Overview

In today's workplace, there is a rapidly spreading cancer called complacency, because employees have not seen a positive focus, nor effective results, from the continuing barrage of new programs, new organizational structures, and new operating philosophies they have been forced to absorb. These new ventures have been chock-full of talk about the need for empowered employees, for more open and forthright communications, for the self-directed work force, for team- and data-based management and so on. However, employees have seen little, if any, real change to the thing that is the springboard for any lasting correction in course the existing system of production.

They have been asked to apply new and advanced concepts, such as SPC or TQM, while the business of manufacturing continues to trod along a single, unchanging course called batch production. This is somewhat like entering Indy-style cars in a quarter-mile, dirt track race. The power of the cars will never be realized, and the end result is a machine that cannot perform up to expectations. It is little wonder that the average U.S. manufacturing employee is frustrated to the point where complacency is the only way to cope. To change this, we must have leaders who are capable of projecting a clear, concise vision, and what is needed most is a road map to steer the requisite priorities.