Driving Our Economy Forward: Nokian Tyres’ Mentorship Program
DAYTON, Tenn. (WDEF) — Nokian Tyres is going all out – recruiting young people in the area, and helping newer workers advance in the company.
They’ve already doubled their capacity, and tripled in size since opening.
Let’s see how Nokian Tyres’ mentorship program is driving our economy forward.
“When I began two-and-a-half years ago, we were just starting our big growth phase, approximately 150 employees,” said Kevin Browning, Training Administrator. “Now we’re at a stage where we’ve expanded and doubled our capacity. By the start of this year, we’ll have up to 475 employees. So we’ve had a lot of growth here, doubling our capacity. We need people, so our mentorship program started about a year-and-a-half ago, where we took the best experts that we had in each area and developed them into being mentors, not trainers. As soon as that trainee comes in and they are connected with a mentor, that now kind of is like that mentor is taking that person under their wing. They are caring for them.”
“So being with someone, they kind of show you what you’re doing and how to do it,” said Grace Zollinger, Nokian Tyres. “And if this problem comes up, how to fix it, I’d say it does put you at ease, because if you came in and didn’t have nobody, you’d be stressed out all the time trying to figure out what this problem’s from, where this is coming from, stuff like that.”
“With that program, we have grown. We probably have about 55 mentors across the plant,” Browning said.
“I slowly get them into starting to run a machine,” said Kyle David Rector, TBM Operator. “I usually start in the back and teach them easy stuff, and we just keep moving forward until I think they’re ready to run by themselves, which even afterwards, I will still stay with them, make sure that they’re comfortable to be by themselves.”
“Grace has a great opportunity. If she decides to stay here, she can become a mentor and then move into potentially like a team lead, maybe an area supervisor, superintendent,” Browning said. “The sky’s the limit. Then, of course, with the growth of the company, we also have a lot of opportunity for those people that mentor and want to learn how to be great leaders. And the mentor is a great stepping stone for that.”
