XYZ Company was established 20 years ago, to manufacture gearbox components for diesel engines. It employs around 250 people, having a head office, which employs a wide range of personnel who are generally well educated and enthusiastic about their work, and a factory, which employs semi-skilled local people who are generally disinterested in the products of the company and who have an instrumental attitude to work, seeing salary as the only reward.
Brief Description of the Problem:
The performance of the Company has not been good and the records revealed the following facts:
Wastage within the factory was costing the Company approximately Rs. 100,000 a month. There was wide spread differences in individual work standards Processes were non-standardized resulting in repeated problems Management made all decisions and cascaded the result down to employees The top management became concerned about the performance of the factory and they hired Mr. Tanmoy Deb, an OD consultant to study the problem and suggest specific changes to relationships and tasks with the following objectives:
To review and improve communication systems.
To restructure the organization and to review teamwork and quality practices. To review leadership issues across all levels.
Mr. Tanmoy Deb carried out discussions, interviews and surveys and made the following observations:
There’ and ‘us’ attitude was widely prevalent between head office and factory personnel Production personnel lacked technical skills
Factory employees felt alienated from sharing the Company’s success Production systems were adhoc and defective because of frequent variations in standards set Many times raw material was found to be of inferior quality
Rigidly defined job descriptions
1. What in your view are the central human resources issues involved in this case?
2. What strategy should Mr. Tanmoy Deb develop and implement for improving the present system?