executing on the current plan, however, doubling output in Canadian manufacturing would generate $1.2 trillion to the economy and $696 billion in exports.
Eight years might still feel like a considerable timeline, but delivering on Industrie 2030’s objectives mean manufacturers can’t afford to waste any time. Some of the key steps should include:
1. Embracing Automation And Digitization In Production Processes
Despite the opportunities to lower production costs, increase productivity and develop innovative new products, the Industrie 2030 reports that manufacturers have been slow to adopt the technologies available to them.
This stems, in part, from concerns about what will be involved in integrating technologies into existing operations, the report added, and what the impact will be.
Fortunately, those attitudes are changing as technologies like cloud computing, machine learning and data analytics become more mature. Manufacturers are also recognizing the potential to connect sensors and equipment to online applications, which in this sector is referred to as the Industrial Internet of Things (IIoT).
In the most recent Advanced Manufacturing Outlook Report produced by Annex Media, 89% of manufacturers surveyed said they see the IIoT as a growth opportunity. Perhaps even more encouraging, 62% of companies said they now know where to find government programs to help with technology investments. This was an increase of 42% from 2020.
2. Moving To Data-Driven Business Processes
The promise of technology in manufacturing isn’t limited to what happens on the factory floor. Much like their counterparts in segments such as retail, hospitality and financial services, manufactures have access to purpose-built tools to enhance key business processes.
Within many manufacturing firms, for example, growth is stymied by a lack of visibility into key areas such as sales. It’s difficult to combat margin pressure when you’re manually having to look up information about orders, material inventory and activity from reseller partners.
Platforms like Salesforce Manufacturing Cloud solve that challenge by providing a cloud-based CRM that can act as a single source of truth about what’s happening. Having all the right data in the same place — such as net new opportunities and customer agreements — puts manufacturers in a better position to handle demand forecasting, and even extend forecast visibility to their partners.
Once they get started, manufacturers can accelerate their efforts to reach Industrie 2030 targets by using rebate management features to boost customer loyalty and incentivize partners. Even long-standing challenges, such as connecting to back-end systems like ERP, are easier to address today thanks to tools like MuleSoft.
3. Empowering Employees With Learning And Skills Development
Manufacturing involves far more than simply machinery, of course. As with any other kind of business, people are often what make the biggest difference in terms of long-term success.
This is why the Industrie 2030 plan begins with a look at the existing labour force, and astutely predicts a shift from manual, repetitive kinds of tasks to jobs that depend on specialized knowledge work and the ability to solve complex problems.
Some of the labour needs of the future will require recruiting different kinds of talent and working with government to support hiring of skilled foreign workers. It’s also possible to reskill or in some cases upskill traditional manufacturing employees to master digital and data-driven roles.
Platforms like Trailhead, for example, were designed as a free and accessible way for people of any background to learn how to manage CRM, marketing automation, customer service applications and even artificial intelligence tools from scratch. Thousands have already done so, including plenty of people from manufacturing.
Other ideas include partnering with schools to ensure industry and academia are aligned on their labour needs, and to run pilot programs that develop staff who can train their coworkers.
Industrie 2030 isn’t just a worthy initiative — it’s critical to Canada’s economic growth and prosperity. The next eight years offer an unprecedented opportunity to ensure the future of manufacturing is a bright one.
