CANTON - Five months after opening its new assembly plant, Nissan North America Inc. is still searching for skilled industrial maintenance technicians.
It isn't that the job doesn't pay well. Nissan pays its maintenance techs up to $26 an hour. And overtime is almost a given, particularly since Nissan is ramping up its new plant to be able by next year to churn out five different vehicles at annual volumes approaching 400,000.
But finding workers with the skills needed has been tough.
Even with the proliferation of auto plants in the South, the region is still short of maintenance technicians with the auto industry-specific skills needed by both assembly plants and the suppliers that have moved to the South to serve them.
"We're multicrafted here; they're required to fix whatever breaks down out here," said Galen Medlin, the Canton plant's human resources director.
Auto suppliers have an additional challenge in finding skilled maintenance techs. Suppliers' hourly wages are several dollars less than the auto makers; consequently, they frequently lose their best workers to the auto assembly plants that are their customers.
"We pay our most experienced maintenance techs $17 to $21 an hour," said Toni Pierce, Oxford's human resources manager. "The challenge is to try to hold onto them as they top out at a certain level so they don't go over to the competition."
Maintenance techs are critical for assembly operations. These positions will be only a small percentage - less than 4 percent - of the 5,300 workers the plant will employ when it hits full production speed in mid-2004.
But these are the folks who must keep all that expensive machinery running at the $1.43 billion plant - who are responsible for the smooth operation of 17 miles of conveyor belts, 853 robots and 70 lasers. Ultimately, they're the ones who keep the assembly line rolling so Nissan's new plant won't erode the Japanese company's reputation as the world's most efficient auto maker.
"We totally depend on them," Medlin said.
It's not that the plant, which opened in May, lacks for eager job applicants. Mississippi's unemployment hasn't fallen below 6 percent since November 2001.
Nissan has held more than 30 jobs fairs around the state, drawing more than 90,000 applicants. Next week, Medlin and his staff will hold a job fair in Hattiesburg at a Sunbeam appliance plant that's closing and laying off 450 workers.
Medlin more easily found workers to fill production technician jobs, which pay up to $21 an hour. But only 130 industrial maintenance technicians have been hired. Nissan needs at least 50 more.
Rickey Johnson, a 43-year-old Quitman resident, lost his maintenance technician job last year at Burlington Industries when it closed its Clarke County plant.
Johnson was hired out of the Holmes County Community College pre-employment tech training program.
But even with 10 years in the field, he had to undergo several months of additional training to upgrade his skills.
"This job is much more challenging," said Johnson, who is averaging about 15 hours a week of overtime.
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