Answered step by step
Verified Expert Solution
Link Copied!

Question

1 Approved Answer

My question is: Explain Weber's ideal bureaucracy and discuss how the characteristics of divison of labour and formal rules and regulations are practiced at Toyota

My question is: Explain Weber's ideal bureaucracy and discuss how the characteristics of divison of labour and formal rules and regulations are practiced at Toyota Georgetown. In order to answer this question, please refer to the document that I have attached. Please only refer to that document when answering the question. Thank you.

image text in transcribed
Deep inside Toyota's car factory in Georgetown, Kentucky, is the paint shop, where naked steel car bodies arrive to receive layers of coatings and colours before returning to the assembly line to have theirinteriorsandenginesinstalled.Everyday,2,000cars glide in to be painted one of a dozen colours by carefully programmedrobots.ChadBucknerisanengineeringmanagerinthepaintingd epartment,wherehearrivedstraightoutof the University of Kentucky. His whole career has been spent at Toyota. Car bodies used to spend 10 hours in painting. Robots did much of the work, then as now, but they weresuppliedwithpaintthroughlonghosesfromstoragetanks.\"Ifwewerepain tingacarred,before we could paint the next car white, we had to stop, flush the red paint out of the lines and reload the next colour,\" Buckner says. Georgetown literally threw away 30% of the car paint it bought, cleaning it out of equipment and supply hoses when switching colours. Now, each painting robot, eight per car, selects a paint cylinder the size of a large water bottle. A whirling disk at the end of the robot arm flings out a mist of top-coat paint. When a car is painted-it takes just seconds- the paint cartridge is set back down, and a freshly filled cartridge is selected by each robot.Nohosesneedtobeflushed.Thereisnocleaningbetweencars.Allthepai ntisinthecartridges,which are refilled automatically from reservoirs. Cars don't need to be batched by colour -a system that savedpaintbutcausedconstantdelays.Carsnowspend8hoursinpaint,instea d of 10.Thepaintshop at any moment holds 25% fewer cars than it used to. Wasted paint? Practically zero. What used to require 100 litres now takes 70. Together with new programming to make the robots paint more quickly, Buckner's group has increased the efficiency of its car-washsized paint booths from 33 cars an hour to50.All tasks are outlined with strict procedures in place for the team to follow. As the manager, Buckner has the responsibility of allocating work to the individual team members and ensure the strict quality control measures are followed to meet the deadlines and production targets.As customers' preferences change and new season colours are released, Georgetown simply adds in an additional canister and reservoir of the special colour to the mix for the robots to choose. Compared to the old process, this saves exceptional amounts of time and money compared to the workers changing the paint, inserting the new paint then the painstaking process to remove it and change to another seasonal colour.In comparison, a nearby car factory nearby, still follows the old inefficient process. This has resulted in several people losing their jobs and restrictions placed on how many colours the car company offers to customers as the organization tries to cut costs.Common feedback received from customers is that they would prefer the latest seasonal colours however as they are not available they go to brands like Toyota who offers several trending options. Howard Artrip, a manager in the assembly area, is telling the story of how they solved a decision-making problem. \"There used to be eight racks of parts here,\" he says. The racks crowded the workstation, giving the worker ready access to all possible parts. The operator would eyeball the car coming up the line,step to the racks of visors and seatbelts,and,saysArtrip,\"grab the right parts and run to the car.\" He or she would step into the slowly advancing car,bolt belts and visors in place, step back onto the factory floor-and do it again. All in 55 seconds, the time each slowly moving car spends at each work station.The problem was,there were12 possible combinations of sun visors and nine variations of seatbelts. So just deciding which parts to snatch had become a job in itself. In every shift, 500 cars passed the racks, each car needing four specific parts: 2,000 opportunities to make an error. Even with 99% perfection, five cars per shift got the wrong sun visors or seat belts. The job of installing parts had become cluttered with meaningless decision making.So a team of assembly employees provided insights and made a critical decision. Don't make the worker pick the parts ;let them focus on installing them.The idea seems obvious inretrospect: Deliver akitofpresortedvisorsandseatbeltswithonekitpercar,eachcontainingexactlytheright parts.The change came out of a routine analysis of dozens of assemblyline jobs at Georgetown. When the simplification effort started three years ago, Artrip's team found 44 jobs where assemblers had to make1or2decisionsastheyinstalledparts.Theyfound23workstationsthatreq uiredbetween7and 11 decisions. Any jobs requiring 7 to 11 decisions in 55 seconds were going to cause problems. Now, 85 line jobs require just 1 or 2 decisions. Not a single job requires 7 or more decisions. The work is easier,theresultsarebetter.This is exactly the kind of work Artrip has spent more than half his career at Toyota doing: looking for ways to make the assembly line faster, simpler and safer, making it easier to do the work perfectly. Continuous improvement is not some add-on to the real work, it isn't some special project Artip does on top of the rest of his work. He does this every day, reviewing how they transform the input intoan output and working out areas to improve. This emphasis on seeking perfection is because Toyota's senior executives constantly reinforce messages such as \"Never be satisfied\" and \"There is always a better way\". The company's foundation is built on constant improvement and innovation.Artrip has been at Georgetown for 19 years. The way he does his work is so compelling it has become part of his personal life. He has analysed his morning routine. \"I do the same standardized work in the shower every morning. I have to get here at 6 a.m., and I know it takes 19 minutes, including walking into the plant.\" He smiles. \"I've maximized my sleep time.\

Step by Step Solution

There are 3 Steps involved in it

Step: 1

blur-text-image

Get Instant Access to Expert-Tailored Solutions

See step-by-step solutions with expert insights and AI powered tools for academic success

Step: 2

blur-text-image_2

Step: 3

blur-text-image_3

Ace Your Homework with AI

Get the answers you need in no time with our AI-driven, step-by-step assistance

Get Started

Recommended Textbook for

Quantitative Methods For Business

Authors: David Anderson, Dennis Sweeney, Thomas Williams, Jeffrey Cam

11th Edition

978-0324651812, 324651813, 978-0324651751

More Books

Students also viewed these General Management questions

Question

Which months of this year 5 Mondays ?

Answered: 1 week ago

Question

Define Leap year?

Answered: 1 week ago

Question

Prepare a short profile of Lucy Clifford ?

Answered: 1 week ago

Question

Prepare a short profile of Rosa parks?

Answered: 1 week ago