Forum Discussion
waynec1957 wrote:
I retired from production at GM after 30 years and I can assure everyone people on the floor, those actually doing the work, used to get really frustrated about this kind of thing. This isn't uncommon at all, especially in parts plants. There's always a push to make schedules and if comes down to a decision to stop the line and fix something or keep running, most times keep running wins.
This isn't something unique to GM though. All car manufacturers, domestic or foreign, deal with this. In fact, all manufacturers period deal with this. I'd bet my bottom dollar someone at a very low level, very early on, alerted the higher ups about this and they were ignored.
This hits close to home for me because over the years I've seen the blame for this kind of thing shifted to those "lazy, greedy, over-paid, workers" when they aren't the ones making the decisions.
100% true! Every word of it.fla-gypsy wrote:
Perrysburg Dodgeboy wrote:
I agree with you 100% Waynec1957, I posted in the other thread about this. It gets old hearing it's the line workers fault every single time, when Management controls everything. Empowerment of the workforce is nothing more than kool-aid for the consumer. Try it on a real line and you won't have your job long!
Don
At my manufacturing facility workers are required to shut it down if something is not right. I am not in the auto industry but not addressing a problem when it comes up in my facility will get you sent on your way in a hurry. It is always more cost effective in my industry to deal with the problem when it arises rather than waste labor, energy and raw materials on making something that will go in the trash. To claim it is completely management's fault or completely the production workers fault is rarely the case. More often there is a small group of people who knew about the problem but did not exercise their brain and make certain it was addressed. Management that knows about a problem and elects to produce it anyway is inept at best, production workers who throw up their hands and say it is not my problem when an issue arises deserve to be terminated.
I can only talk about GM and the auto industry in general because that's my background, specifically automotive electronics and safety products.
I agree there are times when workers throw their hands up. I've seen it happen many, many times, and it's typically in cases like these when some problem has been swept under the rug. I've also seen a lot of workers disciplined for "making scrap" over the years up to and including being terminated.
But...in this case, I'm going to have to say this lays in the lap of senior engineering and management. This isn't just a few hundred bad parts some hourly quality inspector let slip by on their shift. This was a conscious decision by senior managers and engineers to not address this issue for at least 5 years.BenK wrote:
Too common in American and now spreading to foreign corporations who
has adopted the 'business school' metrics of management...AKA bottom line management
I've been banned from the factory floor (computers selling in the millions each)
and removed from a Ford Design building...just a few among many others
Even though those computers were from my design product team, they were
right...I no longer had a say in Ops. As after releasing and Ops signing
off on the design doc's...they owned the production of it. Sure if there
were any 'engineering' issues, I'd be the one they called
Everyone is at fault and truly mean that
From the bean counter management to 'us' in the public who reward
exec's with tens to hundreds of MILLIONs for failure. This is Wall
Street and their stock prices
Not just automotive, but any product that has a large scale production
line. Think even tiny production too, but they don't get the publicity
Early career was in process controls, factory automation, etc and saw
this kind of bean counter management first hand while out on the job
sites
'Blame Game' is huge and no one accountable but the 'little guy'
AKA the goat
At that Ford design center I got tossed out of...my guys invented a
new CPU for a super computer and the sales folks asked us to allow
them to run a Beta out there.
While my crew was installing and tuning I was allowed to investigate
the facility...until I spoke out one too many times 'why' ?
Found some designers changing harness wiring size. The computer would
not allow, as the canned CAD spec said no...so the manager told the
software folks to change the spec. Knew right then and there that
Ford's and any other OEM was going to have electrical issues
Ditto when another young engineer was changing the noble metal flashed
onto switch contact's. Their CAD system spec said no, so another manager
likewise told them to change the spec
Opened my fat mouth asking about tolerance stack up and when one of
those managers heard...asked me to be escorted out of the building...
Did those managers care? Nope, their bonuses were based on 'cost reduction'
without any engineering evaluation and did find that they were not
engineers, but business school grads...
"The squeaky wheel gets the oil...BS! The squeaky wheel is the first one to get replaced!" - George Carlin- And there will be more...
- Or maybe they were following orders given by other techs that did not agree with your analysis
- Too common in American and now spreading to foreign corporations who
has adopted the 'business school' metrics of management...AKA bottom line management
I've been banned from the factory floor (computers selling in the millions each)
and removed from a Ford Design building...just a few among many others
Even though those computers were from my design product team, they were
right...I no longer had a say in Ops. As after releasing and Ops signing
off on the design doc's...they owned the production of it. Sure if there
were any 'engineering' issues, I'd be the one they called
Everyone is at fault and truly mean that
From the bean counter management to 'us' in the public who reward
exec's with tens to hundreds of MILLIONs for failure. This is Wall
Street and their stock prices
Not just automotive, but any product that has a large scale production
line. Think even tiny production too, but they don't get the publicity
Early career was in process controls, factory automation, etc and saw
this kind of bean counter management first hand while out on the job
sites
'Blame Game' is huge and no one accountable but the 'little guy'
AKA the goat
At that Ford design center I got tossed out of...my guys invented a
new CPU for a super computer and the sales folks asked us to allow
them to run a Beta out there.
While my crew was installing and tuning I was allowed to investigate
the facility...until I spoke out one too many times 'why' ?
Found some designers changing harness wiring size. The computer would
not allow, as the canned CAD spec said no...so the manager told the
software folks to change the spec. Knew right then and there that
Ford's and any other OEM was going to have electrical issues
Ditto when another young engineer was changing the noble metal flashed
onto switch contact's. Their CAD system spec said no, so another manager
likewise told them to change the spec
Opened my fat mouth asking about tolerance stack up and when one of
those managers heard...asked me to be escorted out of the building...
Did those managers care? Nope, their bonuses were based on 'cost reduction'
without any engineering evaluation and did find that they were not
engineers, but business school grads... - Apparently, they knew about this issue for the past 6 years. So says one of the other news sources.
Perrysburg Dodgeboy wrote:
I agree with you 100% Waynec1957, I posted in the other thread about this. It gets old hearing it's the line workers fault every single time, when Management controls everything. Empowerment of the workforce is nothing more than kool-aid for the consumer. Try it on a real line and you won't have your job long!
Don
At my manufacturing facility workers are required to shut it down if something is not right. I am not in the auto industry but not addressing a problem when it comes up in my facility will get you sent on your way in a hurry. It is always more cost effective in my industry to deal with the problem when it arises rather than waste labor, energy and raw materials on making something that will go in the trash. To claim it is completely management's fault or completely the production workers fault is rarely the case. More often there is a small group of people who knew about the problem but did not exercise their brain and make certain it was addressed. Management that knows about a problem and elects to produce it anyway is inept at best, production workers who throw up their hands and say it is not my problem when an issue arises deserve to be terminated.- I agree with you 100% Waynec1957, I posted in the other thread about this. It gets old hearing it's the line workers fault every single time, when Management controls everything. Empowerment of the workforce is nothing more than kool-aid for the consumer. Try it on a real line and you won't have your job long!
Don - I retired from production at GM after 30 years and I can assure everyone people on the floor, those actually doing the work, used to get really frustrated about this kind of thing. This isn't uncommon at all, especially in parts plants. There's always a push to make schedules and if comes down to a decision to stop the line and fix something or keep running, most times keep running wins.
This isn't something unique to GM though. All car manufacturers, domestic or foreign, deal with this. In fact, all manufacturers period deal with this. I'd bet my bottom dollar someone at a very low level, very early on, alerted the higher ups about this and they were ignored.
This hits close to home for me because over the years I've seen the blame for this kind of thing shifted to those "lazy, greedy, over-paid, workers" when they aren't the ones making the decisions.
