Suffering Auto Market
There is almost none of auto maker could deter the hardship of selling new car in this economic crisis. Except momentarily perhaps for a few German auto makers, yet new car purchase for the year 2010 might have been shifted forward to 2009 due to scrappage incentives (European’s version of Cash for Clunkers). One auto maker VW is even in the process to leverage buy out Porsche. The Germany auto market is a contrasting prospect to US; where two formerly big players have suffered “slight” downfall by submitting chapter 11, yet their revival remains to be seen.
It is even tough for the most efficient running auto maker such as Toyota which invented and thus coined the term “Zero Inventory Level” and the “Zen” principal of continuous quality improvements. The working attitude of most Japanese managerial levels had already accepted much of the ideas as early as 1950s when DR Demming taught them Control Chart production management tool as part of statistical process control (SPC) and concepts of quality training. This statistic discipline had been developed originally through Shewhart's techniques for minimizing large fluctuation of product quality at Bell Telephone Laboratories in 1927.
DR Demming's Profound Knowledge
While Demming continued working on his method to develop the”Profound Knowledge”; the Japanese auto makers further improved the method over the years to bring their automobile industry into a solid and efficient magnate.
Demming’s Management Application of Profound Knowledge No. 10 (excerpt):
Eliminate slogans, exhortations, and targets for the work force asking for zero defects and new levels of productivity. Such exhortations only create adversarial relationships, as the bulk of the causes of low quality and low productivity belong to the system and thus lie beyond the power of the work force.
- Eliminate work standards (quotas) on the factory floor. Substitute leadership.
- Eliminate management by objective. Eliminate management by numbers, numerical goals. Substitute leadership.
He further reinstated the forte of quality concerns should have been built in within the process instead of mere post process quality inspection, a principal working attitude that had been rigorously implemented in most Japanese auto makers; should the big three listen to this man the chapter 11 would be an elusive options.
DR William Edwards Deming was regarded as a sort of hero for the successful Japanese manufacturing and business practices in particular on the impact of his continuous improvement approach to the auto makers; much more than he is being recognized in his home the US. There is no doubt that his philosophy is also adamantly applied in other sector as well.
I was once participating in such training at one of the biggest Japanese automaker affiliates in Jakarta during my engineering practical work, and the evidence is quite obvious for new car high quality product in the area. Consistent high quality product for such prolong period is a phenomenal in itself. Could this be the secret behind Citroen’s phenomenal wins for five consecutive times in WRC as well?
Bill Vance an acclaimed Canadian automotive journalist/historian has put Demming as one of the most influential person on Automotive Technology and History next to the legendary Henry Ford.
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