In the early 1980s, Wainwright Industries, a manufacturer of stamped and machine
ID: 385663 • Letter: I
Question
In the early 1980s, Wainwright Industries, a manufacturer
of stamped and machine parts, was facing nothing
less than a crisis. Increased competition, along with
intensified customer scrutiny, was forcing Wainwright
to either improve quality or lose its competitive stature.
In the face of this challenge, the employees of the
company, led by CEO Arthur D. Wainwright, decided
to make radical changes. It was clear that business as
usual with a few minor improvements would not save
the company. What Wainwright needed was an entire
new philosophy of doing business based on quality and
total customer satisfaction.
To determine how to achieve this objective,
Wainwright used the criteria for the Malcolm Baldrige
award as a road map. Drawing input from all levels of
the company, the top management team led the process
by setting goals, developing implementation strategies,
and establishing key quality standards. Initially,
the company emphasized three principles: employee
empowerment, customer satisfaction, and continuous
improvement. As a creative way of demonstrating the
importance of working together, the company adopted
the duck as its mascot, based on the fact that ducks fly
in formation as a means of supporting one another in flight. In addition, whenever a duck falls out of formation,
it suddenly feels the drag and resistance of trying
to fly alone and quickly returns to the flock. Wainwright
used this analogy to support the concepts of teamwork
and employee empowerment, which were integral parts
of the company’s quality improvement efforts.
Along its journey toward improved quality, a number
of specific initiatives were implemented. Lean manufacturing,
statistical process control, computer-aided
design, cross-training, profit sharing, and quality-minded
manufacturing initiatives were put in place. Special emphasis
was placed on training and benchmarking. Since
it initiated its quality program, the company has spent
up to 7% of its annual payroll on training. To demonstrate
its resolve in this area, the company has made
training an important criterion for employee advancement.
Wainwright has benchmarked against a number
of companies, including firms in the textiles, chemical,
and electronics industries. For instance, after studying
Milliken & Company, a previous Baldrige award winner,
Wainwright implemented an employee suggestion program
that has been very effective.
Along with the changes mentioned previously,
Wainwright also has changed its culture to make it more egalitarian and quality minded. The employees
at Wainwright (including the CEO) now all wear the
same uniform, eat in the same cafeteria, and park in the
same parking lot. Office walls have literally been torn
down and replaced with glass, based on the premise
that if the managers can watch the frontline employees
work, the frontline employees should be able to watch
the managers work, too. As a result of these changes,
the managers of the company have become coaches
and facilitators rather than supervisors and disciplinarians.
This important change has helped facilitate the
teamwork atmosphere that is supportive of high quality
and total customer satisfaction.
The results of the company’s continuous improvement
efforts are linked to five strategic indicators: safety,
internal customer satisfaction, external customer satisfaction,
design quality, and business performance. The
status of each of these criteria is tracked by “mission
control,” a room set aside to document the company’s efforts. In mission control, each customer’s satisfaction
is documented with a plaque, a current monthly satisfaction
rating, and a red or green flag that indicates the
customer’s status relative to objectives.
As a result of these initiatives, Wainwright has
met the challenge. It has not only survived but has
also emerged as an industry leader. The company has
earned the status of preferred supplier to a growing
number of quality-conscious customers and has received
special recognition from General Motors, Ford,
and IBM-Rochester. The goal of Six Sigma quality
is being pursued. Perhaps most important, in the last
decade, overall customer satisfaction has increased
from 84% to 95%, and the company’s market share,
revenues, and profits are at record levels. Ironically,
the company was one of the recipients of the Malcolm
Baldrige award, the very award against which the
company benchmarked in its early days of quality
improvement.
Discussion Questions
1. In its pursuit of improved quality, Wainwright
emphasized two sets of initiatives: one based on
improvements in its manufacturing operations
(e.g., just-in-time manufacturing, computer-aided
design) and the other based on human resource
management (e.g., employee empowerment, profit
sharing). Why was it necessary for Wainwright to
emphasize both of these sets of initiatives? How
are they related?
2. What is an egalitarian culture? How does the development
of an egalitarian culture help a company
like Wainwright Industries become more quality
minded?
3. Although quality is important for every product
or service, it may be particularly important for the
precision auto parts industry. Do you agree with
this statement? Why or why not?
Explanation / Answer
1)-
It is specifically important to make changes for both manufacturing as well as employee side to achieve the goal of quality. Each and everything should work together as both of the factors would contribute to the customer satisfaction.
Improvement of the technology is the only option that would give an edge over competitors that's why manufacturing changes and continuous improvement is a necessary.
All the employees in the company are part of what they are doing with which the quality products can be made hence it is very important for both of the parts of the organisation to work together for achievement of the quality through satisfaction.
2 ) -
Egalitarian culture can be defined as a trend that favours equality for all of the people inside the organisation. It works as providing equal fundamental worth or social status of each and every person inside the organisation.
By providing a similar position to each and every employee of the organisation as well as implementing it by creating a baseline would be the most important part of egalitarian culture that would benefit the company in terms of increased quality improvement as well as productivity.
3)-
I agree with the statement as we could directly see more customer satisfaction and quality achievement the company was even recognised by major leading manufacturers of the similar industry like General Motors and Ford.
As even a small failure would totally destroy the name of a specific automobile companies and they would suffer a lot then the suppliers, hence maintenance of the quality is very important in automobile power Auto Parts industry.