Industries
Why manufacturing employees leave and how to understand why
Operators, technicians and supervisors leave for reasons that sit in shifts, skills and supervision. How to ask, read the pattern by shift and act on it.
6 min readRead article
Paper and Printing · Industrial Printing Units
HR for Industrial Printing Units: Flexo, Gravure, Screen and Packaging Print Crews
Industrial printing units run flexo, gravure and screen lines on films, cartons, textiles and glass for factory customers. The trouble sits at the press: solvent smell, drying temperature and registration all rely on a few trained eyes.
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Share your requirementsAn industrial printing unit prints for other manufacturers on laminates, BOPP film, cartons, fabric, plastic tubs, glass and tin. Flexo, gravure, screen and pad printing are followed by drying tunnels, curing, rewinding, slitting and packing. Presses run two or three shifts on long orders. Ink viscosity, solvent evaporation, anilox condition and web tension decide whether a roll is saleable, and a senior operator judges them by eye, touch and smell. Trainees learn by standing beside him. Owners usually have loyal long-service hands plus two or three senior operators who can take any job. See also HR for manufacturing.
- Plan
- Hire
- Onboard
- Manage
- Develop
- Perform
- Engage
- Retain
- Exit
- Improve
When HR is weak in industrial printing units, you may see
- Shade matching sits in two heads
- Solvent fumes and tunnel heat build slowly
- Registration slips in the small hours
- Cylinder and screen changes strain backs and hands
- Job changes after a long run cause startup errors
- Veterans resist new checks
These are the places the people side of this kind of business tends to give way. The rest of this page works through them.
Who does the work in industrial printing units
HR here has to work for each of these groups, not only the office. The set-up below is written with all of them in mind.
- Press operators and second-colour hands
- Press helpers and web loaders
- Ink kitchen and shade-matching staff
- Anilox roller, screen and cylinder handlers
- Drying tunnel, curing and rewinding crew
- Slitting and cutting machine operators
- Print quality inspectors
- Press mechanics and electricians
- Shift in-charges
Where HR strains in industrial printing units
Shade matching sits in two heads
Ink kitchen staff match a customer's shade by eye and adjust viscosity by feel. If either of two people is absent, the press waits.
Solvent fumes and tunnel heat build slowly
Crews breathe solvent vapour and stand near drying tunnels for whole shifts. Headaches and tiredness are put down to the job and nobody tracks them.
Registration slips in the small hours
Colour-to-colour register drifts as the night goes on. Waste of printed film rises between two and five in the morning, when fewer seniors are on the floor.
Cylinder and screen changes strain backs and hands
Gravure cylinders and screen frames are heavy, and washing them with solvent leaves hands raw. Lifting is done by whoever is nearby, with no set method.
Job changes after a long run cause startup errors
After days on one repeat order, the crew is slow to reset for a new design, wrong anilox, wrong ink, wrong repeat length, and startup waste climbs.
Veterans resist new checks
Long-service operators see a sign-off sheet as doubt about their skill, while newer recruits copy their shortcuts along with their good habits.
HR topics for industrial printing units
Start with the topics that matter most here: Health, Safety and Wellbeing; Learning and Development; Retention and Attrition Management. Then work through the rest. Each topic is written for manufacturing, not in general.
Health, Safety and Wellbeing
Induction, records, incident reporting and follow-through.
Learning and Development
Training planned from need rather than from the calendar.
Retention and Attrition Management
Who leaves, when, why — and which of them mattered.
HR Strategy and Workforce Planning
How many people, in which roles, by when — and what they will cost.
Organisation Design
Structure, reporting lines and who is allowed to decide what.
Recruitment and Talent Acquisition
Requisition to joining, the same way every time.
Onboarding and Probation
A first day that is the same for the fifth joiner as the first.
Employee Administration
Records, attendance, leave and the day-to-day HR that must simply work.
Compensation, Payroll and Benefits
Salary structure, payroll inputs and a month that closes on time.
Performance Management
Goals, reviews and ratings that hold up in a conversation.
Career and Succession Management
Named backups for the roles that cannot be vacant.
Employee Engagement and Experience
Communication, recognition and the conditions people actually work in.
Employee Relations
Two routes — one for complaints, one for conduct — kept separate.
Policies, Compliance and Governance
Policies a manager can apply, and obligations with owners and dates.
Exit and Alumni Management
Resignation to relieving letter, in a defined order.
HR Technology and Automation
Records that survive people, and approvals that do not queue.
HR Analytics and Management Reporting
A short monthly pack management actually reads.
HR Operations and Governance
An HR function that runs the same way every month.
What a working HR set-up looks like
The pieces a industrial printing units business puts in place, in an order that makes each easier. Open any card for the detail.
Write the ink kitchen routine with the shade matcher
Have the shade matcher note his steps for mixing, viscosity cup readings and top-ups, then check them with a second person.
What this coversHide
Write the ink kitchen routine with the shade matcher
Have the shade matcher note his steps for mixing, viscosity cup readings and top-ups, then check them with a second person.
What this coversHideHave the shade matcher note his steps for mixing, viscosity cup readings and top-ups, then check them with a second person. File them under the HR documentation process.
Run a shift check on extraction and rest
At each shift start, the supervisor looks at extraction fans and tunnel ventilation, and rotates people off the hottest posts.
What this coversHide
Run a shift check on extraction and rest
At each shift start, the supervisor looks at extraction fans and tunnel ventilation, and rotates people off the hottest posts.
What this coversHideAt each shift start, the supervisor looks at extraction fans and tunnel ventilation, and rotates people off the hottest posts. See health, safety and wellbeing.
Fix a registration check every few hours
The in-charge signs a register check at set times, including at night, so drift is caught before a full roll is spoiled.
What this coversHide
Fix a registration check every few hours
The in-charge signs a register check at set times, including at night, so drift is caught before a full roll is spoiled.
What this coversHideThe in-charge signs a register check at set times, including at night, so drift is caught before a full roll is spoiled.
Teach cylinder and screen handling by demonstration
A short practical session with proper trolleys, gloves for solvent washing and a two-person rule for heavy cylinders.
What this coversHide
Teach cylinder and screen handling by demonstration
A short practical session with proper trolleys, gloves for solvent washing and a two-person rule for heavy cylinders.
What this coversHideA short practical session with proper trolleys, gloves for solvent washing and a two-person rule for heavy cylinders. The learning and development process can hold the record.
Bring veterans in before a new check starts
Show the senior operators the sheet first, ask what they would change, and let them brief the crew themselves.
What this coversHide
Bring veterans in before a new check starts
Show the senior operators the sheet first, ask what they would change, and let them brief the crew themselves.
What this coversHideShow the senior operators the sheet first, ask what they would change, and let them brief the crew themselves.
Start by checking where you stand
Before changing anything, find out what is true today. These checks take an afternoon and tell you which of the topics above to start with.
Share your requirements- Ask who can match a shade and set viscosity without help, and who is learning beside them.
- Walk the drying tunnel and curing area and note temperature, extraction and where people take breaks.
- Take last month's printed-film waste and mark the hour of the shift in which it peaked.
- Watch a cylinder change and see how it is lifted, washed and stored.
- Ask two veterans which new check they would accept, and why.
- Confirm with a qualified professional the registration, record-keeping and employment duties that apply to your printing unit, including solvent handling and shift work.
Confirm with a qualified professional. What applies to you depends on your business, your state and your arrangements, and it changes. This page describes practice. It does not state a legal position.
How GullyHR helps
The services below fit this kind of business best. Each starts by recording where you stand, and every later report compares against that. We do not promise outcomes.
- Workplace health, safety and wellbeing
Habits for solvent vapour, tunnel heat and heavy cylinder lifting on press floors.
- HR documentation process
Written ink kitchen and press set-up routines that stay when one operator leaves.
- Learning and development process
A staged route for helpers to learn shade, viscosity and registration.
- Employee retention and attrition management
Keeping senior operators when several nearby units will bid for them.
Start with a free conversation, or see the paid HR Diagnostic.
Our HR transformation approach
- 1
Assess
Understand the business, its workforce, current processes and HR challenges.
- 2
Identify gaps
Find the missing, weak, inconsistent or person-dependent processes.
- 3
Design
Create the structure, processes, policies, SOPs, dashboards and systems needed.
- 4
Implement
Help HR and department managers actually adopt the new system.
- 5
Automate
Digitise repetitive and approval-based workflows where it is worth doing.
- 6
Measure
Track hiring, attendance, employee cost, performance, training and attrition.
- 7
Improve
Strengthen the people-management system continuously, not once.
Blogs worth reading first
From the GullyHR blog: one on HR in manufacturing, and one on each of the topics this page points to.
HR Management
The safety poster nobody reads
A laminated notice, an annual drill, and an incident register with three entries in two years. What workplace health and safety looks like when it is real.
7 min readRead article
HR Process
The training calendar nobody attends: fixing the learning and development process
A calendar of courses, a budget spent by March and no record of what any of it changed. What a learning and development process contains when it starts from need rather than from the catalogue.
7 min readRead article
HR Management
How to recognise and address employee workload problems
How to spot an unmanageable workload before it becomes an exit or an error, what to look at, how to talk about it and what to change, without guessing.
5 min readRead articleMore on the GullyHR blog.
Questions owners ask
Ask him to write his steps, put a named junior beside him for a set period, and show the role in grade and pay. People share knowledge when it is recognised.
Check extraction every shift, rotate people off the worst posts, and supply suitable masks and gloves. Ask a qualified professional what the rules require for your unit.
Fix registration checks at set hours, put a senior in charge and plan the breaks. Slippage at night usually comes from tiredness, not carelessness.
Involve them early, give the reason and try the new check on one press first. Veterans back changes they helped shape, not those announced afterwards.
Often yes. The skills differ, so a scale for each process, or a skill matrix across them, gives fairer pay and clearer training.
We would ask who can match shades and set viscosity alone, walk the tunnel for heat and extraction, and plot waste against the hour of the shift. A useful opening task is a written ink routine with a trainee paired to the matcher. We put scope on paper only after we have talked.
More on HR for manufacturing
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