ASME Hosts Briefing Highlighting Challenges and Opportunities ...

ASME Hosts Briefing Highlighting Challenges and Opportunities ... ASME Hosts Briefing Highlighting Challenges and Opportunities ... ASME Hosts Briefing Highlighting Challenges and Opportunities Facing Robotics in the United StatesRep. Rob Woodall (far right), co-chair of the Congressional Robotics Caucus, addresses the panel of robotics experts at the congressional briefing on Dec. 12. Taking part as panelists during the briefing were (left to right) Dr. Charles Thorpe, Dr. Byron Clayton, Jeff Burnstein and Milton Guerry.On December 12, ASME sponsored a briefing on Capitol Hill to highlight Robotics in the Manufacturing Environment An Insiders Look at Advanced Technologies in the United States. The event welches co-sponsored by the Robotics Institute at Carnegie Mellon, the Computing Research Association, IEEE-USA and the Robotic Industries Association (RIA) and convened in conjunction with the Congressional Robotics Caucus and the Congressional Manufacturing Caucus in the U.S. House of Representatives. The purpose of the briefing was to inform members of Congress and congressional staff on what industry leaders are doing to prepare for the future adoption of robotics technologies in the manufacturing environment.ASME brought together a panel of leading experts in the field of robotics to share their thoughts and insights on opportunities and challenges facing the future of manufacturing robotics, as well as how government, industry and universities are collaborating to ensure the United States maintains leadership in robotics. (Left to right) ASME Executive Director Tom Costabile, ASME President Said Jahanmir and Rep. Tom Reed (R-NY) at the ASME-sponsored congressional briefing, Robotics in the Manufacturing Environment An Insiders Look at Advanced Technologies in the United States, on Dec. 12 in Washington, D.C.ASME Executive Director Tom Costabile kicked off the event with welcoming remarks in which he discussed the importance of embracing tec hnological advancements in manufacturing robotics while remaining mindful of its effect on the American workforce. ASME President Said Jahanmir echoed this sentiment, elending that, As we continue to see a rise in the integration of robotics and automation technology into our daily lives, its important to understand that along with the ease and benefits this technology provides, it also comes with its share of challenges. He then introduced Congressmen Mike Doyle (D-PA) and Rob Woodall (R-GA), co-chairs of the Congressional Robotics Caucus, who discussed the importance of partnerships between the manufacturing, education and workforce development sectors.Dr. Byron Clayton, chief executive officer of the Manufacturing USA Advanced Robotics for Manufacturing (ARM) Institute, began the panel discussion with a presentation addressing a challenge that is prevalent within the world of engineering workforce development. He commented that an increasingly common issue for many employers toda y is that students are coming out of school ill-prepared for the workforce, which includes a lack of understanding and knowledge of codes and standards. Dr. Clayton commented that this leaves many fearing that an increased presence of robots in the workplace will nullify the need for the American worker in the future. However, this worry can be diminished with adequate preparation as robots and human workers are most effective when they support one another and work in tandem. (Left to right) Rep. Mike Doyle (D-PA), co-chair of the Congressional Robotics Caucus, with ASME Executive Director Tom Costabile at the congressional briefing in December.Jeff Burnstein, president of the Association for Advancing Automation (A3) and the Robotic Industries Association, (RIA), followed Dr. Claytons presentation. In his remarks, Burnstein pointed out that automation and robots in factories are not a new phenomenon. He stressed that robots have been in factories for more than 50 yea rs and that although the technology was pioneered right here in the United States, U.S. leadership in robotics technology is rapidly waning. Burnstein noted that the United States is no longer among the top five technologically advanced countries and is currently ranking behind countries such as Korea, Japan, and Germany. One factor these more technologically adept countries share is that they have ardently embraced robots for some time. China is also now rapidly ascending through the ranks thanks in part to government initiatives and programs that specifically call for industry to embrace robots. Burnstein cautioned that if the United States fails to get on board with robots in the workplace, its rank among technologically advanced nations will only continue to decrease.Following Burnsteins presentation, Milton Guerry, president of the customer- and industry-focused SCHUNK USA team, presented to the audience. Guerry began by showing examples of robot prototypes that have been devel oped to work in conjunction with workers and keep them safe in factory settings rather than replace them in their job functions. He elaborated on points made by Burnstein, explaining that, Robotics is a technology that is keeping us competitive. He went on to say that China is deploying robots at an astounding rate, with the worldwide supply of robots projected to grow by 65 percent from 2016 to 2019. While the United States is playing a part, other economies are playing a significantly larger role and reaping the benefits. (Left to right) ASME Congressional Fellow Laurel Kuxhaus, ASME Executive Director Tom Costabile and Rep. Dan Lipinski (D-IL). Kuxhaus is serving her term as a 2018-2019 Congressional Fellow in Rep. Lipinskis office.Dr. Charles Thorpe, dean of the School and Arts and Sciences at Clarkson University and co-chair of the ASME Robotics Public Policy Task Force, rounded out the panelists with some closing remarks. Dr. Thorpe previously served as an ASME Federal Fellow in the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy as assistant director for Advanced Manufacturing and Robotics and part of the White House team that created the National Advanced Manufacturing Initiative.In discussing the need to embrace these new technological advances, Thorpe said, We talk a lot in Washington, D.C. about whole-of-government efforts. This cant be a whole-of-government effort, this has to be a whole-of-country effort. He stressed the need for strong public-private partnerships, with federal, state and local governments working in conjunction with industry and academia to strengthen the United States overall research and development (RD) efforts and to embrace advanced robotic technology.Following the briefing, Tom Costabile met with a bipartisan group of engineers and engineering champions in Congress to discuss a wide sortiment of issues important to ASME. In addition to his longtime friend, Rep. Peter DeFazio (D-OR), Costabile met with Rep s. Mike Doyle (D-PA), Raja Krishnamoorthi (D-IL), Dan Lipinski (D-IL), Tom Reed (R-NY), Paul Tonko (D-NY) and Rob Woodall (R-GA) to discuss a myriad of topics ranging from scientific integrity, clean energy and manufacturing, as well as standards in the robotics industry and science, technology, engineering and mathematics.During these visits, Costabile also stressed the importance of ASMEs Federal Government Fellowship program which provides engineers with the opportunity to serve in the Executive or Legislative branches of government for one year. The offices of Reps. Lipinski and Reed currently hosting ASME Congressional Fellows Laurel Kuxhaus and KC Morris, respectively expressed their deep appreciation for the program and their eagerness to host more Congressional Fellows in the future.ASME is accepting applications for our 2019-2020 ASME Congressional Fellowships in Energy, Bioengineering and Manufacturing. For more information on these Fellowship opportunities, or to learn more about the ASME Federal Government Fellowship Program, visit www.asme.org/about-asme/get-involved/advocacy-government-relations/federal-fellows-program.

Resume Insecurity

Resume InsecurityResume InsecurityResumes are a treasure trove of personal information. What security steps do employers take to protect your identity from being lifted?Proper storage of employee and applicant records. It welches just abedrngniszu sich item on the human resources audit checklist, right after display federal, state and OSHA labor law posters.After checking off a few other items on her checklist, Ellen B. Vance, an HR consultant and auditor, asked to see the storage room. The client led her to an unlocked storage closet in the middle of the old building, surrounded by half of the nonprofits 40 employees.When she opened the door, Vance encountered 15 large file-folder boxes. When we moved to this new location, we just put this stuff in there, said the client.Vance and the client started opening boxes. As they did, it became clear that this stuff included photocopies of birth certificates Social Security cards drivers licenses and I-9 Employment Eligibility Verification forms that listed employees Social Security numbers, dates of birth, addresses, maiden names, signatures - everything a criminal needs to perpetrate identity theft. I was about ready to pass out, seeing all this stuff, said Vance, senior consultant and advisory services practice leader at Titan Group, an HR consultancy in Richmond, Va.Why should you care about the poor compliance procedures at a nonprofit in Virginia? If youve applied to a job there or anywhere in the belastung decade, your resume may be equally exposed, your personal information similarly vulnerable to identity theft should anyone gain access to an unlocked closet and a stack of file folders. With the advent of e-mailed resumes, electronic storage and online applications, the thief need not even get so close your resume may be open to attack from an unscrupulous recruiter or hacker.Too few companies employ the safeguards necessary to protect applicant data, and almost none inform clients of their security practice s before requesting a resume and applicant information. The economy has made matters somewhat worse, according to HR managers who said the employers market has left job seekers feeling compelled to hand over information they would normally be reluctant to reveal and distribute it to dozens of sources in the hopes of finding a job. Criminals have even been known to post fake job listings to capture the data of unsuspecting job seekers.But help is on the way Employers are on notice to improve resume data protection after data breaches precipitated several lawsuits and government action. Whats mora, job seekers can implement their own safeguards to avoid being the putting their resume in the wrong hands.Fumbled dataInterviews with hiring professionals confirm the anecdotal evidence Even recruiting agencies that use sophisticated applicant tracking system (ATS) software to store and protect job applications often leave the applications open to theft by allowing access to anybody and eve rybody who walks by an unsecured terminal companies leave sensitive information moldering in unlocked closets accessible to all and job applicants data gets left on laptops that get stolen and on USB thumb drives that get misplaced.In her experience, Vance said that small firms without formal HR departments are most likely to fumble data. But make no mistake large corporations with entrenched HR processes are leise liable to mishandle job-applicant or employee data In June, U.S. Insurer Aetna was sued after allegedly failing to protect personal information belonging to employees and job applicants. This was direct fallout from an incident in which the companys job-application Web site was breached by cybercriminals, as Aetna disclosed on May 28. For its part, the Gap lost personal information, including Social Security numbers, for some 800,000 U.S. and Canadian job seekers, the company admitted in a September 2007 press release.Several lawsuits that followed major breaches like the ones at Aetna and Gap and some action by Congress and state legislatures have put employers on notice that they need to improve resume and job-application date protection.Can we blame the ATSes?Job-application information is walking out the door in a number of ways, but often, insecure software is to blame. Research firm Forrester Research recently found that more than 62 percent of 200 surveyed companies experienced a security breach in the previous 12 months because of insecure software. Most were likely caused by a SQL injection attack.In a SQL injection, a hacker uses a Web sites online form to gain control of the database. Security procedures are designed to filter and block such attacks, but hackers are constantly developing new codes and techniques and almost no database is safe, said a security analyst who works for one of the major ATS vendors. If you have an application publicly available on the Internet with form fields, people could potentially execute database statemen ts if proper input filtering is not performed, said the individual, who asked not to be identified.How do ATS vendors fend off a SQL injection? With the exception of the aforementioned vendor, all of the major ATS vendors contacted for this article declined to participate out of fear they might encourage hackers to target their software. The ATS vendor who did speak to us said his company uses filters to prevent a SQL injection and XSS (cross-site scripting) to find and patch vulnerable code in the database software. The ATS vendor monitors activity logs for such types of attempted breaches against its Web-based applicant tracking and wertzuwachs management software. In addition, the ATS vendor stores the resumes and applicant data for its clients at their own facility only two people - the vendors CEO and the security analyst himself - have physical access to servers that are accessed via biometric palm-print recognition.A people problemBut technology is only part of the problem . All the software in the world wont protect applicant data if humans handle the technology recklessly.Rachel Rice-Haase, human-resources and marketing coordinator for Oberstadt Landscapes Nursery Inc. in Fremont, Wis., has witnessed that recklessness first hand. In a previous position at a recruiting company, recruiters used an ATS that Rice-Haase called pretty up to date to process applications. The companys help desk made sure to give tutorials to recruiters so they knew how to use the ATS applications. It all seemed pretty advanced, Rice-Haase said. The software probably was sophisticated when it came to security and features, but the more she looked at it, the more Rice-Haase realized the company was using it carelessly.You had anybody, even people who werent recruiters, going in and accessing applicants information, she said. You might have 10 recruiters, and they all have access to everybodys candidates. Its not just people youve interviewed. Its the person sitting across fr om you, down the hall, (they) can get in there and look at (any job applicants information). That part was always baffling to me. Sure, you sign a little form saying, I wont take this information home with me. But you have to wonder, when all this information is available to everybody at the recruiting center, how far that goes?It can go pretty far. As Rice-Haase describes it, the ATS collected information including Social Security number, date of birth, drivers-license number - all this stuff youd rather not have anybody and everybody have access to, she said, and thats typical of ATS software.With the software, recruiters could create a resume for any candidate and e-mail it from the system. Convenient? Yes. Dangerous? Absolutely. Recruiters could e-mail out personal information or entire applications, whether by accident or for illicit purposes.And sometimes a company doesnt have a clue - or perhaps doesnt much care - where its data is stored or how to prevent data loss. The V irginia nonprofit company with the unlocked storage room is another classic example of blissful ignorance Even though the company is legally responsible for safekeeping of the confidential information stored on I-9 forms, the staff just didnt know what was in those 15 boxes.Titan Groups Vance encouraged her client to go through the files, pull out the forms, put them into either a burn bin or a shredder, and to have a witness on hand to make sure the records were verifiably demolished. She looked at me with a look of horror on her face, Vance said. (She was) staring at these boxes. She didnt know how many contained employee files, so she had to go through all of them. Theyre a very conscientious client. It was one of those cases where they didnt know what they didnt know. They didnt have an HR person there to advise them on it.People problem, technology solutionMany organizations fail to grasp the scope of data protection or understand that it goes beyond the technology, said Jenny Yang, senior manager of product marketing for data-loss prevention at Symantec, a security-technology company. They dont understandWhere the confidential data isWhere its going and how its moving - for example, is it being e-mailed out as part of a monthly report to the vice president of human resources, or is it being casually e-mailed around by recruiters as was done at Rice-Haases former recruiting agency employer?How to prevent it from leaving an organizationCompanies like Symantec provide some technology solutions to the problem of managers who mishandle applicant data. Symantec makes a product that it claims will search a companys entire network for sensitive data, like Social Security numbers, even if its on a USB memory stick attached to someones laptop. It should also ID and block such data from being transmitted outside the companys network, either by a negligent employee or a hacker.But such software wont help job seekers unless until the unlikely scenario in which every single potential employer has opted to buy it, and few companies will tell applicants whether they use such technology.Unlike e-commerce sites, which advertise their security practices to gain the trust of consumers about to hand over credit-card data, few employers advertise the steps they take to protect your resume and job application.To protect your resume and sensitive data, the best practice, for now, Vance said, is to make less of it available.

Working with Professional Career Advisors

Working with Professional Career Advisors Working with Professional Career Advisors Career advisors usually see people that are not satisfied with their current position and are looking to make a significant change in their career. They offer testing that can help them identify which careers may be better suited to them. There are even tests that can match your outside interests with those of people in other fields. The theory being people with similar outside interests are better suited for that type of work. The career advisor will help the candidate in resume preparation and coaching them in interview presentation. The advisor will analyze the clients past experience and match them with the new position they are considering. Having a good idea of your transitional skills is a must when making a career changeIf you are a person in an entry level position and you have some ideas about where in the company you would like to advance, you should discuss this with a career advisor. Th ey can administer some tests that assess whether you have the skills necessary for that position. These tests can of course point out weaknesses that can be overcome by training. The career advisor will have information on what is offered and the cost.In this case you may be able to have the training paid for by your employer. Telling your employer that you have consulted with a career advisor certainly shows great initiative. It is a great way to get noticed, especially in a larger firm.They can also be helpful to experienced professionals who have been happy in their job, but due to downsizing are in need of some assistance. It might be just some help in punching up a resume or identifying transitional skills that can help expand the job search for people in this situation. Others may have to come to terms with the fact that their career plan must be drastically altered to keep up with current conditions in their field. A career advisor can offer guidance and specific ideas on how to move forward. A plan that breaks things down into easy to follow steps can ease the anxiety of the situation and make it less overwhelming.As you can see, these professionals are an important resource for any person that takes their career seriously. You get to sit down with a professional that has a lot of experience and find out if you really can get that dream job. The young professional can find out what skills are needed to advance in their desired field. Many career advisors have information about upcoming job fairs and current hiring trends. Some advisors offer job search technique seminars for the older professional whohasntneeded to look for a job for years. When it comes to careers the old adage was Its not what you know, but who you know. That is still true, and one person youd want to know is a career advisor.