Worcester Business Journal

6 Worcester Business Journal • July 18, 2016 www.wbjournal.com Course Contest sponsors Dr. Robert E. Johnson and Michelle Jones-Johnson; Morgan Stanley; Webster First Federal Credit Union; Worcester Business Journal Driving range sponsors Colleen Barrett; Herb Kelleher; Montachusett Regional Vocational Technical High School; Morgan Stanley; Silver Fox Coaches tee anD green sponsors Aruba Networks, an HPE Company; Dr. Colleen Bielitz; BossMark; Dr. Ann Brown '87; Christine Cassidy '15; Cogswell Sprinkler Company, Inc.; Commerce Bank; Country Bank; Cutler Associates, Inc.; Atty. James A. Maloney; Mass Communications, Inc.; MedStar Ambulance; Mike Savino Film/Video; Mosaic Technology Corporation; Patrick Motors; Providence and Worcester Railroad Company; Reliant Medical Group; Rollstone Bank and Trust; Skoler, Abbott & Presser, P.C.; Sterling Concrete tee sponsors American Printing and Envelope Co., Inc.; Bollus Lynch, LLP; Brocade Communications; EMCOR Services – New England Mechanical; Mirick O'Connell; Southbridge Savings Bank; WB Mason Thank You! Challenge MatCh sponsor – Mary DeFeudis 61 Sever Street Worcester, MA 01609 1.877.523.2537 www.becker.edu speCial thanks to the aCCoMMoDating staff at the haven Country Club! FOR MAKING THE 24 TH ANNUAL BECKER COLLEGE LLEW EVANS SCHOLARSHIP GOLF TOURNAMENT SUCH A TREMENDOUS SUCCESS! event sponsors Becker College Alumni Association WinnDevelopment 19 th hole reCeption sponsor The Rowden Family bbQ lunCh sponsor Arthur "Jay" DiGeronimo & Family gift sponsor Christine Cassidy '15 golf Cart sponsors Fletcher Tilton PC Attorneys at Law Risk Strategies Company beverage Cart sponsors Chartwells Educational Dining Services Saint Vincent Hospital Schwartz Charitable Foundation sCoreboarD sponsors Coghlin Electrical Contractors, Inc. Seven Hills Foundation SSC Wilson Language Training Thanks to you, we had a sold-out event, and raised more than $128,000! After helping industry specialize, MassMEP president steps aside This demographic shift in the manu- facturing community played a major part in the charting the direction and programs at MassMEP, a statewide orga- nization based in Worcester tasked with providing manufacturers with the resources needed to succeed. At the start – and still at its heart – is Jack Healy, who stepped down as president and CEO on July 1. "Jack has made a great contribution to help small manufacturers prepare for world markets and the future," said Leslie Greis, owner and director at Worcester metal former and processor Kinefac Corp. "Jack understands what is impor- tant to manufacturers….and MassMEP has made it easy for small manufacturers to have resources at their fingertips." Healy said many small companies are reluctant to invest time, money and resources in training programs because they worry that once an employee is professionally accomplished, they will leave for greener pastures. Large compa- nies are also more likely to have estab- lished internal training and skills enhancement capabilities. Healy saw the need for an outside organization like MassMEP to help pro- vide training resources and career path- ways to prepare qualified people to join these smaller companies, enabling them to grow, and collaborate with secondary schools such as Worcester Polytechnic Institute, Quinsigamond Community College and UMass Lowell to build and expand their manufacturing training and certification programs. "If we lost manufacturing in the met- ropolitan Worcester area, we would be in tough shape," Healy said. Manufacturing represents about $6.4 billion dollars of economic activity in Central Massachusetts, according to BEA, representing 19.9 percent of the private sector's gross domestic product – compared to 12 percent statewide. MassMEP has worked with 1,800 manufacturers since its inception, Healy said, providing these companies with consulting, business and management advice through its professional project managers, job-training programs, established skill standards and associ- ated testing, and industry advocacy to policymakers. Industry growth Healy said many people don't under- stand the true meaning of employment numbers – where statewide manufac- turing employment dropped 39 percent between 1998 and 2014, according to BEA – since true industry growth comes from efficiency and competitiveness. "Everybody thinks of that [decline] as a negative because they equate every- thing in manufacturing to jobs," Healy said. "We are doing it with a small busi- ness economy…We have a fraction of the workforces producing that growth." BEA data shows Massachusetts com- pounded annual GDP growth rate for the past three years was 3.4 percent versus the U.S. average of 3.3 percent, but the state's overall performance is even more dramatic when compared to the New England average of 2.3 percent. Massachusetts' manufacturing GDP grew slightly faster on a cumulative basis (19.9 percent), than the U.S. man- ufacturing GDP since 2010 (18.4 per- BY JOHN MCINTYRE Worcester Business Journal Staff Writer I n 1999, when the Massachusetts Manufacturing Extension Partnership was founded, the state had 43 manufacturers with more than 1,000 employees. Today, it has 10. Instead, 70 percent of Central Massachusetts manufactur- ers have 20 employees or less, according to the U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis. Jack Healy, who stepped down as president and CEO of MassMEP on July 1, still works in an advisory capacity on a new high-tech initiative. P H O T O / F I L E

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