Manufacturing companies all have one thing in common, the need to recruit and retain employees and this can be a time consuming and expensive task.

Good quality and relevant pay information can be invaluable, a fact reflected by the number of queries EEF, the manufacturers’ organisation receives on pay. This bi-annual survey is an extensive benchmark of over 100 jobs, focusing on manual employees and lower level staff workers – up to supervisory level.

Readers of The Manufacturer can purchase this report as part of an exclusive subscription to EEF’s pay benchmark series, which also includes the Directors’ and Professionals’ Pay Benchmarks.  The four reports that make up this subscription provide pay from an unskilled Labourer through to professional engineers, managers and right up to Managing Director level.

The subscription is on offer for a reduced price of £1,496 (+ VAT), which is a 25% saving on the full cost of the series.

To download your free sample of the latest Workforce Pay Benchmark report, please click the Download button.

To order your subscription to the pay benchmark reports, please go to http://www.themanufacturer.com/eef-pay-benchmarking-report/

Or for further information email: infoline@eef.org.uk and quote TMPB2013.

The continued importance of our oil and gas industry is reinforced by the results from the latest annual survey of international activity in the Oil & Gas sector – produced by Scottish Enterprise in conjunction with the Scottish Council for Development and Industry (SCDI).

The survey results show strong growth in international sales at a time when many parts of the world economy have been experiencing continued economic difficulty.

“The international sales figure of £8.2bn for 2011 represents an increase of 8.4% – almost double that of the 4.5% rise recorded in the 2010 survey,” says DAvid Rennie, International Sector Head, Oil & Gas
at Scottish Enterprise. “These results are very welcome and highlight Scotland’s oil and gas supply chain as our single largest export sector which now operates in over 100 countries. International sales now account for a record 47.6% of total sales from the sector. When we consider that in 2002 this figure was 31%, the ever increasing importance of an international focus to the long term future of the industry in Scotland is clear.”

How do you know if the salary package for your directors is giving you the right balance and rewarding your senior executives?  One way is to use salary surveys and EEF’s Directors’ Pay Benchmark can fulfil this brief.

EEF’s latest annual report, published in February this year, provides job by job pay rates for 13 director level roles in the manufacturing and engineering sectors, from Managing Director through to Sales Director.  Users can quickly and easily find the relevant basic and total pay rates for their region and across the UK.  However, the benefits do not stop there; this benchmark report provides additional salary breakdowns, allowing further refinement by company size and sub sector of manufacturing and engineering.

The subscription is on offer for a reduced price of £1,496 (+ VAT), which is a 25% saving on the full cost of the series.  The will be published throughout 2013, with the Directors’ Pay Benchmark and Workforce Pay Benchmark, Issue 8 2013, ready for immediate send out.  The remaining Workforce Pay Benchmark will be published in September and the Professionals’ Pay Benchmark in November.

To download your free sample of the latest Directors’ Pay Benchmark, please click the download button.

To order your subscription to the pay benchmark reports, please go to: http://www.themanufacturer.com/eef-pay-benchmarking-report/

According to manufacturing trade body EEF, there is significant disparity between the opportunity for industry to benefit from UK tax breaks, and the amounts being claimed.

The manufacturing sector conducts 72% of all research and development taking place in the UK today says EEF. And yet only 40% of R&D tax credit claims come from manufacturing companies. SMEs seem to be the main segment missing out with Mark Evans of tax specialist R&D Tax Claims reporting that of 150,000 SMEs eligible to claim for R&D relief in the UK, 93% do not do so.

Lack of awareness, and a fear of having insufficient time and resources to optimise a claim are the most common reasons for an under-utilised tax infrastructure according to a recent survey of EEF members.

In this brief report, finance and tax professionals set out to deconstruct those barriers, opening the way for a clearer understanding of who can benefit from tax schemes targeted at manufacturing and how to manage the claim process.

A strategic outlook for the UK’s mid-sized manufacturers

Mid-sized businesses (MSBs), the forgotten tranche of the manufacturing economy, need more attention as the world gets smaller. They have the critical mass and potential to grow and take advantage of the changing firmament: higher raw material and transport costs, greater regulation and new production technologies.

There is evidence that global production will no longer be the default approach for large scale manufacture and that regionalisation, and localisation, will occur in many sectors. Reshoring of production will increase.

Switching from a focus on increasing exports to controlling productive assets and factories in each of the markets a company wants to serve will change the manufacturing base. More foreign ownership structures will be created, domestic production will increase and there will be a reduction in trade. Only products will high value-density will remain economical to produce at a distance from their point of use.

This report, published by the Royal Society for the encouragement of Arts, Manufactures and Commerce (RSA), explains how the world of production is changing, its likely effect on MSBs and multinational companies and how the UK economy will win and lose from the changes.

Many of today’s industrial manufacturing companies have grown into diverse organisations, with multiple business divisions operating across a number of countries and regions.

This web of complexity has been made worse by iterative organisational change over the last 10-20 years.

In this paper PwC shares its views and experience of how organisations are taking steps to create growth and competitive edge through new approaches to innovation, global operations and a closer alignment of the operating model with legal and tax structures.

Matthew Hancock the Skills Minister set out £214 million investment in 47 colleges across the country, alongside plans for a more rigorous and responsive skills system.

The government’s new skills strategy, Rigour and Responsiveness in Skills, includes stronger action to support the majority of good and outstanding colleges, and new plans to intervene where colleges are failing learners.

In his independent report Doug Richard calls on the government calls to improve the quality of apprenticeships and make them more focused on the needs of employers.

His recommendations include:

• Redefining apprenticeships: They should be targeted only at those who are new to a job or role that requires sustained and substantial training.
• Focusing on the outcome of an apprenticeship – what the apprentice can do when they complete their training – and freeing up the process by which they get there. Trusted, independent assessment is key.
• Recognised industry standards should form the basis of every apprenticeship.
• All apprentices should reach a good level in English and maths before they can complete their apprenticeship.
• Government funding must create the right incentives for apprenticeship training. The purchasing power for investing in apprenticeship training should lie with the employer.
• Greater diversity and innovation in training – with employers and government safeguarding quality.

The Government should set out a comprehensive strategy for national wealth creation, according to Lord Heseltine.

In the report Heseltine said the Government should define its view of its own role – and the limits of that role – together with those of others in local authorities, public bodies and the private sector.

This report makes 89 recommendations:

• Some will say they are criticisms.
• That is exactly the wrong approach.
• To invite criticism is a sign of strength.
• To accept it is a sign of conidence.
• We are all too close to the economic crisis.
• There is opportunity on a grand scale.
• Huge infrastructure demands and hungry institutional funds – link them.
• Excellence in industry, commerce, academia – extend it.
• England’s cities pulsing with energy – unleash it.
• Every one of us needs to rise to the challenge.

Ireland has been a leading player in IBM’s Smarter Buildings initiative for more than five years, and has developed a methodology known as Green Sigma, which marries Six Sigma engineering principles to statistical analytics techniques to identify energy wastage in buildings.

When the Analytics and Optimisation Group moved into IBM’s Smarter Cities Technology Centre in Dublin, they saw an opportunity to put their theories into practice by turning the 35,500 sq ft building into a real-world embodiment of Smarter Buildings principles. Creating a “Living Lab” would provide an ideal working environment for IBM researchers, while minimising energy costs and  environmental
impact.