Article Critique
The article that is being critiqued is authored by Robert P Duimering, Frank Safayeni, and Lyn Purdy and titled “Integrated Manufacturing: Redesign the Organization before Implementing Flexible Technology”. This article was published in the Sloan Management Review journal in its summer 1993 issue, volume 34, issue 4, pages 47 to 56.
To summarize the main points of the article: the authors of this paper argue that the use of flexible technology in organizations needs to be adopted with caution and pre-planning or they would defeat the very purpose for which they are designed. The authors examine two such technologies: the Just in Time manufacturing system or JIT and the Computer-Integrated Manufacturing or CIM. JIT is a system that was developed by Toyota and makes use of inventory control and simplification of processes. CIM is a completely computer controlled system that makes use of inter-departmental networking and information regulation. The main objective of both these systems is decreasing the throughput time. The authors maintain that although these systems may seem more advantageous when compared to their downsides, the organizations should not adopt these systems blindly without extensive re-organization to suit them and render them more effective. JIT underscores the reduction of variability by generating an environment to make it more manageable, whereas CIM accentuates the handling or management of variability.
I agree with the authors’ contention that managers tend to generally assume that both these systems would not only improve productivity and competitiveness of the manufacturing processes but also enhance the quality of the product, higher integration of the organization and increased responsiveness and flexibility in manufacturing. However this assumption is supported by other authors, such as Kim and Lee
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