Showing posts sorted by date for query Toyotaization. Sort by relevance Show all posts
Showing posts sorted by date for query Toyotaization. Sort by relevance Show all posts

Sunday, August 30, 2020

TOYOTAIZATION REDUX

When the Toyota Way Meets Industry 4.0

The real message here is: "adopt and adapt technology that supports your people and processes."

Jeffrey Liker
AUG 27, 2020

Society has reached the point where one can push a button and be immediately deluged with technical and managerial information. This is all very convenient, of course, but if one is not careful there is a danger of losing the ability to think. We must remember that in the end it is the individual human being who must solve the problems.

—Eiji Toyoda, Creativity, Challenge and Courage, Toyota Motor Corporation, 1983

In the 1990s Toyota’s principles of production equipment became “simple, slim, and flexible,” which some people might interpret as “go slow and be cautious in adopting new technology.” In today’s age of lightning speed technological change, particularly in the digital world, I believe that would be a mistake. The real message here is: "adopt and adapt technology that supports your people and processes." The starting point is this: where are real needs that technology can address to help achieve your goals? This is a question of pulling technology based on the opportunity, instead of pushing the technology because it is the latest fad.

This simple lesson grows more relevant every day. It seems clear to me that technology in the digital age can support lean thinking. The key issue is to avoid the temptation to buy and implement the latest gee-whiz digital tools, and instead to thoughtfully integrate technology with highly developed people and processes.

Toyota’s largest supplier, Denso, has made remarkable progress in adapting real time data collection, the Internet of Things (IOT), and data analytics to support lean systems and amplify kaizen. At the center of Denso’s approach is people, and their ability to sense reality and think creatively. Denso demonstrates that technology has the greatest potential when there is a culture of continuous improvement and the people are highly developed.

Raja Shembekar, vice president of Denso’s North American Production Innovation Center, is the chief architect of their use of the Internet of Things (IOT). As a starting point Raja benchmarked other companies thought to be leaders in the technology. He found a lot of what he came to call “IOT wallpaper” with little real application. Cool-looking displays, but no real problem solving. He concluded that Denso needed to take charge and lead their own effort, starting with treating the Battlecreek, Michigan plant as a pilot site. He built a small team, with about half IOT experts, and half shopfloor people like quality managers who were good at software. Together, they started to work on real problems identified at the gemba.

As one example they have huge brazing ovens needed to make aluminum heat exchangers. It is critical to keep the temperature constant throughout the oven and they do this with twelve expensive fans each the size of a table. If a single fan stops, it take 12 hours to cool the oven down from 700 celsius, 12 hours to replace the fan, and 12 hours to bring it back up. With tiny sensors on each fan and an IOT system they can monitor the condition and alert maintenance when there is any degradation, long before a shutdown. In one case, Denso data scientists reported to maintenance that a fan was going to fail in 58 hours and they should replace it. Raja explained: “Maintenance did not believe it. But we asked them to change it anyway. They took the fan out. Half the blades on the fan had disintegrated. They were totally shocked that they had no idea this was happening and we could provide that prediction.”

In another example they focused on direct aid to the operator of an automated assembly process with robots. We are used to the idea of operators filling out a control chart with upper and lower control limits and taking action before the process is out of control. This system continuously develops a control chart in real-time. When observing we noticed a few minutes early that the process was headed out of control and the operator made an adjustment quickly fixing the problem.

A more ambitious project that cuts to the heart of TPS is automated standardized work support. Raja found a Stanford professor working on “motion technology.” A camera videos a person and can in real time analyze the data with AI, for example chunking actions into work steps. Raja saw the potential for revolutionizing standard work and collaborated with the professor who now has a thriving company. The output will be familiar to those experienced with standardized work—steps and times versus takt, operator balance charts, and in effect real time auditing that identifies deviations from the standardized work. The analyst does not have to spend time creating all these sheets and can call up all cases where there was a line stop, or all cases where there was a certain type of deviation from standard, and go back and watch the video. What was the operator actually doing at that point? This technology is getting broad interest from around the world—including from Toyota.

Does the Technology Deskill, Replace, or Enhance?

A key question going back to when I first started studying the impact of computer-integrated technology in the 1980s is: does the technology deskill, replace, or enhance? And the answer then and now is that it depends on management philosophy. Consider two different approaches: mechanistic and organic. From a mechanistic perspective, the value of technology is clear—replace people, monitor those remaining, and control them with clear instructions on what to do. Implement the technology quickly and broadly to remove the unpredictable human element.

From an organic-systems perspective, the value of the technology is very different. When combined with highly developed people motivated toward goals of serving customer and helping the company, it can multiply kaizen—faster and better.

Raja made it clear what side of the fence he was on. Denso’s focus was not on using the technology to eliminate people, though he had no doubt that over time there would be a need for fewer people in the factory. While there would be cases where a closed-loop technical system diagnosed and automatically corrected problems, there would be plenty of issues that required human ingenuity and intervention. In fact, Raja is convinced that the skill requirements of the people need to grow.

“We will always need people, but their skill level needs to be completely shifted over time. The technology provides data that allows the associate and the team leaders at the gemba to provide a far higher level of decision making. In the past they would just fill out the paperwork, but by the time they did all that they had either no time or energy to really comprehend the data. If they want to see trends from say five days ago or across people, that just wasn't there. What this has provided is what we now call fast PDCA. We can’t afford to have PDCA that takes 3 weeks anymore. We want a PDCA done before the end of that shift.”

At Denso in Japan, they operate on the belief that IOT does not cut people out of the loop, but rather provides superior information to people about the process. The power of big data and artificial intelligence is to give the operator information just-in-time that they previously could only guess at. But Denso expects the operator to use that information creatively to find the root cause and solve the problem through kaizen. Denso calls this “collaborative creation and growth of human, things, and equipment.” One irony might come out of this. Historically, a major role of industrial engineers was to reduce the number of workers needed. Now, the technology might enable the workers to the point they can eliminate the industrial engineers.

Balancing Adoption of the Latest Technology with Effectiveness

Toyota is a technologically advanced company and has been for decades—shut down its computer systems and you shut down the company. But Toyota is not interested in being trendy and making adoption of new technology an end onto itself. Just as Toyota refuses to schedule parts made in one department to be pushed onto another, Toyota refuses to allow an information technology or advanced manufacturing technology department to push technology onto departments that do the value-added work of designing and building cars. Any information technology must meet the acid test of supporting people and processes and prove it adds value before it is implemented broadly. And then the ownership for introducing the new technology falls on existing management. They will run it, they will be responsible for meeting the targets, so they should lead the introduction.

The problem as I see it is that people living in the computer software world seem to believe if they can do a demonstration based on a simulated example, it should translate seamlessly into solving real problems in the outside world. That is the thinking that got companies in trouble back in the 1980s. And it was the situation that Raja of Denso encountered in the 21st century when he was exploring Industry 4.0 software. I was skeptical before talking to Raja about the bold concept of a fully-automated factory with everything run by internet connections, big data, and AI--and Raja confirmed my suspicions that it could be a lot of smoke and mirrors. On the other hand, I also was awakened to the strength of the technology. I am now convinced it is real and it includes the technologies missing from early failed attempts to computerize the factory in the 1980s. It seems they were not completely wrong about the potential, but just early.

It also became clear in seeing what Raja has been doing at Denso’s plant in Battle Creek that Industry 4.0 is not a disruptive force that makes TPS irrelevant, but rather can be an enabler that builds on TPS culture and thinking. After all, the Internet of Things necessarily includes things. And if the things are poorly designed, poorly laid out, and poorly maintained software will not solve the problem.

The difference between Denso and companies that are creating electronic wallpaper seems to be a matter of mindset. Denso starts with the problem and then builds the social and technical systems to help address the problem. It builds on its existing culture of disciplined execution and problem solving. Without this, companies are left to throwing the technology at the wall and hoping it sticks. The principles of TPS will not disappear from a company like Denso, but the way the factory operates under TPS + IOT will be very different.

I was fascinated by the IOT technologies I saw at Denso, but in the back of my mind I could not help but guess at the concerns of Toyota Production System. TPS is about forcing people to think deeply to solve problems. Will computer systems make us lazy thinkers? How can we marry the powerful information coming out of the computers with the creativity of people in developing and testing ideas for improvement?

I was encouraged by Akio Toyoda’s thoughts. It is clear he sees the possibility of combining the best of the new technology with the creativity of thinking people In a recent speech he said:

“Two concepts -- automation with people and Just-in-Time -- are the pillars of the TPS. What both have in common is that people are at the center. I believe that the more automation advances, the more the ability of the people using it will be put to the test. Machines cannot improve unless people do, too. Developing people with skills that can equal machines and senses that surpass sensors is a fundamental part of Toyota's approach.”

This article is from the upcoming revised edition of The Toyota Way, Second Edition (due out October 2020), which includes Principle 8: Adopt and Adapt Technology that Supports your People and Processes. It originally appeared in the Lean Post, the blog of the Lean Enterprise Institute, and is used with permission.

Wednesday, November 07, 2007

Loonie Beats Dollar Benefits Who



And, as predicted, the dollar reaches 1.10

Loonie surpasses US$1.08 in overseas trading

So what.I still see American price differentials of at least nine to ten bucks on CD's for sale at Starbucks, books at Indigo/Chapters. Heck even an American price differential on the duvet we wanted buy. Our dollar is high so who is raking in the profit? Well the retailers are and so are their suppliers.

Of course currency traders can make trillions off the cost of the loonie vs. the dollar, but for you and I well we are still paying last summers prices for American goods. Of course because the Canadian retailers bought their stock at higher prices last summer too.
But often our retailers are simply branch plant operations of their American parent company. Which is why Wal-Mart can adjust its prices, so should Home Hardware. While Rona or Indigo can't do so as easily.

Wait a minute whatever happened to just in time production costs. You know the Toyotaization of the economy, where goods are produced and shipped as needed. Should the rising loonie be reflected almost immediately, give or take a month, in the actual production of items. Well of course, but to reprint all those book and cd covers costs money. So the price stays the same on the source label. It's up to the retailer to drop the cost.

Many of the town’s largest retailers say consumers can expect price cuts due to the rising Canadian dollar.

Local management at the big three - Canadian Tire, Wal-Mart and Zellers - wouldn’t comment personally, but passed the question on to press releases or spokespeople at their head offices.
Canadian Tire spokesperson Lisa Gibson said the chain has already dropped prices on over 1,000 items and more will come. The company is committed to being competitive, but Gibson said the exchange rate is only one factor in retail pricing.

"It’s a little more complicated than it seems," she said. "The products you see on the shelves we purchased months and months ago. If the dollar stays high there will be more savings."
A press release from Hudson’s Bay Company, parent company of Zellers, said price cuts started to take effect on Oct. 19. Zellers stores will feature a price cut promotional progam to signal to consumers the products where savings are being obtained.

"HBC is fighting for Canadians," said Rob Johnston, president. "We have worked with our vendors to obtain better deals on merchandise at Zellers. We understand that the rising Canadian dollar has led to a demand for lower pricing and this is our attempt to provide real savings for Canadian families."

According to a press release from Wal-Mart Canada, the company has been negotiating with suppliers for a year to turn the higher loonie into lower prices for its customers. As a result, thousands of items have seen price rollbacks each week. Wal-Mart is committed to 7,000 rollbacks weekly for the holiday shopping period.
Maybe before the Christmas sales rush the loonies rise will be reflected in a mark down of the American prices we pay. Well of course after all it's the Christmas rush. All retailers deal in volume, so we should expect to see prices drop.


MacKinnon said it may be a temporary blip, but even if, in the long run, the Canadian dollar stays exactly the same as the U.S. dollar, you can't expect prices to be exactly the same. Transportation costs, competition and a variety of other factors contribute to the price of goods: the exchange rate is only one part of the picture.

His advice for getting the best deals?

Do your shopping online.

Even though books and magazines that have been slashed to U.S. prices at places such as Wal-Mart, consumers can save even more money by shopping online and paying U.S. prices in Canadian dollars.

"That's what I'm going to be doing this year," MacKinnon said of the upcoming holiday shopping season.


And don't expect to get ten cents on the dollar if you trade in that old folded money from your last trip south of the border.

And beware of all the whining in the resource and manufacturing sector that accompanies the daily news of the loonies flight. Its a mirage. The real impact is declining prices for some resources.

The merger of Abitibi-Consolidated Inc. and Bowater Inc. is complete, but today both companies are expected to report their third-quarter financial results separately in the midst of an industry-wide newsprint slump.

And the final profit report for Abitibi is not likely to be good as its results are expected to be adversely affected by the strong Canadian dollar, rising costs and depressed newsprint prices. Analysts forecast Abitibi's loss at 29 cents a share during the third quarter.

The high loonie is only exacerbating problems in an industry beleaguered by stagnant natural gas prices and by changes imposed by the royalty review, industry watchers said yesterday.

The government's concern surrounds the fact that natural gas prices have remained stagnant and, thanks to the high dollar, Albertans are getting less cash today than they were for the same amount of the resource six months ago.


And even companies with American investments have made record profits despite the price differential between the loonie and the greenback.

Manulife Financial Corp. now earns so much of its $1.07-billion in quarterly profit from outside Canada that one analyst even asked yesterday why the company still reports its numbers using the soaring loonie.

"How do you justify using the Canadian dollar?" asked Desjardins Securities analyst Michael Goldberg of the company's executives on a conference call .

The Canadian dollar's rise cost Manulife's bottom line more than $56-million in the third quarter of 2007, while more than three-quarters of the company's premiums and deposits are from the United States or Asia, and almost 60% of quarterly profit comes from international operations.

In fact, Manulife has considered reporting in the U.S. dollar, said chief executive Dominic D'Alessandro.

But with more than half of all shareholders resident in Canada, it is unclear whether investors want U.S. dollar numbers, he said.

He might have added that the negative impact of the loonie's rise is hardly a dent in the longer-term growth of his powerhouse global insurer, one which had profit increase 10% over last year despite unexpectedly sharp currency movements.

And there is a silver lining to the rising loonie when it comes to some folks salaries.

Surging loonie giving Montreal Canadiens financial leeway,
And remember the Brain Drain not much in the news about that lately, but just wait the loonies rise will contribute to that too.


Your dollar will now go further than it has in quite some time. The US$40,000-a-year tuition bill is going to be, well, C$40,000. Duh, I know, but think about just five years ago, when that US$40,000 tuition bill was $60,000.

And it has not impacted Canada's hotel industry because that industry is relying more on internal travel than tourist accommodation.

According to Statistics Canada’s fourth-quarter survey of travel accommodation providers carried out in the second half of September, a majority of the survey’s 1,300 respondents expect to be busier in the fourth quarter of this year than they were in the third quarter and much busier than they were a year ago.

Because the travel accommodation industry is quite sensitive to exchange rates, the fact that its prospects strengthened in the fourth quarter sends two messages. First, it reinforces the view that domestic demand in Canada is strong heading into 2008.

Second, given the fact that accommodation providers expected demand to strengthen even before Mr. Flaherty’s recent mini-budget, the effects of lower taxes should give another boost to domestic travel and accommodation demand well into 2008.

And the rising loonie is helping Newfoundland pay off its debts. The same goes for the Federal government, and all other levels of government, provincial and municipal that borrow money in U.S. funds. Time to pay down those debts while the loonie is high, and damn the penalties.


The loonie's surge to historic highs means the provincial government will save more than $10 million in debt payments this year.

As of the beginning of the 2007-08 fiscal year, Newfoundland and Labrador had US$1.15 billion on the books in debt payable in American currency.

The province borrowed the cash in seven instalments - ranging from US$100 million to US$200 million - between 1987 and 1993.

One of those issues - for US$100-million, borrowed 20 years ago at an interest rate of 11-5/8 per cent - came due in recent weeks.

According to the Department of Finance, the province paid off that US$100-million debt, without re-borrowing, on Oct. 15.

Money socked away by the government in sinking funds over the years covered off more than US$89 million of the repayment.

The province had to pay the shortfall of US$11 million.

The good news is the strength of the Canadian dollar made that payment millions cheaper than it would have been even six months earlier.



And even car prices are dropping so wait before buying that new 2008. Especially if you live in Ontario and near the border. You can save a far amount thanks to the rising loonie. Add to it the supposed federal green rebate on some models, whenever that comes into effect, and the cut in the GST you can make some real savings.

One by one, the price dominoes are falling. Less than a week after Chrysler announced a series of incentives to keep your dollars from travelling across the border comes news that two more auto giants are joining in the stay-at-home fray while the loonie, already at an all-time high, continues to shatter its own marks.

Honda is planning to give you back $5,500 if you pay cash for a Pilot crossover utility vehicle, $1,500 if you choose a Civic and $4,000 on some Accords.

Ford has also put its foot on the rebate accelerator, offering to lower prices on some of its models by $7,000.

"Right now the MSRP on the car is $2,654," said Ted Hogan from Dixie Ford while talking about a deal on a brand new Fusion. "Ford has added an additional $1,200 E-bonus, they've added a $3,500 and an additional one per cent GST rebate."

Last week, Chrysler introduced a "3 For Free Program" that will see incentives put on almost all its best selling models, including 2007 Chrysler, Jeep and Dodge vehicles, along with its 2008 Grand Caravan, Town Country, Avenger, Ram 1500 and Ram Heavy Duty. Cash rebates of up to $10,750 are being offered depending on what you buy and when.

Ironically, all the rebates come at a time when Canadians are becoming frustrated in trying to buy cars in the States. Many dealers near the border have been ordered not to sell their cheaper vehicles to those from the Great White North or risk losing their franchises.

Honda and Nissan have also followed suit.

"There's also trade-in dollars up to $5,000 on some of the vehicles to try and encourage people to buy Canadian, to buy in Canada," said Honda executive vice president Jim Miller.

"Nissan is in the middle of doing all the adjustments to bring the prices down to what the market is bearing," said Dixie Nissan salesman Greg Carrasco. "We've been waiting for this, so I think it's finally going to happen."



While the Economist reminds us once again it is not workers in Canada that are unproductive, but the capitalist class. Their failure to invest can have a far more negative effect on the loonie than any other factor.

A strong currency reflects booming commodity exports and sound public finances. But not everyone is cheering

the industrialisation of China has boosted the world price of Canada's exports of oil, gas, minerals, metals and farm products. But the country has also done its housework: ten years of federal budget surpluses and a current-account surplus contrast with the twin deficits in the United States. In the end it was the “subprime” mortgage woes south of the border that elevated the loonie over the sickly greenback (or should that be the “Yankee lira”?).

Or perhaps it is Canada's weak productivity and unambitious businessmen. Company profits are healthy but investment remains sluggish. Because of the exchange rate, the price of capital goods fell by 10% over the past year, but purchases rose by only 5%, according to Philip Cross of Statistics Canada.


And then there are the naysayers. They are of course Americans.

Canada should put its loonie pride on hold



Despite the naysayers the reality is that the Loonie is getting stronger while the U.S. Dollar is in free fall. Even if the U.S. dollar rebounds the strength of the loonie may remain according to some market analysists.


FX – USD/CAD

Crude oil at record highs, market-wide weakness in the greenback and a rate cut by the FOMC has allowed USD/CAD to continue to fall like a rock. Most recently the pair hit a multi-decade low of 0.9328, but this support level does not appear likely to hold up as a bottom which leaves USD/CAD open to further declines. Indeed, Canadian economic data and strong oil prices support the case for additional gains for the Loonie, and Tuesday is unlikely to prove differently. Building permits are anticipated to rise 1.8 percent while Ivey PMI is forecasted to fall back to 55.0 from 56.0, but it is the latter report that has the greatest potential to be a market-mover given the risks for a surprisingly strong reading. If Ivey PMI is indeed better than expected, USD/CAD could push down through 0.9300 towards the next level of support at 0.9223. On the other hand, signs that the Canadian economy has taken a sharp hit from the Loonie’s rally could allow the pair to bounce above the 0.9400 level.




crossmarkets_110507_2


Chalk up merger-related demand for Canadian dollars as one more reason the loonie may strengthen against the U.S. dollar in the near term.

Dealing rooms yesterday were rife with chatter about the impact of the US$38.1-billion ($36.8-billion) offer by Anglo-Australian mining giant Rio Tinto RIO.LRIO.AX for Canadian aluminum producer Alcan Ltd AL.TO as the deadline loomed.

Retail investors typically wait until the last minute to tender their shares and so the currency conversions would likely take place over the next few days. Rio is going to pay off the deal in U.S. dollars, a company spokesman said. While the exact amount of the flows from U.S. dollars into the Canadian currency were far from clear, analysts said the loonie still had room to rise against the greenback as a result of the deal's timeline.

"The Canadian shareholders aren't going to want U.S. dollars, so they are going to have to convert them into Canadian dollars," said David Bradley, director of foreign exchange with Scotia Capital in Toronto. "There definitely could be significant flows."

Mr. Bradley estimated flows of U.S. dollars back into loonies would range between US$4-billion to US$12-billion. Alcan's shares outstanding are nearly evenly divided between its dual listings on the Toronto and New York stock exchanges.

The Canadian dollar has been on a tear this year, rising more than 20% to 33-year highs against the U.S. dollar. Surging commodity prices, stable growth, a robust equity market and a weak greenback have all helped the loonie. Merger-related demand has also played a role. In particular, the Rio deal, which would create the world's largest aluminum producer, has been a big driver for the Canadian dollar.

"I certainly do believe that the Rio Tinto bid for Alcan has certainly helped Canada trade to new highs," said Liz Bussanich, senior vice-president for foreign exchange at Bank of Montreal in New York.



See:

The Return of Keynes

Loonie Tories Blaming The Victims

Softwood Sell Out

Americans Recognize Canada

Parity

If It Ain't Broke


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Friday, April 13, 2007

Just In Time War


When capital needs to speed up production of surplus value, profit, it makes workers work faster, longer, it takes its investment in each worker and forces them to produce more. This is known as the speed up.

The development of Toyotaization of manufacturing is known as 'Just In Time Production'. Production is set at an upper limit, no excess stock is manufactured any goods needed are then produced on as need basis.

This is the rational behind the Bush Surge in Iraq. The reservists and volunteers are the working class and the factory conditions are replicated within the military;

Army Extends Iraq Tours to 15 Months

Pentagon extends tours for US troops in Iraq and Afghanistan

15 Month Tours in Iraq? The War is Breaking Our Military

This is no different than the forced Over Time (OT) that workers in America have faced since the 1980's. Reductions in workers, layoffs, etc. led to increased OT for those that remained, increasing America's productivity. Productivity, the creation of surplus value; profit, was the mantra of the corporations adopting their management models to the need of capital.

And since these same neo-cons were in charge of the war in Iraq, they determined to use a corporatist model of political economy of war. While workers in the G6 produce material, those same workers in Iraq and Afghanistan destroy the excess production.

Since the U.S. armed forces,like Canada's, are the surplus working class, an all volunteer force, they act as a force on production; profit. Not only for the War Profiteers, but for those in the service of the State and those who having been formally associated with the State are now private contractors.

Since the U.S. has no extra armed forces it can put in the field it plays numbers games. This has been the whole reason d'etre of the neo-cons. Rumsfeld is gone but his policy lives one.

A volunteer army is working class, they joined not to fight in Iraq but because prior to 9/11 they were promised jobs, and training in job skills. And like their counter parts in industrial capitalist economies, the working class who fights Capitals wars are insufficient for their purposes. Thus the privatization of war in Iraq, the hiring of mercenaries to do your dirty work. Even with the privatization of security, cleaning, cooking and other services there are still not enough troops in the regular military to conduct this neo-con war, so their shifts at work are extended.

This is Class War according to the neo-con political economy; speed up and just in time production. The surge is the speed up, the lack of troops is the just in time model. Further added to this was the other cornerstone of neo-con political economy; privatization. There are as many private security forces in Iraq as their are U.S. military personnel. War conducted on a business model is Rumsfelds legacy which is legacy of failure.
Red flag or white flag? Bush wants somebody else to run Iraq war


See:

A Surge in Terrorism

Sadr Surge

Surge In Iraq

Vietnamization of Iraq

Calling A Spade A Shovel


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Sunday, January 22, 2006

How Ford Screwed Up

'Black Monday' looms over Ford's future
DetNews.com, MI - 11 hours ago
... As a result, Ford's factory utilization rate is the lowest in the industry -- just 79 percent, Harbour Consulting said last week. ...
Stamping plant braces for Ford cutbacks Buffalo News
Wixom plant might be shut down Oakland Press
Ford closures to hit 29,000 jobs, 10 plants TODAYonline
Bloomberg - DetNews.com - all 282 related »

Tomorrow Ford North America will announce massive job cuts and plant closures. The result of poor productivity? No the product of poor planning. Yep capitalism is all about planning, that's why Herr Dr. Marx saw it as revolutionary. Capitalism as reflected by large scale industrial production should be close to socialism with its ability to plan for production.

But in the eighties the Toyotaization of capitalism changed all that, it created just in time production, producing only goods needed immediately for production rather than stockpiling them. While this produced short term economic gains, it left capitalist corporations vulnerable to increased shortfalls due to strikes, natural disasters, or economic problems.

Toyotaism

Toyotaism is the Japanese version of Taylorism which, in this case, is a management technique that encourages workers to internalize self-monitoring and correction and that results in exploitation (Steingard and Fitzgibbons, 1993). Eiji Toyoda, founder of Toyota, visited Ford’s Rouge River Plant in Detroit, Michigan, USA, then the largest industrial plant in the US, and studied it during the spring of 1950 (Womack et al., 1990, pp. 48-9). That study, and an earlier one his uncle Kiichiro Toyoda conducted at Ford in the 1920s, became the basis of Toyotaism’s lean production.

Toyotaism is a modernistic discourse, which is hierarchical, capitalistic and environmentally exploitative (Boje and Dennehy, 1993; Clegg, 1989, 1990; Jameson, 1984a, 1984b, 1986). A sub-discourse, in the modernistic discourse, is the myth of progress. “Progress” is a privileged discourse and is given the power to define reality, to judge what is and is not “civilized”, “modern” and “superior”. In Toyotaism, the Toyota model of greenfield start-ups is deemed to be “progress” over what existed before. It is the easternization of less developed countries (Kaplinsky, 1994). The discourse of “progress” degrades the past as “inferior”, “inefficient” and “primitive” or said differently, “progress” confers privilege the economically and militarily more powerful version of reality over the weaker, to define what is and what is not civilized.

Kaizen’s emphasis on continuous quality improvement makes it a discourse concerning progress. Post-modern organizational theorists argue that kaizen is exploitative for it is stressful and encourages personal sacrifice for increased production quotas and corporate profits (Boje and Winsor, 1993; Redher, 1992; Steingard and Fitzgibbons, 1993; Winsor, 1993). It is a fanatical one-way system in which tasks have been heavily based on time and motion studies (Parker and Slaughter, 1988, p. 36). Job enrichment in kaizen systems creates the illusion of empowerment, all the while increasing employee interchangeability (Winsor, 1993, p. 115) and encouraging self-regulation, which results in increased output (Coriot, 1980). Self-management and worker control is an illusion. In reality there is a machine pace, team-peer pressure and intimidation (Redher, 1992). Workers are coerced into giving suggestions for improvement by publicly posting the quantity of suggestions per worker, and by linking suggestions to performance appraisal (Imai, 1986, p. 15; Winsor, 1993, p. 116).


Meanwhile large transnational corporations like Ford were buying up automobile companies in Europe and Asia in order to produce vehicles in those markets. But what they ended up producing was more American vehicles for those markets, which did not meet the need of their consumer markets. Thus Ford moved in a new direction, one that ultimately was a management decision of the CEO's and one that had disastrous results as the average worker at Ford is about to discover tomorrow.


Ford's fight for survival

What's happened is that Ford has almost completely reversed the shifts made in the radical reorganization a decade ago called "Ford 2000." The brainchild of former chairman and CEO Alex Trotman, Ford 2000 attempted to adjust to the increasing globalization of the auto business by eliminating regional organizations in Europe, Asia and South America and replacing them with five vehicle centers. Each of the five centers would be charged with developing a single class of vehicles -- large rear-drive sedans, small front-drive econoboxes -- and marketing them around the world.

Ford 2000 looked good on paper but really messed things up. A lot of local market knowledge disappeared with the elimination of the regional organizations, and lots of experienced managers went out the door too. Then, under Trotman's successor, Jac Nasser, the vehicle centers stopped sharing common components like air conditioners and shock absorbers and began developing their own, causing an explosion in costs.

Now Ford has recentralized product development and engineering to enforce an economical sharing of platforms and components across product lines. So engineering for a new small car platform known as C1 will serve as the underpinnings for cars marketed by Ford, Volvo and Mazda.


Ironically the very nature of planned mass production economics under capitalism was given a name. Fordism. It is the very model that Lenin saw the Soviet Union adopting for manufacturing, that Stalin implemented and was the ideal of production after WWII in all of the Pacific Asian countries. Manufacturing never left Fordism behind, it merely tinkered with aspects of the managing production but never the skelton of the model.

It was this new model of globalization, globalized industry;Toyotaism, that Ford management did not or would not adapt to.The could not move beyond Fordist production models, no matter their new forms of flexibility, because they tried to reproduce Ford industrial production models in each country not taking into account the ability to link plant production across national boundries. For example in North America Canadian plants are more efficient and modernized than American Plants, as are parts plants in Mexico. But despite this and NAFTA, Ford keeps plants open in the U.S. not for production purposes but for poltical optics. Hargrove worried about Ford's Monday announcement

The closing of the Rover plant in the UK last year shows how global automanufacturing no longer relies upon national based plant operations. The result of the closing of Rover caused only a momentary outrage. There was no General Strike like when Thatcher closed the Coal Mines. Rover occured during the election and was a poltical non-issue. New Labour under Tony Blair gained an unprecidented Third Government. Despite protest votes. Rover was less of an issue than Blairs stand on Iraq.

Automotive production is now world wide. And in fact we suffer classic capitalist overproduction in the market. Toyota has become the number one car maker in the world because it has adapted its production modes to be developed within other nations, with parts productions centred in Japan. Toyota is expanding its North American operations out of Canada, not the U.S. based on exactly this model.

Ford and GM maintain full car and truck production in North America, and compete with their own offshoots in Europe and Asia. This is their problem, they have only accepted globalization as a means of distribution not as a means of production.

Emerging Organizational Forms: Beyond Fordism
  • This chapter analyzes our industries and postindustrial sectors, which are structured by flexibility, greater rationalization and the implementation of communication and information technology. Fordism, Toyotaism, Lean Production and Flexibility Specialization changed our work and our societies. These successful producers acquired advantages in the market by their ability to respond in a prompt and flexible way to signs given by the competitive market. The competition regarded price, quality, demand and delivery. The producers had to be able to adapt to the new form of production by readjusting their productive processes in order to reach the demands of the market. This ability reformulate relies on their strategy use of a type of machinery that can manufacture products.
  • Fordism
  • Fordism consists of just-in-time inventory control, and leaderless work groups. This approach to automated production literally deskilled the workers, which at the end of Fordism marked a significant setback for the working class. Fordism refers to upholding the loyalty of he workers by profiting from a high-income economy, by generating mass products through the assembly line techniques. The characteristics of Fordism consist of the following economies of scale, technical control, specialization, repetition and the separation of mental for manual work. The labor of Fordism The Fordist labor market had little to none managerial and professional elite with minimal job training required. Greater productivity is achieved by the development of efficiency in manufacturing. The use of the assembly line is to be able determine the sequences of operations for the creation of each product. The Fordist economy competition and process protects the national markets and creates global competition. It has been known to bring about mass production of standardized products and compete with others forms of production by cutting the cost.
  • Toyotaism
  • Totyotism refers to the management culture and labor processes that are dominant during the latter part of the twentieth century. Toyotaism depends on the cooperation of labor management, multiple skills and problem solving. Fordism had an external method of putting on pressure to increase production. Through Toyotaism the pressure is no longer from outside, but is exerted from within the work of the team. The Toyotists labor market has diverse career ladders, excellent participation and long lasting job placement. Toyotaism is known for its "just-in-time" production, quality control throughout the entire flow of production and prompt reaction to the market requirements.
  • Lean Production
  • Lean production is based on doing more with less, meaning less time, inventory, space, labor, and money. The Lean Production model consists of careful selection, job switching, simplifying procedures, speeding up production eliminating waste and surveillance. The lean production concept is a way of improving processes through customer relationships, fast product development and manufacturing, and the collaboration with its suppliers. One main element of lean production is elimination waste elimination, which implies continuous workflow and customer satisfaction. When these elements are focused on it expands in the areas of cost, quality and delivery.
  • The Flexibility Paradigm
  • The flexible specialization (post-fordism) strategy was to obtain advantages in the market by presenting a product with exceptional quality and technology. This idea demands the constant change of the product with flexible forms of production. In contrast with the mass production, it allows the creation of standard quantities of a variety of non-uniform products that are selected according to the market and its consumers. Flexible production relies on the beliefs that it would not prosper by treating workers like machines and the assembly worker could perform most functions better than the specialists. Flexible specialization significantly reduced the demand for unskilled labor, which requires that you are intelligent and are capable of self-control. The downside to this is the number of unskilled industrial workers that are unable to obtain a job within this field of work. The flexible specialization presents higher costs than manufacture it also involves high levels of technological development. This new form of structuring the market encouraged the development of global markets, which also affected the practices of consumption.

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