With a growing number of boomers retiring, they're taking with them long-held beliefs, workstyles, and, in many instances, great quantities of tribal knowledge. Losing the latter — that exclusive, often technical, product or process information that is stored inside someone’s head — is what will be most felt by the companies they are departing. In the manufacturing world, this knowledge may be as basic as understanding why an eerie sound is provided when a huge piece of expensive equipment warrants maintenance. It may be how to do makeshift fixes of key assets using tools, wires, and who knows what. It may be a technician who many, many years ago came up with an obscure software workaround to enable old databases and servers to continue to interoperate. No one else may ever figure out how to keep this system running without an expensive new fix.

 

It’s in a company’s best interest to obtain as much of this intelligence as possible to help ease the conversion to a newer, younger workforce — even if those workers don’t buy in to the way things were earlier done. The outflow of baby boomers and influx of millennials and soon Generation Z is taking place additionally as massive technology changes impact industries, including the Industry 4.0 innovations. This confluence of events is meant to leave a knowledge gap and, possibly, a skills gap ahead. Retaining or repurposing tribal knowledge for consumption by younger workers is indeed a challenge. The competitive advantage goes to companies that find ways to pull it off.

 

Here are some strategies to help:

 

1. Transfer knowledge the YouTube way

Yes, encouraging the documentation of processes is smart, but doing it by using the written word … not really much. Older workers mainly do not like writing instructions (and do not always get them right). And many younger workers don’t care to pore over pages and pages of steps. Try using videos to share knowledge via YouTube, which has pioneered showing people how to do things. For example, documenting how to make sensors and software work together to provide asset conditioning monitoring data can be much more advantageous with a visual dimension. Your videos don’t have to be anything fancy (and don’t even have to go on YouTube). Make them simple and consumable and share with only those who need to know. Having a veteran maintenance tech wear enterprise-connected smartglasses and record their work is one easy way to do it.

 

2. Leverage smart technology to capture intelligence

By acquiring data and applying machine learning or natural language processing to analyze it for patterns and conditions, technology is basically pulling exclusive information out of someone’s head and making it visible to teams. If you have workers writing daily logs or providing voice recordings that recap activities, getting them to tag key information using their tribal knowledge can help machine learning synthesize the unstructured data and turn it into valuable insights. Your new generation of workers is expecting that technology be applied this way to pass down information.

 

3. Move away from break/fix to maintenance reliability

Today, the worker who got up at 3 a.m. to repair a machine is judged a hero. Maintenance teams that are always adequately troubleshooting problems are star performers. But what if machines rarely failed, and maintenance teams were free to attend to the needs of the whole operation, proactively? With computerized maintenance management systems (CMMS) and Industrial Internet of Things (IIoT) platforms, processes can be automated and maintenance more predictive. This enables companies to more efficiently manage assets, free up maintenance resources, and offset the loss of their longtime fix-it gurus.

 

4. Provide workplace technology that is faster and simpler

Management can learn from current generations and their affinity for applications and tools that are easy to operate and accessible from anywhere. Products from companies like Apple, Google, Amazon, and Microsoft have shaped their views on technology. Many, as for instance, prefer touchscreen functionality over knobs and dials. While it may be challenging to build the tools they will adopt, it’s time to start. This new, “consumerized” or “democratized” technology may be lacking decades of tribal knowledge, but it is here to stay. And it's best to make the change now while the both the experienced workers with tribal knowledge and the younger digital natives are all still in the plant to work together on making the transition the right way.

 

5. Encourage online problem solving

A long tradition is out there of testing a job candidate’s tech knowledge and skills by not allowing them to access the internet for help. It’s time to reconsider this. For young workers today, the internet is a go-to problem-solving tool. Whether they are job candidates, software developers, or whatever, avoid forcing them to express an ability to recall knowledge. Encourage them to generate any and all resources to get the job done.

 

6. Incentivize employees to learn from each other

At a variety of companies, resentment runs both ways. Older workers may be annoyed at seeing younger counterparts move in with new ideas and ways of working. Younger workers may envy the older generation for sticking around and delaying their chances for leadership roles and promotions. It’s not one generation immediately displacing another — the demographic shift is gradual, and seasoned employees will definitely be around for some time. There is much to be gained by offering incentives for them to spend time together sharing and learning. Get creative here. There are quite a few gamification companies out there ready and willing. It’s a win-win and the knowledge transfer does help the company.

 

7. Cultivate young leadership for driving change

For around the foreseeable future, companies will need people, as robots will only take over jobs that do not demand much thinking and analysis. Leaders will come from all the generations in the workforce, but the Gen Xers — those between the baby boomers and millennials — may be your best option for driving change. They get the need for smart technology, but they also respect and value experience and tribal knowledge. The fact is, they have much of their own.

 

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