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Meeting the challenge of Industry 5.0. A challenge for food system companies?

A new industrial paradigm?

In an industrial world in daily search of productivity optimization, the digital transformation and digitization of processes have become crucial issues for our factories!

To remain competitive and offer greater organizational flexibility, it’s best not to miss the boat and seize the many opportunities offered by Industry 5.0…

Today, this new paradigm offers several significant advantages.

Unlike Industry 4.0, which focused primarily on machine automation and connectivity, Industry 5.0 emphasizes collaboration between man and machine. This makes it possible to personalize production processes and enhance creativity and innovation. By enhancing the role and skills of workers, Industry 5.0 creates a stimulating and fulfilling work environment, helping to attract and retain the best talent.

What’s more, by integrating digital technologies and artificial intelligence, companies can improve the quality and reliability of their products, optimize costs and lead times, and thus increase their competitiveness in the global marketplace.

These benefits show that Industry 5.0 is not just a technological evolution, but also a societal transformation aimed at creating a more humane and sustainable industry.

Is the agri-food sector an industrial exception?

Far from it! As they embark on their digital adventure, the food industry faces a number of challenges. Particularly when it comes to managing their production staff. They need to feel motivated and challenged. The aim is not to be at the service of the production machine, but at the heart of production, with their skills and know-how.

A large proportion of jobs in this sector are seasonal, which means there is a constant need to recruit and train new staff, often for short periods. This creates high turnover and makes it difficult to retain workers.

The sector is also experiencing a shortage of skilled workers. The trades often require specific skills that are not always available on the job market.

And in the field, it’s common to hear that working conditions can be difficult, with repetitive tasks, fast-paced rhythms, and sometimes demanding working environments (cold, noise, etc.). This can discourage potential candidates and increase absenteeism.

Against this backdrop, the automation and digitization of production processes can quickly come up against certain obstacles, as it requires more advanced technical skills. Companies must therefore invest in ongoing training for their staff, which can be costly and time-consuming.

In any case, these challenges show that managing production staff in the food industry is complex, and requires appropriate strategies for attracting, training and retaining talent.

PeopleForce, a solution to these challenges …

Today, PeopleForce is the benchmark software for managing production personnel, particularly in the agri-food sector, both in Belgium and in France, where numerous players such as Fleury Michon, Lactalis, Mondelez, Delacre (…) place their trust in it.

In the age of Industry 5.0, PeopleForce digitalizes

– skills and knowledge management

– training follow-up

– production staff scheduling

– and, more broadly, all the elements that operational managers need to manage their staff.

The PeopleForce story goes back to 2007: an MES project for a major agri-food group – at the time, there was no talk of the Industry of the Future.

As part of our reflections on how to improve the tools used by production managers, we came across the problem of staff scheduling on production floors: “who does what at what time?

We initially envisaged this as a project, but within a few months we realized that there was a real demand from the industrial market.

Both in the food industry and in all industries that work in shifts – with more or less fixed workstations depending on the plant’s load.

It took us 2 years to produce a functional automated planning system. Over time, we perfected the automatic assignment to arrive today at an assignment engine which is recognized in multiple industries, multiple situations and which is totally configurable by key users.

This is one of our trademarks: we emphasize the fact that the user must be able to evolve the configuration of his plant. A factory is alive!

Over time, PeopleForce has been enriched to better manage temporary staff, manage more complex plants with different staff loan scenarios, integrate with existing systems such as time management…

The second turning point for PeopleForce was the addition of training management.

In fact, the practical organization of training courses is integrated into workshop personnel planning.

PeopleForce enables you to manage your training plan. Whether it’s a question of personal development, anticipating retirements or a change in activity.

PeopleForce manages skills, certifications, authorizations… but also medical restrictions or production equipment: work clothes, harnesses…

The major evolution of PeopleForce that we are now experiencing is to take on a more global role in the process of digitizing the factory.

Today, PeopleForce is taking on a central role for field managers:

– A single point of contact for everything to do with personnel: schedules, counters, skills, training, etc.

– A highly practical view of teams: skills matrices, training triggers, etc.

– A powerful planning tool that can be configured to adapt to sometimes complex real-life situations 😉

– With a mobile application for employees to consult their schedules and other information.

– With a web interface, adapted to tablets, for field managers: team leaders, production managers…

– With a fully configurable display solution

All with a SaaS offering, hosted and administered by us.

 

In conclusion, PeopleForce is a collaborative tool… probably the favorite of 5.0 manufacturers.

With PeopleForce, we provide a very concrete solution for digitizing personnel planning, knowledge management, skills tracking and training.

Our ambition is to help manufacturers become more efficient in their operations, by providing the digital tools they need. All for the benefit of a more human and more efficient industry!