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Question: Service Adhesives Ltd. produces specialist


Service Adhesives Ltd. produces specialist adhesives. It has always been profitable, but there had been a slowdown in the company’s profits. Several improvement initiatives had attempted to reverse their declining position but none had fully taken hold. Some senior management put this down to staff as being ‘below average’ skills and motivation, and reluctant to change. Staff turnover was high and the company had started employing short-term contract labour to cope with fluctuating orders.
There had been some tension between temporary and permanent employees. The company organized a visit to one of their customers, called (bizarrely) ‘Happy Products’. ‘It was like entering another world. Their plant was cleaner, the flow of materials seemed smoother, their staff seemed purposeful, it seemed efficient and everybody worked as a team. I’m sure that team-based approach could be implemented just as successfully in our plant’, (CEO Service Adhesives).
The Happy Products operation made diapers (nappies) and healthcare products and was organized into three product areas, each staffed by five operators. One operator was a team leader responsible for ‘first line management’. A second operator was a specially trained health and safety representative. A third was a trained quality representative who also liaised with the Quality Department. A fourth operator was a trained maintenance engineer, while a fifth was a non-specialist, ‘floating’ operator. This meant that most day-to-day problems could be dealt with immediately, so production output, product quality and line efficiency were controlled exceptionally well. Team members derived great satisfaction from playing a key part in the success of the organization. Teams were also involved in determining annual performance targets for their specific areas. Service Adhesive decided to adopt a team-based work organization. However, they realized their lack of the organizational ‘cohesiveness’ that Happy Products had. Traditionally, they had prided themselves on their hierarchical organization structure, with five layers of management from the plant director, to the shop floor operatives. The chain of command was strictly enforced by operating procedures enshrined in their comprehensive quality assurance system.
(a) Service Adhesive Ltd currently employs some people on short term contracts. How could this affect their proposed team-based working structure?
(b) In moving from a traditional to a team-based work structure, what sort of formal (e.g. roles and procedures) and informal (e.g. social groups and communication) barriers are Service Adhesive likely to encounter?
(c) Senior management of Service Adhesives thought that the reason for ineffective improvement initiatives in the past was due mainly to the apparent lack of cohesion amongst the organizations human resource. Could a team-based work organization be the answer to their organizational difficulties?
(d) Employee empowerment is a key element of team-based working, what difficulties could Service Adhesives face in implementing empowerment?


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> Our suppliers often offer better prices if we are willing to buy in larger quantities. This creates a pressure on us to hold higher levels of stock. Therefore, to find the best quantity to order we must compare the advantages of lower prices for purchase

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> Airline catering is a tough business. Meals must be of a quality that is appropriate for the class and type of flight, yet the Airlines who are their customers are always looking to keep costs as low as possible, menus must change frequently and respond

> Many companies devise a policy on ethical sourcing covering such things as workplace standards and business practices, Health and Safety conditions, human rights, legal systems, child labour, disciplinary practices, wages and benefits, etc. (a) What do y

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> Revisit the example, ‘United breaks passengers’ operations. (a) How should the airline have handled the situation? (b) After the incident attracted so much negative publicity, United announced a new upper limit of $10,000 in compensation for passengers w

> In a typical 7-day period, the planning department of the pizza company programs its ‘Pizzamatic’ machine for 148 hours. It knows that changeovers and set-ups take 8 hours and breakdowns average 4 hours each week. Waiting for ingredients to be delivered

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> My flight to Stockholm would be late landing. We were in a “stack” of planes circling above Brussels. Air traffic control had closed the runways for a short period at dawn, because of snow. Flights from all over the World were now being allocated new lan

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> The headquarters of a major creative agency offered a service to all its global subsidiaries that included the preparation of a budget estimate that was submitted to potential clients when making a ‘pitch’ for new work

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> Globalization is very much a “mixed blessing”. There is little doubt that it has lifted millions out of poverty, but it has also led to the destruction of traditional cultures in developing countries and many jobs in the developed world.’ Draw up lists o

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