Valuing Workforce Cross-Training Flexibility

Workforce flexibility is an often sought-after capability of production systems. Manufacturing and service organizations understand that the composition of a workforce (i.e., the number of workers who are competent at specific tasks in a production system and their skill levels on these tasks) may significantly affect productivity. Cross training is one such lever on productivity because it can potentially increase operational productivity by training the workforce in a specific tactical or strategic manner. The capabilities of a workforce given a level of cross training may be considered an important component of workforce flexibility (e.g., see Ebeling and Lee, 1994; Gerwin, 1993; Molleman and Slomp, 1999)