Workforce News

Manufacturing training often covers technical skills, but critical soft skills are often overlooked. This can cause friction when technical experts are promoted to leadership roles they aren’t equipped for. Westminster Tool closed this gap with emotional intelligence training, an investment that helped strengthen and retain their current and future workforce.  

• This approach to training is one of many featured breakout sessions at this year’s Workforce Summit, the premier event for manufacturing workforce development. 

The big idea: The session Using Emotional Intelligence to Manage Successfully explores how Westminster Tool built emotional intelligence skills into its employee onboarding and continuous training. This helped strengthen communication, empathy and resilience across teams, creating a healthier workplace culture and supporting stronger engagement and retention. 

• Led by Hillary Thomas, President of Westminster Tool, the session includes mindfulness exercises and reflection practices to help attendees improve their own emotional intelligence. 

The takeaways:  

• The value of emotional intelligence in the workplace and its connection to training, communication and business growth. 

• Reflection on your own communication style and how to adjust your approach for outcomes. 

• Self-awareness skills such as breath work, mindfulness and reflection. 

Why it matters: The pressure to develop talent quickly can mean that employees are asked to take on greater responsibility before they’ve had the opportunity to build the skills needed to navigate new challenges and relationships. Emotional intelligence can help people at every level communicate effectively, respond thoughtfully, build trust and contribute to a stronger workplace culture. 

• 76% of manufacturing leaders said that frontline leader training plays an extremely important role in creating a positive employee experience, which 74% of frontline-adjacent workers say significantly reduces turnover, according to our 2024 research with PwC.  

Who should attend: As an advanced-level breakout, this session is built for leaders who already influence strategy or shape programs and want benchmarking, ROI methods and real-world models to test against their own.  

Join the conversation: This session is part of a larger conversation at the 2026 Workforce Summit, October 26-28, in Indianapolis, IN. Register today to be part of the dialogue shaping the future manufacturing workforce. 

• See the full agenda and learn more on our website.