Companies are run by zeros not heroes

This statement made by our POM Professor during our third lecture made me sit straight on the chair and listen carefully to the differences between Craftsmanship and Modern Management.

Craftsmanship	Modern Management
Craft production is the process of manufacturing by hand with or without the aid of tools. The term Craft production refers to a manufacturing technique applied in the hobbies of Handicraft but was also the common method of manufacture in the pre-industrialized world. For example, the production of pottery uses methods of craft production	Mass production is the production of large amounts of standardized products, including and especially on assembly lines. This concept came into picture after the Industrial Revolution.
Only one person is working on the entire process	Many people are working on the same process
Time required to complete the entire task is more	Time required to complete the task is less
Satisfaction gained after completion of work is high	Satisfaction gained after completion of work is low
The skill sets required is more and varied	The skill sets required is small and monotonous

Can craftsmanship survive in the age of mass production?

Pre-industrialized world:

There was a time when craftsmanship meant something and there are still a few small Mom and Pop operations that believe in the word to this day. Then enter the internet, the global market, the ability to "feed" the masses with whatever they desire and we quickly find that Mom and Pop can't keep up with the demand curve. Try as they might, burn long hours into the night, work weekends, hire inexperienced workers etc. usually ends with the first telltale sign arising as a lack of quality control and the ultimate erosion of their customer base. 

Industrial Revolution:

Then came a time when many of the products we bought were mass-produced in factories, sacrificing high-quality craftsmanship to save money.

The world now:

However, Mass production today means maximizing your product output (maximizing your return on investment) while preserving the quality you are known for. If you slip, the response is almost instantaneous with today's social networking and "connected" world. Words gets out at light-speed that something isn't right, not up to par, caution, and buyer beware and you are "toast" as they say.

Some companies appear committed to craftsmanship even while offering a mass-produced product for example Apple. These are the companies which are committed to EXCELLENCE. They display their ‘Love of Excellence’ through their products.

Excellence = Effectiveness X Efficiency

                                                                  (Direction)          (Speed)

Today, these 3 E’s form the basis of any manufacturing companies.

Lean Manufacturing:

Lean Manufacturing aims to combine the flexibility and quality of craftsmanship with the low costs of mass production. Lean production was seen as the third step in an historical progression, which took industry from the age of the craftsman through the methods of mass production and into an era that combined the best of both. It has been described as “the most fundamental change to occur since mass production was brought to full development by Henry Ford early in the 20th century.”

In lean-production systems a manufacturer's employees are organized in teams. Within each team a worker is expected to be able to do all the tasks required of the team. These tasks are less narrowly specialized than those demanded of the worker in a mass-production system, and this variety enables the worker to escape from the soul-destroying repetition of the pure assembly line.

With lean production, components are delivered to each team's work station just-in-time, and every worker is encouraged to stop production when a fault is discovered. This is a critical distinction from the classic assembly-line process, where stoppages are expensive and to be avoided at all costs. Faulty products are put to one side to be dealt with later, and a large stock of spares is kept on hand so faulty components can be replaced immediately without causing hold-ups. With such a system, workers on the assembly line learn nothing and the faults persist. Thus, we can see that lean manufacturing is the way forward and the companies that incorporate it will be the ones that survive.

The Chemistry between X and Y

In the corporate world, two distinct categories of managers' leadership styles were defined in the 1960s as the X-Y Theories of Douglas McGregor at the MIT Sloan School of Management. Theory X defined autocratic managers, whose directive, even dictatorial styles were based on the belief that workers are lazy by nature, and need to have the manager watch them closely and crack the whip to make them work. Theory Y defined a more democratic, inclusive style, which was more respectful of employees, and assumed that under the right conditions, workers are self-motivated, enjoy their work for its own sake, and intrinsically desire to do a good job.

 Let us understand Theory X and Theory Y in terms of student-teacher relationship.

Consider this scenario:

In an experienced teacher's classroom: It is the first period of the day in a 9th grade English class. The students are subdued (research suggests that adolescent brains do not fully "wake up" until mid-morning). As the class shuffles to their seats, one student shouts out, "Dude! Stop jabbing me in the butt with that pencil!"

There is an outbreak of giggles, and the teacher slams down her books, shouting, "Sam! To the office! Take this and get out of here!" She shoves a paper slip at the student, who loudly tries to explain that his friend, walking behind him with objects protruding from his backpack had unknowingly been bumping him. The teacher is incensed at the interruption as class is just beginning, and berates Sam all the way to the door, where he finally stomps off down the hall.

She turns to the giggling class demanding, "And who's next?" The giggles die down, and as the teacher begins her lesson on Romeo and Juliet, she simply cannot get the class to engage in the discussion.

As the class ends and the students file out, she remarks, "I hate teaching ninth graders. It's like pulling teeth."

An alternative scenario:

Imagine that in the room next door, an identical incident occurs. It is the first period of the day in a 9th grade English class with an equally-experienced English teacher. The students are subdued, their brains not fully awake. As the class shuffles to their seats, one student shouts out, "Dude! Stop jabbing me in the butt with that pencil!"

There is an outbreak of giggles, and the teacher shakes her head trying to hide a smile. She wordlessly motions to the student, Sam, to come up to her, and as he approaches with his loud explanations she whispers, "Sh! Sh! Sam, I can hear you!" He immediately drops his voice to mirror hers, and she lets him go on for a few more seconds as she looks past him to the class, shaking her head at those that obviously want to participate in the fracas.

Then she wordlessly puts up her hand and whispers, "How about you sit down now?"

"Oh," is Sam's response, and he makes his way to his seat.

The teacher says, "Who can tell me what part of Romeo and Juliet involved something a little like what just happened here?" Instead of dissolving into chaos, the class is fully engaged, still giggling, with about half the hands waving. The teacher capitalizes on the unexpected opportunity to engage her class of normally half-awake teenage brains.

The first teacher is an obviously extreme example of Theory X. X-style teachers kill engagement. Their own style triggers a fight-or-flight response in their students. The daily, ordinary silly behaviors of children and adolescents are either escalated into needless confrontation when a student feels put on the spot in front of peers (fight), while other students shut down and withdraw out of fear of embarrassment (flight).

On the other hand the second example is of Theory Y. Theory Y works on the principle of respect of the students. This is how our POM professor Dr. Mandi teaches us the various principles of management and this is how he also taught us the differences between Theory X and Theory Y.

A new beginning - POM

“If there is ever a paradise on earth, it’s here, it’s here, it’s here.”

This was the mesmerizing effect that Kashmir had on Mughal emperor Jahangir and this was the same mesmerizing effect that the beauty of NITIE had on me when I arrived here on 13^th June, 2013 with my luggage in tow. Looking at the awestruck expressions of my fellow batch mates I knew they felt the same. Having been born and brought up in Mumbai, I am used to listening to the traffic sounds day in and day out and seeing minimal greenery around me. NITIE with its lush green lawns and a pond of its own situated in the heart of Mumbai city came as a pleasant surprise to me and thoroughly convinced me about why it’s called as ‘God’s Own Campus’.

They say that there are few days in life that we never forget. I would say that it is the first week at NITIE that I would never forget. At the outset we were reminded that NITIE would be celebrating its 50^th Year of establishment this year and we would be known as the ‘Golden Jubilee’ batch. Being part of the 50^th Batch we would be part of grand celebrations at NITIE but it also comes with the expectations that we would work twice as hard too. This hard work started even before the classes could begin. The four days before the classes were to begin were spent in solving numerous case studies bestowed on us to accustom us with long, sleepless nights that were going to follow soon enough. The best parts of these case studies were the high level of ingenuity and ‘jugaad’ everyone came up with in their solutions and the intra-batch interactions which made us comfortable with each other. The icing on the cake was ‘Mumbai Darshan’ journey that was embarked upon by the entire batch, braving the torrential rains, one day before the classes were to begin.

Finally, the dawn emerged where we all rushed to attend the first class of our B-School journey. For me, personally, after three years of corporate life this would mean a dawn of a new life. However, before that we needed to triumph the task of eating the hostel mess breakfast and climbing NITIE’s famous ‘96 steps’. Nevertheless, the first lecture taken by Professor Prasad a.k.a. ‘Dr. Mandi’ totally made it worth it. He brought with him a fresh perspective on learning and innovation. His concepts of ‘Becho Seekho, Seekho Socho, Socho Becho’ and ‘Aaj ki roti aaj hi kamana’ inspired the latent entrepreneurs in all of us.

At NITIE, each class is unique and each faculty is a distinguished member in their area of expertise. It is our privilege to study under such experts. The assignments and case studies given to us by them have already started transforming our thinking from an engineer’s perspective to a manager’s perspective.

It has only been one week but I have started feeling NITIE like a home away from home and am sure many of my peers would be feeling the same. I am proud to be a part of an amazing set of talented individuals that NITIE beckons every year. Special thanks to the senior batch that was always there to quell all our doubts earnestly and patiently and guide us in the right direction. They have surely inspired me to lend a helping hand to the junior batch that will arrive next year and make NITIE even better than it is now, in the coming two years.

We all know life at any B-School is often compared to that of a roller coaster ride. There are zeniths of happiness and deepest of lows to be encountered in these two years. The first week has been just a glimpse of what is in store for us in the coming two years.

As it is so often said ‘It is the journey that matters, not the destination’, looking forward to make this journey as memorable as possible.