I. Identification of Chapter 2
Fearon and Blanco try in an interesting way to explain what they understand under managerial mind and organizational learning. Between the dry theory they write about a very practical case in a factory to show how organizations are really managing to learn. The practical case is a fictional company, but is very strong related to the reality. The case is about a machine operator in the Grand Bay Manufacturing Company, who has an idea how to mark different, but similar, parts so that a confusion is not possible. It is only a small change, but can have a great impact, because if the wrong small part is built into an engine, like an airplane, horrible things could happen. The case shows how a normal machine operator can implement his idea into the company and which problems he has to solve.
The authors say "Organizational learning is the purposeful creation of shared meanings derived from the common experiences of people in organizations" and the prime sources of knowledge are the employees. The real teacher of organizations is work, defined as creating something of value, because work creates experiences. Management has to give enough freedom so that experiences can be made. "The essence of management is to make knowledge productive." Therefore is the question how can the Quality of Experiential Management be improved. If the worker lacking the official power to make substantive changes, he will do poor quality experienced management of the situation. Management that offers enough freedom for experiences is called experiential management. Very important is the matter of spirit. If we notice, we care, therefore we act and the cycle of learning started. The manager who wants to create managerial minds in his workers needs to take in account:
1. The customer value is the most important thing, because he is why the company can survive.
2. The necessity of unbounded cross-functionality.
3. The passion for continuos improvement, because standstill is actually a step back.
4. The importance of team working in all performance arenas.
5. The treatment of the organization as a total system, because every action has an impact on other actions and people.
The manager must change his behavior from someone who wants to protect the existing order to someone who is always questioning the status quo.
All-Member Management
Management is no longer just an organizational status, but a shared state of mind. The authors call this all-member management. Effective work happens when we allow each other to act responsibly. The future of the companies will be to be in the world with responsibility. Responsibility is not something given by managers to workers, but as a state of being, as the life-force of the organization. This is why American behavioral science has been saying wrong things. They collected facts and invented methods, and then told manager-leaders that if they want to be effective they have to absorb the facts and learn the methods, as management educator Peter Vaill says it. To express the insights from work words and actions are necessary.
The New Prism of the Managerial Mind
Living with responsibility for the organization can be interpreted to happen in four, wellintegrated facets, as well:
1. work
2. process
3. context
4. Ourselves
These are the four sides of a prism. The "do-it-yourself memories" are working the way that first the employee wants to do something, then he has an idea and least he searches for someone he can talk about his idea.
Facet 1: Work is the activator of the managerial mind, because when we are working, we are watching, hearing, feeling the organization live. The more fascinating the work, the more will be the managerial mind animated. To learn what is on anyone's mind, just encourage them to talk. The most people tend to identify themselves by what they are doing. Facet 2: Processes operate in systems and give life to them. Problems often signal breakdowns somewhere in the process and they help to understand processes. The process facet often helps to form a "we" feeling, because you learn that you are be dependent on other. Facet 3: It is important to see the present and future work in the context of technology, related organizational units, the company as a whole, the industry and many environments. Facet 4: This facet is the most important, because if something is not worth to us we close our facet and leave the other three "in the dark." The self facet is the window to our intellectual and spiritual powers. This fourth facet allows to see the interaction of task, process and context, to understand what is going on as a whole, and assesses the value of expected outcomes to securing the future of our organization, and therefore ourselves.
When we follow Fearon and Blanco every worker should have a managerial mind, but if all members manage, what of managers. Stahl defines management as the "creation and continuous improvement of organizational systems." Therefore if every worker should continue improve the organizational system everybody should be a manger in Stahl's definition. The new manager has to support the rest in expressing our managerial thinking and learning into the organizational behavior of the enterprise. It is the work of the new manager to develop a pathway to link all minds so that collective thinking and action are possible. One powerful way is to develop a common language unique to their enterprise and setting. The specialists should translate their technical terms into a for everybody understandable language.
Ronnie Lessem says for total quality learning a holographic mind is necessary, because each member is part of an organization, yet the whole of the organization is reflected in the person. And again talking with each other is important to share and modify the holographic minds, therefore a new media is needed.
Prospects for a Paradigm Shift
Outsourcing and reengineering in the last years showed that the employees are the most important asset of a company. The specialists who reengineered companies made nothing else than to use the ideas of the employee to create a system change. Therefore employees could also reengineer a company on their own. The collective thinking and rethinking of organizational members drive the action from within. Ideas flow from individual thinking, through talk, to the collective thinking of groups, and ultimately the entire membership. Insofar management is more integrated than fractionated.
Management Learning
All employees are managers therefore management education is needed for all. But to develop management education for everybody tools are necessary, so that a learning organization can be created. The new management must initialize every employee that he discovers his own managerial mind, otherwise no great changes will be made.
II. Observation
The following paragraph will analyze the second chapter and compare it to experiences.
The German newspaper "Die Zeit" published on December 20, 1996 an article that is very similar to the situation of the Grand Bay Manufacturing Company mentioned in the chapter 2. The article writes about a shift worker without high-school education. This worker, Puetz, was be hired by a big chemical company. The first time he came into the chemical plant he was totally confused, because there were no order and everything was confusing. He learned fast to operate the machines, but he did not really understand what he did. Therefore Puetz bought chemical books, wrote memos and draw sketches. To draw the sketches really exactly he asked colleagues who worked in the factory since a longer time. At home Puetz put all sketches into his computer and brought the prints to work, so that everybody who has a problem was able to fix it much faster. Puetz, who knew less about the factory, teaches his colleagues, because he started to communicate and open his managerial mind. But Puetz was not satisfied with the drawings, he wanted to see the whole factory in action, to understand all processes. Therefore he decided to program a simulation on his small home computer. The machine operators often had their own sketches to know what to do in emergencies, but they knew only the things on this special machine. The engineers knew more about the whole system, but nobody understood their sketches and they did not know the details of each machine. Puetz saw very fast that he must combine the knowledge separated in the whole factory to have the necessarily information for a simulation. He also realized that some situations nobody can explain, therefore he programmed also training simulations. Puetz worked three years every free minute on his computer to program the simulation, called Sim Factory, because he wanted to know what exactly is going on in the factory and he is concerned about the company at a whole and his colleagues. After three years hard work, when he sometimes broke down during the work because of to less sleep, he sent his idea to the department that is collecting ideas of employees. First the department did not react at all. The old management idea was still, that ideas as this must come from the top and not from the bottom. Puetz started to speak to important people in the factory and show them his idea. At the beginning the management was not really lucky about his simulation, because they saw how accurate his sketches were. They were afraid that everybody could rebuild the factory and everybody can understand the factory. But some pioneers in new management thinking were able to convince the highest managers that Puetz's work is very valuable for the company. Puetz got a new job in the training center and continues his programming so that everybody can be trained on the computer. At the moment he is programming an adventure game for trainees to learn special chemical processes. The company also thinks about selling his simulation to other companies.
This story shows how important discussions with others are, but also that open minded managers are necessary to start a process. But the most important think is that every worker thinks about what he is doing and has the freedom to change something. If Puetz had to work more than 40 hours a week it had been probably not possible for him to program such a simulation, about 500 MB, in three years. The article underlines the existence of a prism of the managerial mind. The work was the activator for Puetz to start his simulation, because he did not understand what he is doing. The facet process was involved when he realized that even experienced worker could not explain some situations. This event brought him to the idea to simulate the process. The facet of context was important for Puetz when he had to speak to important people to start his project. But the most important and also starting facet is himself, because he thought it is worth for himself to program such a big simulation. This is more amazing when you know that he did not expect to earn a lot of money with his simulation.
This story is perhaps a little bit radical, but it shows in a demonstrative way that the most important improvements can and must come from the employees itself.
On page 38 of chapter two it is written that "Every one of those 420 employees think, talk about their thoughts, and test their insights in action." This is exactly the problem of many companies that the employees do not communicate with each other. My experiences in factories showed me that a lot of workers do not communicate with each other. There are many reasons for it. One reason was that people from different countries worked together so that language problems occurred. Companies like BMW tried to brake down these language barriers and offered language courses. The amazing thing was that in the language courses the foreign worker spoke about their experiences with their work and they tried to improve their workplace. The native worker recognized that the foreign worker knew after a while more about the machines than the native worker and therefore the native worker asked also for teaching lessons. BMW changed the language courses into work improvement courses and was able to change the working places and improve the whole company. Another reason why people in the company where I worked did not speak about their problems, was that they did not get support from their boss. One worker told me that he gave his boss an idea how to improve a process. The boss gave the idea to his boss, but said that it was his idea and he got the premium. Therefore the worker never told anybody again about his ideas.
P. 38 "Before industrialization, ... The purpose of work and the worker's purpose were inseparable." I am not sure about this. Many people worked only, because otherwise they would starve. If they had the choice they would not work in their profession, but the society often allowed people only to work in the profession their father had. Women often had no chance to work outside the home at all and not every woman was satisfied with this situation. That is why I think the purpose of work was often only to earn enough to live, but the worker's purpose was to enjoy the life.
Soft system
The characteristics of soft system thinking are:
1. learning is more important than goal seeking
2. systems models are intellectual constructs, rather than maps of the actual world
3. the world is problematic but can be explored using systems models, rather than engineering structures to meet needs. This includes the use of System Dynamics.
4. talks the language of "issues" and "accommodations," rather than problems and solutions.
A soft systems view is that an organization is the mental creation of all its members. I am a member of a party and this party had problems to identify itself and gain votes at elections. Therefore the management discussed how to solve these problems. First of all they found out that both problems are interrelated to each other. As long as the party has no identification of itself nobody will vote for them. The second important thing is that the most people rely their decision whom to elect on discussion with friends and relatives. Therefore the management thought the most important assets of the party are the member of the party. Because each member can influence its friends and relatives, but they can do so only if they identify themselves with the party and have the same picture of the party. That is why the management of the party started with discussions in the party. It was the first time that a party discussed about their image with all members and even in some questions with the public. This discussion brought the party member together so that everybody identifies itself now with the party and is not ashamed to say that he is in the party. The discussion in the public also helped to win more elections, because the voters recognized that this party wants to change themselves. The members did not only discuss which image the party should have but also how the organization should be built up, e.g., how many managers should exist. Transferred to a company this example shows that the employees are the highest value and that discussions in the company can help that each employee identifies himself with the company. Employees are the prime source of knowledge.
Page 39: "Once the idea left his head, ... it began ...(an) organizational learning cycle." The main question is how to bring someone to the action that he will give his idea a free run. Possibilities are the tools mentioned in Senges The Fifth Discipline Fieldbook and with support of the boss. Therefore the main function of a manager is to motivate his employees to let their ideas a free run. Some tools could be brainstorming and mental models.
Page 40: "...in the United States yields of implemented ideas are negligible, when compared to businesses in Japan." The MIT study on the future of the automobile in 1989 shows very drastic in their book "The machine that changed the world" the difference between USA and Japan. In American companies that are producing in the US every employee has in average 0.4 suggestions he gives to his company. In Japanese companies that are operating in the US every employee has 1.4 suggestions and in Japanese companies that are producing in Japan every employee has 61.6 suggestions1. These differences are not only explainable with different management styles, it is also a difference in culture. Japanese start in the childhood always to make progresses and suggestions even if they are very small. Another thing is that Japanese must learn they whole life if they want to improve their language skill, because nobody will ever be able to remember all of the more than 10,000 characters.
Page 43: "...the manager, once the `maintainer' of status quo, is now its `disturber.'" If you analyze companies that are successful since many years it is nearly always visible that they were in continuos' changes. If a company wants to be successful they must change and that is true since 100 years. The only difference to the present time is that the change must be done even faster than the decades before. From the ten most successful companies ten years ago only two are still under the ten best and these two companies made a lot of internal changes.
Page 45: "... hired an outside consulting firm ... Learning from employees through interviews and observations, (and) ... translated the solutions for the management ..." When a company hires a consulting firm it often shows that something is not going right in the company. In this case it is obviously that the communication between the employees and management is not working. Therefore they need an outside company to translate between employees and management. The real change in the company should be to tear down the barriers between employees and management. In the bank where I worked an outside consulting firm, McKensey, came to analyze and restructure the working processes. When the employees heard that McKinsey will come everybody was afraid that he will lose his job. The employees were not very assistant to the consultants. After the analyses the consultants showed the managers the changes, which they think must be implemented to make everything more effective. The managers started to implement the changes like buying a $1,000,000 expensive work-hour-control-system. But the work-hour-control-system had a bad impact. The new control system shows that the employees worked much more than the contract says they have to. Therefore the labor union asked the managers to pay the overtime. The result was that the managers put away the work-hour-control-system and implemented the old system. The same problems erased with implementing the new working procedures. A lot of employees had to change they workplace and a lot of changes were made, but it was not more efficient. At the end the most working processes were returned to the original one. I think the main problem the managers made was not to speak with the employees before they hired the consulting firm. They should have first talked to the employees and asked them how they think things could be changed. They also never told the employees that they do not want to fire people rather than hiring people. But everybody was afraid he will lose his job, because they never knew that the manager want to hire people.
The small story on page 48/49 wants to tell that automation is not working when special orders have to be processed. If this is the case in a company then they have the wrong or old automation. Automatons and robots nowadays are nearly as flexible as a human being. In car factories like Mercedes Benz it is no problem anymore to produce different car models on the same assembling line.
Page 51: "Fortunately. Dana knew several of the brass from `way back' when they worked with his dad or with him before they were promoted." This situation is very typically, but shows also a big problem in many companies. At the end you need connections to important people, as in the case of Puetz, to get something moved. For people to believe something, like the new idea from Dana, it is very important who is telling them the story. Therefore it will be very difficult to change this behavior to create a more effective and faster learning organization. Managers and all employees must be trained to listen to all ideas and not think from the beginning that it is a bad or not worthwhile idea. This is perhaps also a difference to the Japanese way of thinking. In a Japanese company nobody would laugh about a suggestion like to turn off the light when you are the last person who leaves the office. In American and European companies a lot of bosses would say that this is no suggestion at all.
Page 55: "In the old days, ..., seeing a supervisor charge down the line meant heads would roll. Now, it means help is on the way." This change is very important but still not the rule in the most western companies. It is again a big difference to Japanese companies and perhaps one of the reasons for the success of Japanese companies. If a college student starts to work in a Japanese company they always start at the bottom of the hierarchy. This means they make the lowest (some would say the worst, but this must not be true) work and only if they perform themselves they get the chance to climb up the career ladder. In companies as Toyota it is the rule that everybody, even the highest manager, must work some weeks per year on the assembling line. This helps them to understand the whole company and especially the important part where the value is produced. Many reports also tell that in Japanese assembling lines every worker can jump in every job position and everybody can help each other, because they know what the other one is doing. A supervisor in these companies is not working as rulers but as friends who are helping you when you have problems and who can help you, because they have the knowledge and the access to the information you need.
On page 57 the authors say that words as downsizing are ringing hollow for many employees. In the last years a lot of companies especially in Germany downsized very strong. Some companies downsized so strong that they have to rehire the persons they fired before, because they saw that they lost to much knowledge by firing these persons. The problem of course is that the best people already work in competitive companies and the company that fired them has to invest a lot of money in training to come to the same base of knowledge it had before. Another big problem with downsizing is that it creates fear in the employees. Everybody is afraid that he will lose his job. Some people say this is good, because the people will work harder to show they boss how important they are. But I think this works only a short time, in the long run fears cause less quality of work. If somebody is afraid he can never show all his abilities and will also make mistakes. An employee works the most efficient if he feels comfortable at his working place.
Page 58: "His father and grandfather worked for Grand Bay, and he would like his son and daughter to do so, when they finish college." Dana is concerned about his company, because he and his family built up a relationship to the company where they worked they whole live. The problem is the most employees in American companies do not work their whole life in one company. Therefore Dana is not an average American worker. In Japanese and some European companies lifelong employment is much more common. This can help people to build up a relationship to their company. But it can also produce blindness to the company. The employees do not see where and how to change something, because they never saw it different. My experiences in the factories where I worked are, that the people who worked on the same machine since more than 25 years knew less about the company than the young worker who worked their just since two or three years. The workers who worked there since such a long time did not think anymore about their work. I think it can help to built a relationship to a company when somebody is working there since many years, but he needs changes in his work life so that he can be flexible enough in mind to produce new ideas. On the other hand young workers bring often more ideas, but they must be trained to feel like a member of the company. Very useful is it to give the employee shares of the company and bonuses, but also social events together with colleagues are important.
The story about the boss on page 58/59 who is speaking about `economic value added' is very typically. It shows in a very good way the communication problems between boss and employees. Many bosses do not know how to translate the things they learned at college and in seminars to the language his employees are speaking. Therefore one of the most important thing in training managers should be to improve their communication skills. In the past improving communication skills meant to improve free speeches in front of the CEO, but nowadays it is more and more important to learn how to communicate with people who never learned the language of colleges. But I must also say with some people who never finished high school it is very tough to communicate. I worked several months on an assembling line for plastic products and most people there never finished high school. It was more difficult for me to speak with the Germans who never finished high school than to communicate with the foreigners, because they had a higher education. Therefore I think it is one of the most important things of schools to teach children how to communicate. Companies are not able to repair the problems that are made at school. This is also why I think nobody can have too high education for any job, you can only have too less education.
Page 59: "... he felt that they should kept his and one other semi-automated line going to take up the slack when all that fancy technology broke down." This sounds like new (fancy) technology is bad. But the problem that arises here is more a problem of safety and backup. Everybody makes backup up of important data, this is the same with assembling line. If this line is very important for the whole company the management should have an emergency plan how to solve the problem fast. One of the solutions can be to have a second line ready for emergencies.
Page 61: "... many changes they seemed to be getting away with while the professionals were home asleep He mused about the freedom of that third shift, ..." I had exactly the same experiences. When I worked several months in different factories I also worked night shift. Everybody wanted to work night shift, because it was paid better and no bosses jumped around. The worst shift was always the morning shift, because the bosses had nothing else to do then walking around and say you how you could do your work better. But in the night we never worked as the bosses told as to work, because if we worked against some stupid rules the work was much faster and easier. This is also the reason why we had time in the night shift to play cards, and the quality of the work was never worse than in the other two shifts. Employees can mostly arrange their work on their own, if they have to and mostly it is more efficient.
Page 61: "... it was revealed that three of those lit lights were caused by ... a sole vendor's not just-in-time shipment." The problem is not that the company is using just-in-time, the problems are organizational and management problems. In Japanese companies' just-in-time works very well since many years, but it is not enough just simple to copy the just-in-time system. Everything else must also be changed and it must be thought in the way of lean production. The biggest difference between just-in-time shipment between Japanese and western companies is the relationship to the supplier. In Japanese companies' suppliers are very strong involved in the buying company. Every change will be discussed with the supplying company before and developments of new products are discussed together with the supplier. In western companies the buying company is just making a contract with the supplier and also threatens the supplier when he is not shipping on time or bad quality they will find another supplier. For the supplier of a western company it is important to sell the product as expensive as possible. In Japanese companies the supplier would tell the buyer how much they have to spend to produce the product and the buyer will tell how much profit they make. Both would sit together and discuss the fairest price. Therefore the biggest difference is the relationship between supplier and buyer. A supplier for western companies will have it easier to brake his contract and not to sell to the buyer anymore, because no private relations do exist between both companies.
Page 63: "There was the CEO, dresses casually,". It is not important that the CEO is dressed casually. A much better sign that a CEO accepts that everybody, included himself, has to learn and should form a we-feeling, is that he speaks about the successes of the company not as his own successes but as successes of all employees. It is an often misunderstood sign, that a manger should wear casual clothes to show that he is on the same level as his employees. I think a CEO should still wear his business suit, because he has to represent the company. More important is that the employees feel that he does not think that he is the supervisor who knows everything.
III. Advice to the authors
On the pages before I already gave advice and critics to the authors, but I want to mention three more things, that could be explained in more detail in the book, so that it is easier for the reader to understand. I must also say that the used language was sometimes very unclear and complicated. Therefore, it was sometimes not clear what the authors want to say. Without the practical case of the Grand Bay Manufacturing Company, it has been much more difficult to understand the thoughts of the authors. The three things that should be explained more in detail are:
1. What do the authors understand with learning cycle and what they think a learning cycle in this case would look like. In `The fifth discipline' from Peter M. Senge about ten different learning cycles are shown, therefore it is necessary to explain which learning cycle is the one the authors think about.
2. Even that the characteristics of soft systems are mentioned in Chapter one of the book it would be better to repeat in short form the characteristics. It is not a big problem just to write that the characteristics are: I. To place emphasis upon learning, rather than goal seeking. II. System models are intellectual constructs, rather than maps of the real world. III. Using system models can solve problems better than engineering structures. IV. Talks the language of "issues" and "accommodations," rather than problems and solutions.
1. I take Actions based on my beliefs
2. I adopt Beliefs about the world
3. I draw Conclusions
4. I make Assumptions based on the meanings I added
5. I add Meanings (cultural and personal)
6. I select "Data" from what I observe
7. Observable "data" and experiences (as a videotape recorder might capture it)
One example for a ladder of inference could be:
1. This boss shouldn't be supervising women.
2. He picks on Jane because she's a woman
3. The boss thinks Jane's work is unacceptable
4. The boss is chewing Jane out
5. "Jane your performance is not up to standard "says the boss
6. Explain at least one tool for developing a learning organization. A very nice and easy to understand tool could be The Ladder of Inference2. I like to explain it here, also for students who want to know more about it.
[...]
1 James P. Womack, Daniel T. Jones & Daniel Roos, The Machine That Changed The World (New York: Macmillian, 1990), p.92
Häufig gestellte Fragen
Worum geht es in Kapitel 2 dieses Textes?
Kapitel 2 beschäftigt sich mit dem Thema des managerialen Denkens und des organisationalen Lernens. Es wird anhand eines Fallbeispiels einer fiktiven Firma, Grand Bay Manufacturing Company, veranschaulicht, wie Mitarbeiter Ideen einbringen und umsetzen können. Die Autoren definieren organisationales Lernen als die zielgerichtete Schaffung von gemeinsamen Bedeutungen, die aus den gemeinsamen Erfahrungen der Mitarbeiter resultieren. Die Essenz des Managements besteht darin, Wissen produktiv zu machen.
Was versteht der Text unter "All-Member Management"?
All-Member Management bedeutet, dass Management nicht länger nur ein organisatorischer Status ist, sondern eine geteilte Denkweise. Es betont, dass effektive Arbeit dann geschieht, wenn man sich gegenseitig erlaubt, verantwortungsbewusst zu handeln. Verantwortung wird nicht von Managern an Mitarbeiter gegeben, sondern als ein Seinszustand, als die Lebenskraft der Organisation betrachtet.
Welche vier Facetten des managerialen Denkens werden im Text vorgestellt?
Die vier Facetten des managerialen Denkens sind:
- Arbeit
- Prozess
- Kontext
- Wir selbst
Welche Rolle spielen Manager im Kontext des "All-Member Management"?
Im "All-Member Management" unterstützt der Manager die Mitarbeiter dabei, ihr eigenes manageriales Denken und Lernen in das organisatorische Verhalten des Unternehmens einzubringen. Er entwickelt Wege, um alle Köpfe miteinander zu verbinden, so dass kollektives Denken und Handeln möglich sind. Eine Möglichkeit hierfür ist die Entwicklung einer gemeinsamen, unternehmensspezifischen Sprache.
Welche Bedeutung hat die Fallstudie mit dem Schichtarbeiter Puetz?
Die Fallstudie über den Schichtarbeiter Puetz, der in einem Chemieunternehmen eine Simulation entwickelte, um Prozesse besser zu verstehen, verdeutlicht die Bedeutung der Kommunikation, des offenen Denkens von Managern und der Freiheit der Mitarbeiter, etwas zu verändern. Sie demonstriert, dass wichtige Verbesserungen von den Mitarbeitern selbst kommen können.
Was wird zum Thema "Soft Systems Thinking" gesagt?
Soft Systems Thinking legt Wert auf Lernen statt Zielorientierung, betrachtet Systemmodelle als intellektuelle Konstrukte und betont die Erkundung problematischer Situationen mithilfe von Systemmodellen. Es verwendet die Sprache von "Issues" und "Accommodations" anstelle von Problemen und Lösungen.
Welche Empfehlungen gibt der Text den Autoren des besprochenen Kapitels?
Der Text empfiehlt den Autoren, den Begriff des Lernzyklus genauer zu definieren, die Charakteristika des Soft Systems Thinking zu wiederholen und ein Werkzeug zur Entwicklung einer lernenden Organisation, wie z.B. "The Ladder of Inference", zu erklären. Außerdem wird eine klarere und verständlichere Sprache empfohlen.
Was wird über die unterschiedliche Anzahl der Verbesserungsvorschläge pro Mitarbeiter in japanischen und amerikanischen Unternehmen gesagt?
Die MIT-Studie über die Zukunft des Automobils zeigt, dass amerikanische Mitarbeiter durchschnittlich 0,4 Vorschläge pro Mitarbeiter im Betrieb einbringen. Die Anzahl der Verbesserungsvorschläge in japanischen Betrieben die in den USA produzieren liegt bei 1,4 Vorschlägen. In japanischen Betrieben die in Japan produzieren liegt die Anzahl bei 61,6 Verbesserungsvorschlägen pro Mitarbeiter im Betrieb. Die Unterschiede liegen nicht nur an Management-Stilen, sondern auch an kulturellen Unterschieden.
- Quote paper
- Frei Messow (Author), 1997, The Prism of the New Managerial Mind, Munich, GRIN Verlag, https://www.hausarbeiten.de/document/95354
