One-stop job shopping
Boeing adapts its streamlined production ideas to its formerly complicated hiring process.
By Michelle Dunlop
Herald Writer
SEATTLE - It’s easier than ever to get a job at the Boeing Co.
Boeing has simplified its formerly cumbersome application and screening process that potential employees had to endure to get a job building Boeing jets in Everett or Renton. The streamlined process benefits both Boeing and would-be workers.
Borrowing some of the “lean” principles the company uses on the assembly floor, Boeing began boiling down its hiring practices more than a year ago as plane production started to ramp up.
“What we really wanted to do was apply the lean manufacturing principles to this process,” said Rich Hartnett, who oversees hiring for Boeing.
As a result, Boeing has shaved off as much as a few weeks from the pre-employment process. More importantly for the company, Boeing has developed a steady flow of new employees onto the production floor, ensuring the company will meet its commitments to customers.
Last year, Boeing exhausted its pool of people whom the company had previously laid off. To keep Boeing’s production floor filled, the company needed to ramp up its hiring. However, unlike previous Boeing booms, the company sought to level out its erratic practices in hopes of avoiding mass layoffs when the current commercial jet order cycle cools.
In the 1990s, Boeing tried to speed up production with disastrous results. This time around, executives stress they won’t approve increases unless the production ramp-up can be done prudently.
That means Boeing needs to have the right amount of new production people on the floor each week to provide adequate on-the-job training. So Hartnett and his team have approached the hiring process much like Boeing approaches its plane production.
Each week, the staffing group gets an update of how many new employees they need to have hired in 60 days — the average amount of time it takes a potential employee to complete the screening and training required to work on Boeing’s commercial jets. They’ve consolidated into one building much of the staff involved in hiring assembly electricians, assembly mechanics and manufacturing technicians.
In the past, people looking to fill those positions were shuffled from building to building and from site to site, costing both Boeing and the candidate time. Boeing now operates a one-stop shop for job-seekers out of its employment center near Boeing Field in Seattle. The company also works with the state out of the Employment Resource Center in Everett, where 787 Dreamliner employees are hired.
Inside the hiring center in Seattle, job candidates take a three-hour assessment. Successful job-seekers work with Hartnett’s staff to complete an online application and are given a date to start training before they leave the building. Previously, candidates filled out the paperwork at home, leading to training delays.
“It was unpredictable,” Hartnett said.
Boeing also finishes its drug and background checks on hourly employees before they begin their two- to four-week training. In the past, a person could get through this unpaid training only to find out he or she failed the background check.
The changes in Boeing’s hiring process also reflect an awareness by the company of the work force in the Puget Sound region, said Cindy Wall, spokeswoman with Boeing.
“Boeing’s no longer the only game in town,” she said. “We have to compete.”