From Ingram's Magazine...
From agriculture and aviation to zoonotic-disease research, Kansas is awash with companies, universities and non-profit organizations that are pushing the state’s economy forward. In doing so, they elevate the quality of life for nearly three million residents. Kansas, it’s been said, is small enough for everyone to know everyone else. Obviously, not true. But here are 50 people who, if you don’t know them, you should know about, because in many ways, they are touching your life today.
Included in the 2023 list was Tony Szot with Superior Essex in Hoisington.
Tony Szot, Superior Essex, Hoisington
In the wide-open, sparsely populated stretches of Kansas, it can be tough for employers to find talent. Manufacturers, though, know that the workforce in smaller communities is precisely what they need to operate at higher levels of productivity. But distance is no shelter from broader national workforce trends, which is what compelled Tony Szot, plant manager for Superior Essex, to plead his case for city assistance with workforce child-care needs. In his pitch before the City Council last spring, Szot addressed not only the needs of roughly 220 employees but the plant itself, where 25 open positions were straining the production scheduling effort. And that was before an additional 25 spots were expected to come online following a plant expansion. “We can’t get people to work the night shift,” he told the council. “One of those reasons, I assume, is because the night shift is where the inexperienced, young people go to earn their tenure before a day shift spot opens up. These are the people with children.” The irony is that manufacturing jobs pay quite well; the majority of openings when Szot made his appeal paid between $50,000 to $62,000 per year. “If we continue to have trouble getting people to fill positions,” Szot cautioned, “my fear with Superior Essex being a big corporation is they will take the equipment and move it where they can find employees.”
For the full list visit ingrams.com.