With steady recent growth and a favorable outlook for capital spending in the wake of recent tax reform, many manufacturers are well-positioned to pursue investments into restructuring initiatives and efficiency-building programs.
That includes hiring talent with specialized skillsets, a particular challenge considering the current tightening labor pool of available finance and accounting professionals.
How are manufacturers addressing this challenge?
To find out, we asked Aston Carter account manager Bowen Knarr Jr. He’s specialized in placing niche finance and accounting talent in this industry for nearly a decade.
Seeing the Value of Specialization
Given the current labor market, CFOs and hiring managers facing large-scale implementations of recent accounting changes such as revenue recognition and leased asset reporting may find themselves struggling to fulfill their finance and accounting staffing needs, and feel tempted to compromise on position requirements.
That hasn’t been the case in manufacturing.
“In this sector, the hiring trend has been towards even more specialization,” says Knarr. “Even when faced with a difficult set of requirements, manufacturers have been sticking to their guns about what their needs are. They don't want to risk hiring anybody who would be a bad fit.”
Opportunity, Patience and Adjusting to the New Reality
With the labor market being what it is, manufacturers have favored a more flexible approach to accounting and finance hiring. In particular, hiring managers have pursued active partnerships with recruiting firms to be more responsive to talent as it becomes available.
Says Knarr, “I recently had lunch with a VP of Finance who told me, ‘Any time you see someone who has the relevant skills, I want you to send them to me. Every single time, whether I have an opening or not, I always want to see those people.’ Because he understands how niche his target skillset is, he’s willing to be patient and make adjustments to his team based on labor availability, and also take action when an opportunity presents itself.”
Medium-Term Labor is at a Premium
Efficiency has always been the name of the game in manufacturing, and the current climate is no exception.
As manufacturing companies reorient their structure to consolidate market share of niche subsectors and vertically integrate supply chains, they’ve also taken the opportunity to leverage their capital towards large-scale efficiency projects such as software installs. Both activities — mergers, acquisitions and divestments on one hand, and project implementation on the other — put a premium on specialized medium-term contract labor.
“Many of these companies are investing in systems that take two or three years to implement, which requires a volume of contract labor to help them handle the increased workload,” says Knarr. “The post-implementation end game may significantly reduce accounting labor costs, but in the meantime, their staff has to double.”
Data Now, and Even More Data Later
Internet of Things integration, automation, and cloud-based software are trends in every industry, but even more so in manufacturing. The staffing needs of companies in this sector are evolving apace.
It’s now more important than ever for manufacturers to cultivate finance and accounting talent who not only have the requisite skills to implement such changes, but who will also be able to handle analysis of the huge data outputs that result from successful installations.
“One thing I’m hearing more of is a need for financial analysts who also love working through a large amount of data,” says Knarr. “Great employees need to be passionate about it, because more data is always on the way.”
Building a Specialized Hiring Strategy
So what’s the right finance and accounting hiring strategy for companies in sectors such as manufacturing, who are implementing structural changes while drawing from a tight pool of specialized finance and accounting talent?
It depends.
“There are two approaches I recommend most often,” says Knarr. “You can either move your current staff onto implementation projects and then backfill their day-to-day responsibilities with contract resources, or you can bring in contract labor at the consultant level who have project implementation experience, and let them run the project.”
“Either way, you’ll need a staffing partner with enough experience in your sector to ask the right questions,” he adds.
Are you confident that your staffing partner has sufficient knowledge of both the talent pool and your industry? If not, maybe it’s time to reevaluate. Contact Aston Carter now.
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