Fully automated operations are rarely feasible or the most efficient processes, making humans an essential differentiating factor in manufacturing. But without mastering the art of successfully introducing technologies to the shop floor, companies risk failing to keep up with the rapid pace of innovation and falling behind their global competitors. This report reveals the views of an often overlooked source – the workers on the ground – asking them how the process of technology introduction looks from their perspective.

The value of the report is that it answers the question of how managers can best engage their front-line workers and ensure that technology introductions are designed in a long-term, sustainable, human-centric and effective way. The report – the result of a collaboration between the World Economic Forum, the University of Cambridge, and constituent members of the Manufacturing Workers of the Future initiative – is based on more than 85 interviews with employees in large, international corporations drawn from several industrial sectors in the US, Europe and Asia.