Managing the human resource in the factory of the future

Abstract

Powerful marketing, economic and technological forces are driving manufacturing toward greater functional integration. Computer integrated manufacturing and flexible manufacturing systems will be the logical outgrowth of these pressures. Functional integration will place special demands upon the people in the factory environment of the future, affecting jobs and organization structure. Specialized jobs, based upon ‘scientific management’ will yield to the multi skilled worker. Flexible work roles will in turn affect training, employee motivation and manufacturing organization structure. The authors discuss implications of these trends for introducing new manufacturing technology into existing facilities.

Human resource issues in cellular manufacturing: A sociotechnical analysis

“…Although STS theories emphasize the importance of organizational choice (Trist, Higgin, Murray and Pollock ( 1963)) much of the research in this area seems to point toward the creation of work groups whose members are temporally interdependent with one another. This concept is similar to what Thompson ( 1967) has called "sequential interdependence," and it provides theoretical support for the structures advocated in CM. Consistent with STS, a move away from functionally-oriented structures brings about changes in the necessary coordination mechanisms, and temporally interdependent team members are more likely to rely upon "mutual adjustment" modes (Thompson (1967)) than on more structured modes of coordination.…”

“…This concept is similar to what Thompson ( 1967) has called "sequential interdependence," and it provides theoretical support for the structures advocated in CM. Consistent with STS, a move away from functionally-oriented structures brings about changes in the necessary coordination mechanisms, and temporally interdependent team members are more likely to rely upon "mutual adjustment" modes (Thompson (1967)) than on more structured modes of coordination. This suggests that major changes in the social system must accompany the technical changes associated with a CM layout.…”