Profit-Sharing, Job Rotation and Permanent Employment: The Large Japanese Firm as a Producers' Co-op

McCormick, B. J.; Marshall, G. P.

doi:10.1177/0143831x8782003

Cited by 5 publications

(3 citation statements)

References 10 publications

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“…Another employment buffer is provided by the subcontractors of the firm's primary/ preferred suppliers who are unable to confer life-time employment on their own employees given the variability of monthly production schedules received from their customers (suppliers regularly report monthly discrepancies of plus or minus 20% from the initial plan) [54]. As a result only around 25% of all Japanese workers have life-time employment status (a percentage similar to that of Britain and other Western economies) [55], while 65-70% are non-permanent workers employed by the smaller/ subcontractor firms. In addition, an estimated 3.5 million workers are employed/ unemployed on a daily basis [56].…”

Section: Just-in-time and Industrial Relations-the Limits To Japanisamentioning

confidence: 99%

The limits to‘Japanisation’—Just‐in‐Time, labour relations and the UK automotive industry

Turnbull

1988

New Technol Work Employ

134

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Section: Just-in-time and Industrial Relations-the Limits To Japanisamentioning

confidence: 99%

The limits to‘Japanisation’—Just‐in‐Time, labour relations and the UK automotive industry

Turnbull

1988

New Technol Work Employ

134

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“…The first is that in each of these firms job rotation has been a component of a number of "unconventional" attributes. For example, Japanese firms have been variously described as providing lifetime tenure, being labor-managed (or producers' co-op), or having a management philosophy of "employeeism" (McCormick and Marshall [1987], Miyazaki [1993]). Similarly, as communes, both the Shakers and the kibbutzim have pursued egalitarian principles in the ownership of property and the distribution of output.…”

Section: Job Rotationmentioning

confidence: 99%

Job Rotation

2017

The SAGE Encyclopedia of Industrial and Organizational Psychology, 2nd Edition

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A fundamental principle of economics with which Adam Smith begins The Wealth of Nations is the division of labor. Some firms, however, have been pursuing a practice called job rotation, which assigns each worker not to a single and specific task but to a set of several tasks among which he or she rotates with some frequency. We examine the practice of job rotation as a serious alternative to specialization, with three objectives. The first is to consider current and historical examples of job rotation, in addition to those in Japanese firms, in order to examine the variety of contexts in which job rotation has been practiced. Second, we develop a simple model of work organization in order to examine the cost and benefits of job rotation and to identify factors that make it the preferred organization of work. Extending the model in light of the available evidence, we critically examine the previous explanations of job rotation and identify some of the other, previously unnoticed, benefits such as reduced possibilities of shirking because of peer pressure. As a third objective, we evaluate the benefits of job rotation with respect to the organizational form of firms, particularly remuneration schemes and worker participation in decision making.

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“…It is, however, likely that there are more labourers without this benefit than with it. McCormick and Marshall [19] state that 25 per cent of all Japanese workers are covered by the system. Hasegawa [18] believes that approximately one-third of Japanese workers enjoy the benefits from lifetime employment, and Storhagen [10] estimates this figure to be between 50 and 70 per cent for the large firms in his investigation.…”

Section: Forms Of Employment (Lifetime Employment Vs Temporary Workers)mentioning

confidence: 99%

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

Dahlén

Ericsson²,

Fujii³

1995

International Journal of Operations &Amp; Production Management

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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

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Profit-Sharing, Job Rotation and Permanent Employment: The Large Japanese Firm as a Producers' Co-op

Cited by 5 publications

References 10 publications

The limits to‘Japanisation’—Just‐in‐Time, labour relations and the UK automotive industry

The limits to‘Japanisation’—Just‐in‐Time, labour relations and the UK automotive industry

Job Rotation

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

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