Rather than replacing your staff, robots improve their jobs.
With an ongoing labor shortage, many companies are turning to robots for help. They have a well-proven track record for relieving employees of the dull and dirty tasks and freeing them up for more interesting and upskilled jobs. But what does that look like exactly? The scenarios are varied from one organization to the next, but they generally have several features in common.
Below is a specific case where a company was able to add a variety of robots—totaling 100 systems—and subsequently experience a big reduction in turnover. It began with short staffing—daily, the warehouse dealt with 10 percent to 20 percent fewer employees than it needed for daily operations. Additionally, the company dealt with average turnover of 100 percent of its team every six months.
Several issues arose with the short staffing. One is that problems often got swept under the rug—with daily fires to put out due to short staffing, the company was focused on getting packages out the door. That meant they overlooked bigger issues. The company also faced safety issues because its employees were stuck trying to move or lift heavy products, leaving the organization vulnerable to worker’s compensation payouts. With an unsustainable system, the company began looking into robots.
The company settled on three types of robots: Fixed induction robots, which take product from the conveyor to a sortation system; fixed sortation robots, which move products into a destination container or sack; and autonomous mobile robots (AMRs), which deliver the products to the shipping area for the right outbound trucks.
With robots there to take over the monotonous and difficult jobs, the company was able to offer its employees new, upskilled jobs. For instance, some became robot mechanics, learning how to keep the new equipment up and running at all hours. Other became leads in the exception areas, directing packages and personnel to sort and manage packages that needed a fix before heading out the door.
With new skill sets, the company found that retention drastically improved. Employees took pride in the robotics systems they operated—some even created names for their robot partners. One facility—which had 12 robots—allowed each employee of the month to pick a name for a robot this delivered more buy-in. The bottom line is that robots can deliver more fulfillment to your current employees and attract new ones when facing staffing shortages.
It’s important to point out that none of the additional 100 robots in this company replaced a single employee. Often, the perception is that robots are there to take jobs. As this organization demonstrated, the robots gave employees new purpose and engagement with their work, a winning solution for everyone involved. Upskilling your workers is an effective tool for solving the labor shortage, and robots allow you to provide that.
Learn more about The Robotics Group (TRG): mhi.org/trg
For further articles from the The Robotics Group (TRG):
How to Justify the Cost of Robotics–Part 1
Podcast: Robotics and Humans: A Synergistic Workforce
Order Orchestration Optimization Through Robots
Robotics in Logistics, Part 2 – You’ve Decided to Add Robots—Now What?
