Perspectives on Japanization

John Bratton

Chapter 2 in Japanization at Work, 1992, pp 17-47 from Palgrave Macmillan

Abstract: Abstract Books such as Schonberger’s Japanese Manufacturing Techniques, World Class Manufacturing and The Road to Nissan have captured the attention of British and Northern American managers. Since the early 1980s, the vogue managerial terms are labour ‘flexibility’ and a battery of ‘Japanese’ management techniques, including cellular technology (CT), just-in-time (JIT), total quality control (TQC), appraisal, and employee participation. It has been said that flexibility has become a managerial cause célèbre.1 There appears to be a general consensus amongst engineering consultants and some managers that Japanese manufacturing management can be readily implanted into British manufacturing firms. Schonberger (1982) for instance, claims that such management techniques are ‘a highly transportable commodity’ (1982:1). And, in what is probably one of the most publicized ‘models’ of Japanese managerial control, Peter Wickens, Director of Personnel at the Sunderland Nissan plant, asserts that ‘much that is good about Japanese management practices is transferable, with modification, to a western environment’ (1987:38).

Keywords: Computer Numerically Control; Japanese Management; Labour Process; Strategic Choice; Computer Numerically Control Machine (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 1992
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DOI: 10.1007/978-1-349-12172-4_2

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