Future competence at shopfloor in the era of Industry 4.0 - A case study in Norwegian industry

Abstract

Industry 4.0 technologies with the vision of smart factories will dominate the manufacturing industry for the next decades. Hence, the application of digital technologies of modern IT and communication technologies to enable machines, products, and human being exchanging information with each other will be of high importance. Consequently, more complex manufacturing processes will evolve and affecting the interplay of humans and technology. Thus, we argue that the competence needed for the future will change to successfully integrate industry 4.0 technologies.

From this perspective, sufficient and correct competence will be a critical success factor enabling to integrate and to apply required new digital technologies at shopfloor. Hence, both technical professionals and operators at shop floor will be involved. Case studies from six Norwegian industry companies are used to illustrate how future competence at shopfloor must fit into the era of industry 4.0. Our empirical evidence shows that both upskilling and reskilling is necessary to success with the digital transformation and a good starting point is the operators’ positive attitude to upskill their competence. How to manage this has to be included in a digital strategy. This article will provide an important contribution on how companies can solve the issues as evolution of competence for future success in the era of industry 4.0, which should be relevant to both industry and academia.