Print edition: 
Recruiters who want to hire engineers and other aerospace employees have their eye on Wichita, where Boeing plans to close its facility by the end of 2013.
Boeing employs 600 engineers in Wichita, who earn an average salary of $84,000. The company announced Jan. 4 that it plans to close the Wichita facility over the next two years and move the work to Oklahoma City and San Antonio. Some current employees will be offered jobs at those locations.
The Wichita facility has received many calls from companies inside and outside the state seeking employees with a variety of skills, said Boeing spokesman Jarrod Bartlett.
“But right now we’re still assessing our staffing needs for the locations where our work is going,” Bartlett said. “We’re trying to help employees find opportunities within the Boeing Co. first, then we’ll look at other opportunities to place them with our suppliers or other aircraft companies.”
In the meantime, the site must also make sure it has enough employees to meet customer delivery commitments on current programs, he said.
“We are focused on helping our employees through this transition,” Bartlett said. “We want to help employees with the decisions they have to make … whether it’s retirement, Boeing employment, or employment outside the company.”
Companies with job openings are reacting to the news. Local aviation companies Airbus Engineering North America and Bombardier Learjet are getting the word out that they have engineering openings.
And companies from outside Kansas have begun to visit. A human resources executive from Innovative Solutions and Support in Exton, Pa., was in town this week seeking avionics engineers.
Eight aerospace-related companies will be part of an engineering job fair from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. Wednesday at the Wichita Airport Hilton.
“It’s because of the Boeing news,” Tracy Dawson, operations manager of Expo Experts, said of the reason for the job fair. Expo Experts is hosting the event.
“They want those qualified people to come and work for them, and they know they have that right kind of experience,” she said.
The companies – Triumph Accessory Services, Ball Aerospace, Nordam, Lockheed Martin, General Atomics, L-3, Goodrich and Sierra Nevada – have hundreds of engineering openings, Dawson said. They are looking for engineers in electronics, manufacturing, electrical, mechanical, reliability, software, aeronautical, flight test, design, field engineers and managers.
Triumph and Nordam have openings in Wichita, she said, but “the majority of them are going to want to relocate you.”
While the plant’s closing is two years away, Boeing has said that any layoffs it needs to make could begin in the third quarter of this year. And engineers may be notified of a job offer to move to Boeing’s Oklahoma City facilities or elsewhere as early as March, said Bob Brewer, Midwest director of the Society of Professional Engineering Employees in Aerospace, which represents Boeing engineers.
“Until they know what’s happening, I’m not sure they will have all the information they need from Boeing or other companies to make a decision on where their career is going to take them,” he said.
With an average age of 50, not all the engineers will be looking for another job. By early 2013, 270 of them will be eligible to retire; another 156 will qualify for Boeing’s early retirement program or full retirement within the next six years.
Spirit AeroSystems, which has added hundreds of employees in the last year, also has openings. However, it recently took down job postings from its website as the company assesses its needs.
“At the start of the new year, the company goes through a normal process to refine its strategy and priorities, aligning current work force capability and capacity to demand for our products,” Spirit spokesman Ken Evans said in an e-mail. “Spirit expects to add critical skills as needed throughout the year.”
The company this week has started to post some job openings, he said.
