Just in Time

IJOPM 15,11

62

Employee reactions to JIT manufacturing practices: a two-phase investigation

S. Mullarkey, P.R. Jackson and S.K. Parker

Institute of Work Psychology, The University of Sheffield, UK

Introduction It is widely suggested that the adoption of just-in-time (JIT) leads to marked improvements in an organization’s competitiveness and ability to respond to rapid fluctuations in market demand. JIT incorporates a variety of manufacturing practices that involve fundamental changes to the nature and management of shopfloor work. The implications of these changes for production employees are currently a matter of considerable controversy. In this article we examine these implications, and describe an empirical investigation, carried out within an electronics company in the East Midlands (UK), of the effects of a two-phase introduction of JIT manufacturing practices on the perceptions of changes in the content of work and psychological wellbeing of shopfloor employees. JIT manufacturing practices JIT is an approach to manufacturing based on waste reduction and rapid response to customer demand. Unlike traditional forms of manufacturing, where fabrication or assembly takes place on the basis of materials availability, JIT is a “pull” system of manufacturing where production only takes place when there are requirements from downstream operations and specific demands from external customers. Thus, a major aim of JIT is to “produce and deliver finished goods just in time to be sold, subassemblies just in time to be assembled into finished goods, fabricated parts just in time to go into subassemblies, and purchased materials just in time to be transformed into fabricated parts”[1]. Core elements of JIT focus on streamlining production flow, and eliminating waste in materials and labour through substantial reductions in work in process (WIP), standardization of work methods and elimination of all forms of nonvalue added operator activities, such as rework,...