OLSOM | WHITEPAPER

While data and technology drive manufacturing efficiency, people remain at the heart of operations.

Yet the sector faces acute workforce challenges: skills gaps, labour shortages, decreasing retention rates and the urgent need to capture tribal knowledge before it walks out of the door. According to Deloitte and The Manufacturing Institute, the US manufacturing sector may require up to 3.8 million new employees by 2033, driven by growth and replacement needs – but as many as 1.9 million of those jobs risk going unfilled due to skills gaps, retirements and retention challenges.

To address the skills gap and preserve institutional knowledge, manufacturers must move beyond traditional, time-based experience models by harnessing digital tools.

Automation and the autonomous factory Workflow automation represents the most significant factor in addressing workforce shortages. As Iurii explains:“ Automate manual repetitive, monotonous operations and leave people to do creative jobs. This is a concept of the‘ autonomous factory’, which I believe is our future.”

While some assembly operations may remain challenging to fully automate – at least within a 10-year horizon – packing, intralogistics and many production processes are increasingly robotised. This shift does not eliminate the need for people. Rather, it transforms their roles.“ Two years ago, I had three robots and 50 operators,” one OLSOM client

Number of new employees potentially required by the US manufacturing sector by 2033

Source- Deloitte & The Manufacturing Institute

58 March 2026