Management and Restructuring
There's a text message doing the rounds at the moment;
A Japanese company (Toyota) and an American company (Ford) decided to have a canoe race on the Missouri River. Both teams practised long and hard to reach peak performance before the race, but on the big day the Japanese won by a mile.
The Americans very discouraged and depressed, decided to investigate the reason for their crushing defeat. A management team made up of senior management was formed to investigate and recommend appropriate action. Their conclusion was that the Japanese had 8 people paddling and one person steering, while the Americans had 8 people steering and one person paddling. Feeling a deeper study was in order, the American management hired a consulting company and paid them a large amount of money for a second opinion. The consultants advised, of course, that too many people were steering the boat while not enough people were paddling. Not sure of how to utilze that information, but wanting to prevent another loss to the Japanese, the rowing team's management structure was totally reorganised to 4 steering supervisors, 3 area steering superintendents and 1 assistant superintendent steering manager. They also implemented a new performance system that would give the 1 person paddling the boat greater incentive to work harder. It was called the 'Rowing Team Quality First Programme' with meetings, dinners and free pens for the paddler. There was discussion of getting new paddles, canoes and other equipment, extra vacation days for practices, and bonuses.
The following year the Japanese won by 2 miles.
Humiliated, the American management laid off the paddler for poor performance, halted development of a new canoe, sold the paddles and cancelled all capital investments for new equipment. The money saved was distributed to the Senior Executives as bonuses and the next year's racing team was outsourced - to India.
Sadly, THE END
Here's something else to think about. Ford has spent the last 30 years moving all its factories out of the US, claiming they can't make money paying American wages. Toyota has spent the last 30 years building more than a dozen plants in the US. According to the last quarter's results Toyota made $4 billion profit, while Ford racked up $9 billion in losses. Ford folk are still scratching their heads. If this weren't true, it might be funny.
Sound like any other American company in Nigeria you know?