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C O O L S T U F F 2 0 2 2 • A Guide to Career Opportunities in Central Mass. 19 Along with the tangibility of his work, Brady said the impact and importance of manufacturing vital products makes it so rewarding. At the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic, manufacturers at Hologic continued to work 24/7 to keep these essential devices available to the public, while also manufacturing a COVID test. Even in non-life-saving industries, there's often a sense of pride and owner- ship coming with creating a product and seeing the physical result at the end of the day. "There's a real heightened sense of camaraderie," said Adam Romanow, the vice president of the Massachusetts Brewers Guild and a co-founder of Castle Island Brewing Co. in Norwood. "A lot of people get into beer out of a pas- sion for the prod- uct and that ends up breeding a shared sense of purpose among our pro- duction team, people who feel like they're coming to work with a mission in mind." On-site skill building Romanow opened Castle Island in 2015 with two friends, neither of whom had much professional experience in the beer industry. One was a film studies major who made a documentary about beer and got interested in the field, and the other was a journalist who just loved beer. Most of Romanow's employees come from a wide range of backgrounds but are drawn together by an interest in the product. "It's really more a mentality and a work ethic that makes for a productive employee on the brewing and production side, more so than a technical expertise in brewing sci- ence," he said. This is a similarity across most of the field. While some product development positions require a college degree in engi- neering, most production jobs require very little experience, and anything beyond a high school diploma is icing on the cake, said Jessica Barnes, the human resources director at FLEXcon in Spencer. "It's very specialized work," said Barnes, whose company produces labels and film products. "There's not a lot of schools that can train somebody specifically for this, so we do all the training in-house." FLEXcon, which employs roughly 730 people, makes an effort to pair new, younger workers with older employees to help pass technical knowledge onto new hires. The average tenure at FLEXcon is 20 years, so older employees have a wealth of information, which can help young people explore different career paths, Barnes said. "There's a wide range of opportunities that the manufacturing industry provides," said Kshama Vyas, who's been an employee at the lithium battery recycling manufactur- er Ascend Elements in Westborough for Adam Romanow NUMBER OF MANUFACTURING EMPLOYEES IN MASSACHUSETTS Employees Year (in thousands) 2012 250.3 2013 247.8 2014 245.8 2015 246.4 2016 243.5 2017 241.3 2018 242.4 2019 244.8 2020 224.7 2021 231.3 2022 240.5 Source: U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics Jessica Barnes Workers at Spencer manufacturer FLEXcon handle duties ranging from production to administration. PHOTO | COURTESY OF FLEXCON