Labour stability and flexibility – conditions to reach just‐in‐time

Abstract

If you would like to write for this, or any other Emerald publication, then please use our Emerald for Authors service information about how to choose which publication to write for and submission guidelines are available for all. Please visit www.emeraldinsight.com/authors for more information. About Emerald www.emeraldinsight.comEmerald is a global publisher linking research and practice to the benefit of society. The company manages a portfolio of more than 290 journals and over 2,350 books and book series volumes, as well as providing an extensive range of online products and additional customer resources and services.Emerald is both COUNTER 4 and TRANSFER compliant. The organization is a partner of the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE) and also works with Portico and the LOCKSS initiative for digital archive preservation. IntroductionThe explanations in the West of the superior productivity and quality development in Japanese firms employing the just-in-time-concept ( JIT) have varied over the years. Myths have been created, such as better performance owing to a higher degree of automation or a unique technology, in spite of a strong rejection of the significance of these factors from a number of different researchers, such as Hayes[1], Dohse et al. [2], and Womack et al. [3]. Another, and perhaps more likely thesis, is based on a pioneering work by Abegglen [4] connoting that the high productivity is a result of Japanese cultural and social features. The thesis is dismissed as a major explanation, however, by Sapie and Schonberger[5], Weiss[6], Shimada[7-8] and Vogel [9], and by the fact that Japanese industries have also shown successful results at their transplants in the USA and England [3]. According to these researchers the main explanation for the success of the JIT-system is rather to be found in a unique way of organizing and leading the industrial work.In an investigation of 52 Japanese and three Swedish companies, Storhagen[10] discovered that the important difference between Japanese and Swedish companies was not to be found in the implementation of JIT techniques and methods, such as kanban-control, short set-ups, adjusted factory layouts, etc. The Japanese firms were instead superior in managing activities indirectly supporting these techniques and methods, like visibility, job rotation, teamwork, lifetime employment, seniority, suggestion systems, wage systems, education, etc. Storhagen's clue is that Swedish companies must focus much harder on managing these supporting activities to implement JIT successfully.Labour stability and flexibility in the form of highly motivated, multi-skilled employees accepting flexible working hours, are often claimed to be conditions

The deployment of temporary production workers in assembly operations: a case study of the hidden costs of learning and forgetting

“…A stable and knowledgeable workforce is necessary for such production efficiency and flexibility, and strategic infrastructural factors such as human resource policies and workforce training have been shown to be critical in the achievement of these goals. (Upton, 1995;Suarez et al, 1996;Dahlen et al, 1995;Malhotra et al, 1993).…”