Saturday, February 5, 2022

Industrial Engineering and Scientific Management in Japan

The success of Toyota in cost reduction, productivity improvement, and international competitiveness and its celebrated Toyota Production System, fulfilled the dream of Yoichi Ueno (that Japan can guide US in improved practices of efficiency improvement). The success of #Toyota and the World Class #TPS was  built on the sustained efforts many Japanese persons who understood Taylor and Gilbreth's writings and improvised them in implementing them in Japanese companies.


Japanese scholars and business men embraced scientific management, efficiency movement, and industrial engineering right from the inception and excelled in implementing it and reaped great rewards in economic as well as academic spheres. In the process there were many innovations in the subject on the Japanese soil.

Early Adoption of Scientific Management by Japan

Late nineteenth century Japan was a rational shopper for products, technology and organizational models[1]. Scientific management of F.W. Taylor was quickly spotted by Japanese and was translated into Japanese in 1912, within one year of its publication in USA in 1911 [1]. It is an astonishing fact that one million copies were sold to workers in a special edition for workers. Yoichi Ueno and Araki Toichiro were enthusiastic supporters. Yoichi Ueno was responsible for organizing the Industrial Efficiency Research Institute (Sngyo Noritsu Kenkyujo) in 1921.

Motion analysis techniques were used in Japanese companies in starting in 1913. Firms like Mitsubishi Electric and Nippon Electric took the lead. In the area of textiles, Kanebo and Toyobo companies took the initiative and implemented standardization. (Refer The Cotton Industry - Institute of Developing Economies, Takeo Izumi.
https://www.ide.go.jp/library/English/Publish/Periodicals/De/pdf/79_04_02.pdf).


Industrial engineering was organized as a subject that increases the education and skills of workmen in Japan. Improving the education and skill of a workman is a dominant concept in Japanese industrial set up compared to the slogan of deskilling in US systems. Also, the Efficiency Research Institute was an initiative of Harmony and Cooperation Society (Kyochokai) formed in 1919 by the state and leading corporations of Japan. Industrial engineering has a more welcome environment in Japan to deliver its scientific potential.

Yoichi Ueno - Japanese Leader in Efficiency - Productivity Movement



Zenjiro Imaoka [3]  explained Industrial Engineering as a concept for improving the efficiency of production and is the driving force that brings success in mass production today. OR (Operations Research) is an approach to explore optimization using statistical figures and linear programming. Both of them are included in supply chain flow [2].  IE (industrial engineering) is a concept that was first structured as a concept to enable the improvement of production efficiency. Various scientific approaches started by Taylor were tried out to improve production efficiency by various companies. During the Civil War, the U.S. promoted the standardization of firearms and parts of munitions. As a result, the U.S. succeeded in the mass production of parts by realizing low-cost and short-lead time production. The engine of the further success of mass production was the concept of IE. IE was employed by Henry Ford for producing the Model T Ford and that was a starting point of growth for auto industry.  The base of business administration and management consulting methodology of today started with IE. We can also say that IE is a technology that combines manufacturing techniques and product technologies or it synchronizes management resources. If IT (information technology) can be used together with IE (manufacturing technologies), information and communication will be combined with production systems, leading to the efficient flow in supply chain management which resulted in supply chain innovations such as CALS, BPR, ECR, and QR.


Contribution of JMA in Promoting and Using IE and Scientific Management in Japan

Scientific Management began in 1880s and spread quickly around the world. In Japan, this concept evolved into the pursuit of efficiency, and in 1942 the Japan Management Association (JMA) was established as an organization to promote that concept, based on IE and other management methods.

JMA set three basic principles to govern all its activities.

1. Japan-oriented strategy toward efficiency.
2. Execution than vacuous theory
3. Priority basis than all-round policy

JMA's Achievements 


At the early stage

Tanker production project with Mitsubishi Heavy Industries (1944) - The approach has produced a revolutionary production method and process management system, which dramatically cut the tanker building work period from eight months to just three months.

Drastic production line process improvement that formed the basis of Toyota production method (1944) - JMA and Toyota came up with a method that dramatically reduced the setup time from several hours to less than 10 minutes.

1957 - Held the first IE (Industrial Engineering) Course

1974 - *Opened IE-er Training Course

1982 - Held ICPO (International Conference on Productivity and Quality Optimization)

1984 - Started promoting the notion of White-collar Productivity

1987 - Launched the JMA Management Innovation Proposal with ”Management of Global Optimization"
http://www.jma.or.jp/en/about/history_jma.html



Contribution of Taiichi Ohno and Shigeo Shingo to Industrial Engineering


An interesting point is that Taiichi Ohno did not accept the present method as the best method. He advocated that it can be improved today or tomorrow. It is only a present standard operating procedure subject to improvement today or tomorrow. He wanted every body to believe in progress and improvement of methods.

Taiichi Ohno's Contribution

Use of Industrial Engineering in Innovative Way and Increasing the Productivity of Toyota Motors to Surpass the Productivity of US Automobile Companies
Toyota Production System - Origin and Development - Taiichi Ohno

Shigeo Shingo's Contribution
Toyota Production System Industrial Engineering - Shigeo Shingo
Development of SMED
Development of Poka Yoke




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References

1. Oxford handbook of work and organization, OUP 2005
2. http://www.lean-manufacturing-japan.com/scm-terminology/ieor-industrial-engineering-operational-research.html
3. Zenjiro Imaoka, Understand Supply Chain Management through 100 words,
KOUGYOUCHOUSAKAI
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Bibliography


Manufacturing Ideology: Scientific Management in Twentieth-Century Japan

 By William M. Tsutsui, Princeton University Press, 2001

Manufacturing Ideology: Scientific Management in Twentieth-Century Japan - A Review
http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_hb3024/is_2_11/ai_n28809136/

Japanese Television Plant Transplants in USA - Good description of Japanese work and management practices
http://hcd.ucdavis.edu/faculty/webpages/kenney/articles_files/Transferring%20the%20Learning%20Factory%20to%20America.%20The%20Japanese%20Television%20Assembly%20Transplants.pdf


The American and Japanese auto industries in transition : report of the Joint U.S.-Japan Automotive Study
Joint U.S.-Japan Automotive Study.
1984
https://quod.lib.umich.edu/c/cjs/ack1064.0001.001/--american-and-japanese-auto-industries-in-transition-report?rgn=main;view=fulltext

Japanese Blue Collar Worker - Changing Tradition - 1973 - Cole
Full view Google Book
http://books.google.co.in/books?id=gswwd5k3xKEC

Japanese culture, western management: Taylorism and human resources in Japan
Author: Malcolm Warner
Organization Studies(Vol. 15, Issue 4), Fall 1994, Publisher: Sage Publications Ltd. (UK)
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Updated 5 Deb 2022, 5 November 2019,   11 June 2019,   11 June 2016,  20 May 2012,  3.3.2011
Knol Number 1906

4 comments:

  1. Those who are still unaware of the said field will surely gain new information from this post.

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  3. Japanese management Fukuzawa Yukichi https://books.google.co.in/books?id=74_Maj80BksC&pg=PA122#v=onepage&q&f=true

    Fifty Key Figures in Management

    Morgen Witzel
    Psychology Press, 2003 - Biography & Autobiography - 319 pages
    Fifty Key Figures in Management is a collection of biographies of fifty people who have helped to make management what it is today - through their ideas, writings and teachings, through practical example and leadership, or both.

    Featuring business leaders such as Henry Ford, Jack Welch and Bill Gates, all of whom were pioneers in business pratice, the book also includes thinkers and consultants who have helped to redefine the way we think about management, such as Ohmae Kenichi, Fukuzawa Yukichi, Tom Peters and Charles Handy. Moreover, new and emerging aspects of management are covered through the inclusion of such cutting-edge thinkers as Arie de Geus, Max Boisot and Nonaka Ikujiro.

    Taken together, the fifty biographies presented here described how management emerged as a modern discipline and grew into its present form. Organization, strategy, marketing, production management, human resource management and knowledge management all come together to show how management is a multi-faceted discipline.

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  4. The article received appreciation from a very senior IE academician.

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