Lean Production System
A Delhi professor's thesis reveals how the Japanese lean production system ends up reducing permanent employment and denying workers a better life.
Lean Production System
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n 1936, Charlie Chaplin released his movie Modern Times. The film starts with the shot of a herd of jostling pigs followed by a frame that captures a swarm of workers entering a steel factory. It makes a telling statement on the similarity in the behaviour of animals and humans. The movie then goes on to tell the story of Chaplin, whose job as a factory worker involves tightening nuts on a piece of machinery on the assembly line. After a few hours, as the line accelerates and work picks up a frenetic pace, Chaplin suffers a nervous breakdown, creates terror on the floor and ends up in hospital. Three quarters of a century later, nothing seems to have changed.
Sitting in the library of Delhi’s Shri Ram College of Commerce (SRCC), Professor Annavajhula J C Bose says the human mind goes through severe stress when it has to do the same task over and over again for more than eight hours a day and for over 350 days a year. Repetitive function, along with a punishing work environment and ridiculously low wages, saps a worker mentally and physically. “It is no surprise that these factories need young guys who can slave that much. But, by the time you are 35, you are done,” he says.
Bose is associate professor in the department of economics at SRCC. Over the past 10 years, he has trawled the factories and villages of Gurgaon, Noida and Faridabad to study the condition of workers in one of the largest automobile clusters in India. In his PhD thesis, which he submitted in July, Bose has uncovered shocking realities of the life of a worker and the pitfalls of following the Japanese lean production system blindly.
In the past four years, there has been an alarming rise in industrial conflicts in the National Capital Region. Skirmishes between workers and the management at Honda, Maruti Suzuki and Pricol factories have led to the loss of hundreds of jobs and many lives. What has caused such catastrophe? Bose blames it on the much-touted Japanese lean production system that, he says, has failed to deliver on its promised benefits. Not just in India but across the world. “People said there will be innovation in the automobile industry all over the world and they talked about lean production as its basis. A lot of people also said the industry will be the bellwether of employability in terms of labour relations,” says Bose. He, along with a few researchers, decided to check if there was any empirical evidence to back this claim.
What they found was startling. During the golden era of capitalism in the 60s and the 70s, all top Japanese companies ensured job security, wages based on seniority, enterprise unionism and consultative decision making—components that make up labour-friendly working conditions. They quickly junked the model when economic recession set in in the 1990s. What they proposed instead was a restructuring, dubbing it the ‘Japanese style of management in a new era’ and throwing job security and seniority-based pay system out of the window. According to the new principle, each firm should figure out how to separate ‘stock’ and ‘flow’ workers and decide pay strictly on the basis of performance.
Bose contends that this new form of lean production led to the rise of exploitation of contract labour. He explains how. On the pretext of maintaining a flexible workforce, the owner of a unit creates a fake contractor from among the supervisors and managers. The contractor is not registered as it would entail valid records, regular wages and other entitlements. He then informs the labourers that they are contract workers, pays them a pittance and never makes them permanent. “Doing field research on this is very difficult. Nobody wants to talk about the contractors. My own sense tells me they are dangerous people,” adds Bose.
Enough has been said and written about industrial relations. Labor laws their interpretations, examples opinions from various named and unnamed industry sources have led to destructive distillation of this 'matter', so much now I wonder if there is any fruitful essence left. If there were so much of wisdom in the ecosystem, one ponders how IR issues surfaced round the year (last) at a steady frequency much like Salman's Id block-busters! Hit stories.
And now Dr. Bose from SRCC goes oriental in his analysis. The Japs have got it wrong he says! While the article is pitched using 'Modern Times' which is far from the land of the rising sun, I wonder what exactly is the bloodline of this viral accusation! Chaplin's hit aimed at the Fordist regime, Taylorism if one would say. And lean manufacturing is common place to any manufacturing and business process. Japanese belief systems are approaches, mainly, disciplined ways to go about achieving such ends. Dr Bose should have, while he waited at the gates of Maruti's manufacturing facility, tried to appreciate basic lexical meaning of terms which are often peppered in conversations as "concepts". Who would not want maximum resource utilization to run a production facility? Who would not want to reduce waste so that throughput of an assembly line goes up and there is maximum efficiency? Putting an acronym to things (5S, 2S, Kaizen etc.) and also focusing on basic elements of shop floor management to end up doing better is 'Modern Times' (pun intended!). And it requires due diligence, quite a bit of discipline and dedication to roll out these simple commandments of overall good manufacturing/operations practices.
You visit the TVS Motor Company manufacturing plant at Hosur, Tamil Nadu and you would realize what good manufacturing practices are. Swarms of workmen get down from the company buses and queue up to enter the factory. It would be a horrendous mistake to draw comparison with Charlie Chaplin and a cinematic 'herd of jostling pigs'! Employees in TVS queue up to deposit their mobile phones before entering the unit. Stealing from Arindam Chaudhari I am tempted to ask "Dare to think beyond the Japs"! The learned doctor has been myopic about his evaluation of Japanese work practices. He has made a heady cocktail of incorrect assessment and ill-informed concepts. Nowhere does TPM, TQM talk about contract labor usage. No where do they talk about short circuiting work through trainees at half the compensation.
If you visit the TVS Motor Canteen at Hosur you would see the intent to follow guidelines. The President sits with employees for his lunch. No one chooses best lunch buddies there! Sequentially people take their meal portions and occupy tables serially. Employees and managers alike wash their plates preliminarily and then leave the canteen. Outsiders and guests enter only with lunch coupons duly signed. And it’s a sumptuous meal I tell you. There are even options for diet meals for employees and managers conscious of their waist-lines!
Who says education or lack thereof is the fulcrum for good manufacturing practices? Who says Indian units are just looking at low hanging production fruits to be eaten using oriental 'chop-sticks'? Why is the need felt to drown in self-pity and then cry foul regarding the Japanese way of life? Employees of TVS Hosur unit sit after their shifts to draw up QC Story and talk about what contributions they have made to manufacturing lines and product quality. How they have affected and effected QCD parameters! They use OHP sheets and present using OHP and Vice-Presidents of various departments chair those sessions. Quarterly awards have been instituted. Employees participate in national level QCC and Productivity Council competitions and 'fly international' to present their case, present their contribution towards business outcomes. Truly, for these employees, the 'labor pain is worth the birth'!
I wonder how we would ever progress with negative intent. The Delhi professor has hardly a ring side view into Indian auto industry and yet some macro criticism of reputed organizations and their manufacturing facilities have been so easy to voice. And sadly enough he has even questioned the Japanese philosophy without understanding its bare essence. Without learning the grammar of the language, our learned Doctor writes a prose, now that really can be 'painful'.
IR is not equal to shop floor manufacturing practices; the later would be management, the earlier would be an art. And there is no scope here of generalizing things. Who would have stopped us to apply these management principles without being sly in the art of man management? Or maybe the Doctor wants to say that its only the Japanese cloak that hides the dagger of exploitation and subversive tactics leading to factory operations? Indian organizations running on conventional methodology are puritans, sans any ills? He would not have waited outside factories run by traditional Marwari business families. He would not have waited outside European industries who have milked money out and then dumped their units. Has Dr. Bose heard of Bhopal Gas Tragedy? UCIL? Dow Chemical Company? Why does he not talk about Hindustan Motors, the grand old lady of Indian Automobile Industry? The unit which used to roll out the beloved 'ambassador' is now coughing, struggling to stay alive! Who owns this mammoth manufacturing facility? And trust you me, Dr. Bose, it’s not some oriental gentleman. Its a Birla group company! Incidentally TVS Motor Company is headed by Venu Srinivasan, an Indian passport holder.
Let the concepts work their magic, doctor, let believers apply and better themselves. For as the English would say, ignorance is bliss and in the land of the blind it’s dangerous to be one-eyed!
I am also from corporate sector background with more than 35 years industry management experience. Indian baniyas have been exploited labor for hundred years. Every where story is same. In connivance with corrupt politicians of India, these so called MNCs are allowed to do loot and plunder. The local industrialists are no less.
I am shocked to see such sketchy and superficial contents of this article which are known to every one every where sinne last 2 decades.What is research in it that merits PhD level work? Perhaps Forbes should improve their publishing standards. The contractorship labor system has nothing to do with lean manufacturing.The whole contents of this article are messy and worthless. I am sorry but I am greatly disappointed.Truth is bitter.
Dear Sir, no doubt an illuminating aspect of the crisis that seems to persist in the factories in NCR. I am sure there are HR and IR issues which have been mishandled by the Suzuki management, as they are unmindful of the indian cultural sensitivities. However, to call it a design flaw may be going too far. What it points to is a criminal lack of institutional mechanisms in the region. Governments, happily collecting taxes from such setups do not seem to have functioning safety valves that would prevent escalation of conflicts to such limits. Large scale contract labour under the guise of trainees is surely an aspect that could not have gone un-noticed if there was someone doing their job at Suzuki plant or at the state labour department.
This has nothing to do with lean, but I too noticed SE Asian workforce as much more flexible and hard working than indian. Whether that needs to change, and if so, how, are issues for the institutional members to decide. Yet, these are big questions for India's ambition of promoting industrialization of the country.
Ignorance is bliss Enough has been said and written about industrial relations. Labor laws their interpretations, examples opinions from various named and unnamed industry sources have led to destructive distillation of this 'matter', so much now I wonder if there is any fruitful essence left. If there were so much of wisdom in the ecosystem, one ponders how IR issues surfaced round the year (last) at a steady frequency much like Salman's Id block-busters! Hit stories. And now Dr. Bose from SRCC goes oriental in his analysis. The Japs have got it wrong he says! While the article is pitched using 'Modern Times' which is far from the land of the rising sun, I wonder what exactly is the bloodline of this viral accusation! Chaplin's hit aimed at the Fordist regime, Taylorism if one would say. And lean manufacturing is common place to any manufacturing and business process. Japanese belief systems are approaches, mainly, disciplined ways to go about achieving such ends. Dr Bose should have, while he waited at the gates of Maruti's manufacturing facility, tried to appreciate basic lexical meaning of terms which are often peppered in conversations as "concepts". Who would not want maximum resource utilization to run a production facility? Who would not want to reduce waste so that throughput of an assembly line goes up and there is maximum efficiency? Putting an acronym to things (5S, 2S, Kaizen etc.) and also focusing on basic elements of shop floor management to end up doing better is 'Modern Times' (pun intended!). And it requires due diligence, quite a bit of discipline and dedication to roll out these simple commandments of overall good manufacturing/operations practices. You visit the TVS Motor Company manufacturing plant at Hosur, Tamil Nadu and you would realize what good manufacturing practices are. Swarms of workmen get down from the company buses and queue up to enter the factory. It would be a horrendous mistake to draw comparison with Charlie Chaplin and a cinematic 'herd of jostling pigs'! Employees in TVS queue up to deposit their mobile phones before entering the unit. Stealing from Arindam Chaudhari I am tempted to ask "Dare to think beyond the Japs"! The learned doctor has been myopic about his evaluation of Japanese work practices. He has made a heady cocktail of incorrect assessment and ill-informed concepts. Nowhere does TPM, TQM talk about contract labor usage. No where do they talk about short circuiting work through trainees at half the compensation. If you visit the TVS Motor Canteen at Hosur you would see the intent to follow guidelines. The President sits with employees for his lunch. No one chooses best lunch buddies there! Sequentially people take their meal portions and occupy tables serially. Employees and managers alike wash their plates preliminarily and then leave the canteen. Outsiders and guests enter only with lunch coupons duly signed. And it’s a sumptuous meal I tell you. There are even options for diet meals for employees and managers conscious of their waist-lines! Who says education or lack thereof is the fulcrum for good manufacturing practices? Who says Indian units are just looking at low hanging production fruits to be eaten using oriental 'chop-sticks'? Why is the need felt to drown in self-pity and then cry foul regarding the Japanese way of life? Employees of TVS Hosur unit sit after their shifts to draw up QC Story and talk about what contributions they have made to manufacturing lines and product quality. How they have affected and effected QCD parameters! They use OHP sheets and present using OHP and Vice-Presidents of various departments chair those sessions. Quarterly awards have been instituted. Employees participate in national level QCC and Productivity Council competitions and 'fly international' to present their case, present their contribution towards business outcomes. Truly, for these employees, the 'labor pain is worth the birth'! I wonder how we would ever progress with negative intent. The Delhi professor has hardly a ring side view into Indian auto industry and yet some macro criticism of reputed organizations and their manufacturing facilities have been so easy to voice. And sadly enough he has even questioned the Japanese philosophy without understanding its bare essence. Without learning the grammar of the language, our learned Doctor writes a prose, now that really can be 'painful'. IR is not equal to shop floor manufacturing practices; the later would be management, the earlier would be an art. And there is no scope here of generalizing things. Who would have stopped us to apply these management principles without being sly in the art of man management? Or maybe the Doctor wants to say that its only the Japanese cloak that hides the dagger of exploitation and subversive tactics leading to factory operations? Indian organizations running on conventional methodology are puritans, sans any ills? He would not have waited outside factories run by traditional Marwari business families. He would not have waited outside European industries who have milked money out and then dumped their units. Has Dr. Bose heard of Bhopal Gas Tragedy? UCIL? Dow Chemical Company? Why does he not talk about Hindustan Motors, the grand old lady of Indian Automobile Industry? The unit which used to roll out the beloved 'ambassador' is now coughing, struggling to stay alive! Who owns this mammoth manufacturing facility? And trust you me, Dr. Bose, it’s not some oriental gentleman. Its a Birla group company! Incidentally TVS Motor Company is headed by Venu Srinivasan, an Indian passport holder. Let the concepts work their magic, doctor, let believers apply and better themselves. For as the English would say, ignorance is bliss and in the land of the blind it’s dangerous to be one-eyed!
I am also from corporate sector background with more than 35 years industry management experience. Indian baniyas have been exploited labor for hundred years. Every where story is same. In connivance with corrupt politicians of India, these so called MNCs are allowed to do loot and plunder. The local industrialists are no less. I am shocked to see such sketchy and superficial contents of this article which are known to every one every where sinne last 2 decades.What is research in it that merits PhD level work? Perhaps Forbes should improve their publishing standards. The contractorship labor system has nothing to do with lean manufacturing.The whole contents of this article are messy and worthless. I am sorry but I am greatly disappointed.Truth is bitter.
Dear Sir, no doubt an illuminating aspect of the crisis that seems to persist in the factories in NCR. I am sure there are HR and IR issues which have been mishandled by the Suzuki management, as they are unmindful of the indian cultural sensitivities. However, to call it a design flaw may be going too far. What it points to is a criminal lack of institutional mechanisms in the region. Governments, happily collecting taxes from such setups do not seem to have functioning safety valves that would prevent escalation of conflicts to such limits. Large scale contract labour under the guise of trainees is surely an aspect that could not have gone un-noticed if there was someone doing their job at Suzuki plant or at the state labour department. This has nothing to do with lean, but I too noticed SE Asian workforce as much more flexible and hard working than indian. Whether that needs to change, and if so, how, are issues for the institutional members to decide. Yet, these are big questions for India's ambition of promoting industrialization of the country.
n 1936, Charlie Chaplin released his movie Modern Times. The film starts with the shot of a herd of jostling pigs followed by a frame that captures a swarm of workers entering a steel factory. It makes a telling statement on the similarity in the behaviour of animals and humans. The movie then goes on to tell the story of Chaplin, whose job as a factory worker involves tightening nuts on a piece of machinery on the assembly line. After a few hours, as the line accelerates and work picks up a frenetic pace, Chaplin suffers a nervous breakdown, creates terror on the floor and ends up in hospital. Three quarters of a century later, nothing seems to have changed.
Sitting in the library of Delhi’s Shri Ram College of Commerce (SRCC), Professor Annavajhula J C Bose says the human mind goes through severe stress when it has to do the same task over and over again for more than eight hours a day and for over 350 days a year. Repetitive function, along with a punishing work environment and ridiculously low wages, saps a worker mentally and physically. “It is no surprise that these factories need young guys who can slave that much. But, by the time you are 35, you are done,” he says.
Bose is associate professor in the department of economics at SRCC. Over the past 10 years, he has trawled the factories and villages of Gurgaon, Noida and Faridabad to study the condition of workers in one of the largest automobile clusters in India. In his PhD thesis, which he submitted in July, Bose has uncovered shocking realities of the life of a worker and the pitfalls of following the Japanese lean production system blindly.
In the past four years, there has been an alarming rise in industrial conflicts in the National Capital Region. Skirmishes between workers and the management at Honda, Maruti Suzuki and Pricol factories have led to the loss of hundreds of jobs and many lives. What has caused such catastrophe? Bose blames it on the much-touted Japanese lean production system that, he says, has failed to deliver on its promised benefits. Not just in India but across the world. “People said there will be innovation in the automobile industry all over the world and they talked about lean production as its basis. A lot of people also said the industry will be the bellwether of employability in terms of labour relations,” says Bose. He, along with a few researchers, decided to check if there was any empirical evidence to back this claim.
What they found was startling. During the golden era of capitalism in the 60s and the 70s, all top Japanese companies ensured job security, wages based on seniority, enterprise unionism and consultative decision making—components that make up labour-friendly working conditions. They quickly junked the model when economic recession set in in the 1990s. What they proposed instead was a restructuring, dubbing it the ‘Japanese style of management in a new era’ and throwing job security and seniority-based pay system out of the window. According to the new principle, each firm should figure out how to separate ‘stock’ and ‘flow’ workers and decide pay strictly on the basis of performance.
Bose contends that this new form of lean production led to the rise of exploitation of contract labour. He explains how. On the pretext of maintaining a flexible workforce, the owner of a unit creates a fake contractor from among the supervisors and managers. The contractor is not registered as it would entail valid records, regular wages and other entitlements. He then informs the labourers that they are contract workers, pays them a pittance and never makes them permanent. “Doing field research on this is very difficult. Nobody wants to talk about the contractors. My own sense tells me they are dangerous people,” adds Bose.
Enough has been said and written about industrial relations. Labor laws their interpretations, examples opinions from various named and unnamed industry sources have led to destructive distillation of this 'matter', so much now I wonder if there is any fruitful essence left. If there were so much of wisdom in the ecosystem, one ponders how IR issues surfaced round the year (last) at a steady frequency much like Salman's Id block-busters! Hit stories.
And now Dr. Bose from SRCC goes oriental in his analysis. The Japs have got it wrong he says! While the article is pitched using 'Modern Times' which is far from the land of the rising sun, I wonder what exactly is the bloodline of this viral accusation! Chaplin's hit aimed at the Fordist regime, Taylorism if one would say. And lean manufacturing is common place to any manufacturing and business process. Japanese belief systems are approaches, mainly, disciplined ways to go about achieving such ends. Dr Bose should have, while he waited at the gates of Maruti's manufacturing facility, tried to appreciate basic lexical meaning of terms which are often peppered in conversations as "concepts". Who would not want maximum resource utilization to run a production facility? Who would not want to reduce waste so that throughput of an assembly line goes up and there is maximum efficiency? Putting an acronym to things (5S, 2S, Kaizen etc.) and also focusing on basic elements of shop floor management to end up doing better is 'Modern Times' (pun intended!). And it requires due diligence, quite a bit of discipline and dedication to roll out these simple commandments of overall good manufacturing/operations practices.
You visit the TVS Motor Company manufacturing plant at Hosur, Tamil Nadu and you would realize what good manufacturing practices are. Swarms of workmen get down from the company buses and queue up to enter the factory. It would be a horrendous mistake to draw comparison with Charlie Chaplin and a cinematic 'herd of jostling pigs'! Employees in TVS queue up to deposit their mobile phones before entering the unit. Stealing from Arindam Chaudhari I am tempted to ask "Dare to think beyond the Japs"! The learned doctor has been myopic about his evaluation of Japanese work practices. He has made a heady cocktail of incorrect assessment and ill-informed concepts. Nowhere does TPM, TQM talk about contract labor usage. No where do they talk about short circuiting work through trainees at half the compensation.
If you visit the TVS Motor Canteen at Hosur you would see the intent to follow guidelines. The President sits with employees for his lunch. No one chooses best lunch buddies there! Sequentially people take their meal portions and occupy tables serially. Employees and managers alike wash their plates preliminarily and then leave the canteen. Outsiders and guests enter only with lunch coupons duly signed. And it’s a sumptuous meal I tell you. There are even options for diet meals for employees and managers conscious of their waist-lines!
Who says education or lack thereof is the fulcrum for good manufacturing practices? Who says Indian units are just looking at low hanging production fruits to be eaten using oriental 'chop-sticks'? Why is the need felt to drown in self-pity and then cry foul regarding the Japanese way of life? Employees of TVS Hosur unit sit after their shifts to draw up QC Story and talk about what contributions they have made to manufacturing lines and product quality. How they have affected and effected QCD parameters! They use OHP sheets and present using OHP and Vice-Presidents of various departments chair those sessions. Quarterly awards have been instituted. Employees participate in national level QCC and Productivity Council competitions and 'fly international' to present their case, present their contribution towards business outcomes. Truly, for these employees, the 'labor pain is worth the birth'!
I wonder how we would ever progress with negative intent. The Delhi professor has hardly a ring side view into Indian auto industry and yet some macro criticism of reputed organizations and their manufacturing facilities have been so easy to voice. And sadly enough he has even questioned the Japanese philosophy without understanding its bare essence. Without learning the grammar of the language, our learned Doctor writes a prose, now that really can be 'painful'.
IR is not equal to shop floor manufacturing practices; the later would be management, the earlier would be an art. And there is no scope here of generalizing things. Who would have stopped us to apply these management principles without being sly in the art of man management? Or maybe the Doctor wants to say that its only the Japanese cloak that hides the dagger of exploitation and subversive tactics leading to factory operations? Indian organizations running on conventional methodology are puritans, sans any ills? He would not have waited outside factories run by traditional Marwari business families. He would not have waited outside European industries who have milked money out and then dumped their units. Has Dr. Bose heard of Bhopal Gas Tragedy? UCIL? Dow Chemical Company? Why does he not talk about Hindustan Motors, the grand old lady of Indian Automobile Industry? The unit which used to roll out the beloved 'ambassador' is now coughing, struggling to stay alive! Who owns this mammoth manufacturing facility? And trust you me, Dr. Bose, it’s not some oriental gentleman. Its a Birla group company! Incidentally TVS Motor Company is headed by Venu Srinivasan, an Indian passport holder.
Let the concepts work their magic, doctor, let believers apply and better themselves. For as the English would say, ignorance is bliss and in the land of the blind it’s dangerous to be one-eyed!
I am also from corporate sector background with more than 35 years industry management experience. Indian baniyas have been exploited labor for hundred years. Every where story is same. In connivance with corrupt politicians of India, these so called MNCs are allowed to do loot and plunder. The local industrialists are no less.
I am shocked to see such sketchy and superficial contents of this article which are known to every one every where sinne last 2 decades.What is research in it that merits PhD level work? Perhaps Forbes should improve their publishing standards. The contractorship labor system has nothing to do with lean manufacturing.The whole contents of this article are messy and worthless. I am sorry but I am greatly disappointed.Truth is bitter.
Dear Sir, no doubt an illuminating aspect of the crisis that seems to persist in the factories in NCR. I am sure there are HR and IR issues which have been mishandled by the Suzuki management, as they are unmindful of the indian cultural sensitivities. However, to call it a design flaw may be going too far. What it points to is a criminal lack of institutional mechanisms in the region. Governments, happily collecting taxes from such setups do not seem to have functioning safety valves that would prevent escalation of conflicts to such limits. Large scale contract labour under the guise of trainees is surely an aspect that could not have gone un-noticed if there was someone doing their job at Suzuki plant or at the state labour department.
This has nothing to do with lean, but I too noticed SE Asian workforce as much more flexible and hard working than indian. Whether that needs to change, and if so, how, are issues for the institutional members to decide. Yet, these are big questions for India's ambition of promoting industrialization of the country.
Ignorance is bliss Enough has been said and written about industrial relations. Labor laws their interpretations, examples opinions from various named and unnamed industry sources have led to destructive distillation of this 'matter', so much now I wonder if there is any fruitful essence left. If there were so much of wisdom in the ecosystem, one ponders how IR issues surfaced round the year (last) at a steady frequency much like Salman's Id block-busters! Hit stories. And now Dr. Bose from SRCC goes oriental in his analysis. The Japs have got it wrong he says! While the article is pitched using 'Modern Times' which is far from the land of the rising sun, I wonder what exactly is the bloodline of this viral accusation! Chaplin's hit aimed at the Fordist regime, Taylorism if one would say. And lean manufacturing is common place to any manufacturing and business process. Japanese belief systems are approaches, mainly, disciplined ways to go about achieving such ends. Dr Bose should have, while he waited at the gates of Maruti's manufacturing facility, tried to appreciate basic lexical meaning of terms which are often peppered in conversations as "concepts". Who would not want maximum resource utilization to run a production facility? Who would not want to reduce waste so that throughput of an assembly line goes up and there is maximum efficiency? Putting an acronym to things (5S, 2S, Kaizen etc.) and also focusing on basic elements of shop floor management to end up doing better is 'Modern Times' (pun intended!). And it requires due diligence, quite a bit of discipline and dedication to roll out these simple commandments of overall good manufacturing/operations practices. You visit the TVS Motor Company manufacturing plant at Hosur, Tamil Nadu and you would realize what good manufacturing practices are. Swarms of workmen get down from the company buses and queue up to enter the factory. It would be a horrendous mistake to draw comparison with Charlie Chaplin and a cinematic 'herd of jostling pigs'! Employees in TVS queue up to deposit their mobile phones before entering the unit. Stealing from Arindam Chaudhari I am tempted to ask "Dare to think beyond the Japs"! The learned doctor has been myopic about his evaluation of Japanese work practices. He has made a heady cocktail of incorrect assessment and ill-informed concepts. Nowhere does TPM, TQM talk about contract labor usage. No where do they talk about short circuiting work through trainees at half the compensation. If you visit the TVS Motor Canteen at Hosur you would see the intent to follow guidelines. The President sits with employees for his lunch. No one chooses best lunch buddies there! Sequentially people take their meal portions and occupy tables serially. Employees and managers alike wash their plates preliminarily and then leave the canteen. Outsiders and guests enter only with lunch coupons duly signed. And it’s a sumptuous meal I tell you. There are even options for diet meals for employees and managers conscious of their waist-lines! Who says education or lack thereof is the fulcrum for good manufacturing practices? Who says Indian units are just looking at low hanging production fruits to be eaten using oriental 'chop-sticks'? Why is the need felt to drown in self-pity and then cry foul regarding the Japanese way of life? Employees of TVS Hosur unit sit after their shifts to draw up QC Story and talk about what contributions they have made to manufacturing lines and product quality. How they have affected and effected QCD parameters! They use OHP sheets and present using OHP and Vice-Presidents of various departments chair those sessions. Quarterly awards have been instituted. Employees participate in national level QCC and Productivity Council competitions and 'fly international' to present their case, present their contribution towards business outcomes. Truly, for these employees, the 'labor pain is worth the birth'! I wonder how we would ever progress with negative intent. The Delhi professor has hardly a ring side view into Indian auto industry and yet some macro criticism of reputed organizations and their manufacturing facilities have been so easy to voice. And sadly enough he has even questioned the Japanese philosophy without understanding its bare essence. Without learning the grammar of the language, our learned Doctor writes a prose, now that really can be 'painful'. IR is not equal to shop floor manufacturing practices; the later would be management, the earlier would be an art. And there is no scope here of generalizing things. Who would have stopped us to apply these management principles without being sly in the art of man management? Or maybe the Doctor wants to say that its only the Japanese cloak that hides the dagger of exploitation and subversive tactics leading to factory operations? Indian organizations running on conventional methodology are puritans, sans any ills? He would not have waited outside factories run by traditional Marwari business families. He would not have waited outside European industries who have milked money out and then dumped their units. Has Dr. Bose heard of Bhopal Gas Tragedy? UCIL? Dow Chemical Company? Why does he not talk about Hindustan Motors, the grand old lady of Indian Automobile Industry? The unit which used to roll out the beloved 'ambassador' is now coughing, struggling to stay alive! Who owns this mammoth manufacturing facility? And trust you me, Dr. Bose, it’s not some oriental gentleman. Its a Birla group company! Incidentally TVS Motor Company is headed by Venu Srinivasan, an Indian passport holder. Let the concepts work their magic, doctor, let believers apply and better themselves. For as the English would say, ignorance is bliss and in the land of the blind it’s dangerous to be one-eyed!
I am also from corporate sector background with more than 35 years industry management experience. Indian baniyas have been exploited labor for hundred years. Every where story is same. In connivance with corrupt politicians of India, these so called MNCs are allowed to do loot and plunder. The local industrialists are no less. I am shocked to see such sketchy and superficial contents of this article which are known to every one every where sinne last 2 decades.What is research in it that merits PhD level work? Perhaps Forbes should improve their publishing standards. The contractorship labor system has nothing to do with lean manufacturing.The whole contents of this article are messy and worthless. I am sorry but I am greatly disappointed.Truth is bitter.
Dear Sir, no doubt an illuminating aspect of the crisis that seems to persist in the factories in NCR. I am sure there are HR and IR issues which have been mishandled by the Suzuki management, as they are unmindful of the indian cultural sensitivities. However, to call it a design flaw may be going too far. What it points to is a criminal lack of institutional mechanisms in the region. Governments, happily collecting taxes from such setups do not seem to have functioning safety valves that would prevent escalation of conflicts to such limits. Large scale contract labour under the guise of trainees is surely an aspect that could not have gone un-noticed if there was someone doing their job at Suzuki plant or at the state labour department. This has nothing to do with lean, but I too noticed SE Asian workforce as much more flexible and hard working than indian. Whether that needs to change, and if so, how, are issues for the institutional members to decide. Yet, these are big questions for India's ambition of promoting industrialization of the country.
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