First of all, after previously having stuck with IE, I installed Google Chrome at the start of this unit. Besides IE, I have some experience with Firefox and Safari but they had not convinced me to switch. After only 1½ weeks with Google Chrome, I am a convert. In particular, I like the apps and extensions available.

Up to now, my techniques for keeping my work organised have been pretty traditional with folders on my computer that I back up to the school network. Once I have backed up the folders to the network, I can access them via the Internet. This works quite well, but I will now make more use of Evernote and have also started using Dropbox. Is Dropbox included in the content of the course? By the way, here is the link to my first ever Evernote.

I save my web links in folders in “Favorites” in Internet Explorer. I keep them in reasonably well organised folders. I have been aware that this is neither efficient nor “social”, but for some reason I had not allowed myself the time to “get into” Diigo or other social bookmarking tools. Doing this unit has made me make a commitment to change my habits. However, I am still somewhat undecided between using Diigo, or just sticking to Evernote for everything. I am leaning towards just using Evernote. Why would I use two different tools, when Evernote can do it all?

Teaching workflow and organisation techniques to students is vitally important and needed. Most of our students are unorganised and have notes, links, documents etc “all over the place” and seem to struggle. They waste much time by looking through folders to find the right version of the right document. Often, they seem to have forgotten that the most recent version of a document is on the computer at home, and cannot be accessed from school. Some of them are learning to use tools like Dropbox or Google Drive, but the majority of them struggle or rely on carrying USB memory sticks, which are frequently lost. I think we have a job in teaching our students the skills required.

Digital technologies have changed the way we work and organise ourselves. We can work from anywhere, as long as we make use of web tools effectively. Most of us are still learning to do this. We need to make time for this learning, to be able to work “smarter”.
I am now looking forward to a 4-day Easter weekend, and I will spend some of this time doing Unit 3 of the course.

Happy Easter!

This was back when I could see huge skills gaps in the logistics sector. Being an industrial engineer, I knew about advances in manufacturing management and how these had not yet been taken up in logistics operations. What I knew little about, at that time, were social and organisational theories; and in particular social network theory. I’d figured out from my time in industry and other experiences that whilst conventional organisations have formal reporting and decision making structures, there’s a whole lot of work that gets done below the radar. I reckoned that people are good at working around the inefficiencies of management structures and systems, and witnessed this through my socio-technical research.

What I’ve since realised is that I was focusing on the micro issues; doing research that aimed to enable individual workers to operate more autonomously and effectively. This was, and still is a noble pursuit, but it will never tackle the wider organisational constraints and not provide wholesale solutions. In fact a new, more senior colleague, has been pleading with me to look at the bigger picture; the political economy perspective. So I’ve changed tack (and so will this blog).

My research focus is now very much on the social networks that enable productive work in organisations and across supply chains. I have a series of research projects that will seek to uncover what those networks look like, how they influence their organisations, and most importantly how they can be leveraged to improve the flow of goods across global supply chains to keep us consumers happy. There’s still a big technological dimension to this, and I’ll continue to blog about the impact of technologies on our lives; but as my research focus sharpens, I’ll bring more reflections from my research into this blog. This is a work in progress, but hopefully something worthwhile will come from it.

Nevertheless, we can’t escape the fact that different demographics in society, whether they are in the real or virtual worlds, have different weltanschauungen (world views). These impact how we live and work. What we must increasingly learn to appreciate is that the conventional spaces in which we live and work are no longer fit-for-purpose. Digital natives are the demongraphic who grew up surrounded by digital technology and seemly cannot live without it. As this new breed now are entering the workforce we are beginning to see changes to the spaces in which we live and work. Infrastructure such as the proposed National Broadband Network in Australia, and enabling technologies like smartphones are becoming fundamental to our well-being and productivity.

With different colleagues, I’ve researched knowledge workers in supply chains and social media users in society, and we’re seeing patterns of information technology use evolving at a rapid rate in both business and society. I’m increasingly asked to make predictions about “where this will all end”. The simple answer is it won’t. My fundamental point is it’s evolution, not revolution.  Business, society and the technologies used have continually evolved over time – think about the impacts of the wheel, the printing press, the steam engine. The key difference today is that it’s now happening at such a rapid rate, few of us can keep up. Those who will lead us through the 21st century will be those who can cut through the complexities of a rapidly changing world, maintain the equilibrium between society and technology, and use it for betterment.

My interest in franchising is the issue of replication. What each of these businesses need to understand before they begin franchising is what makes them successful where they are today. The thing is, their operations are each founded on people-oriented processes. The small outlet advertising for franchisees is a classic example of how to offer a quality product wrapped in excellent service, but they do it through long established, well-rehearsed routines done by the same people over many years. They’re family too. Working in a confined space they overlap a lot, but each know their roles and can step in for each other as and when is needed. There’s a status quo, and being family helps maintain it. The problem I foresee is replicating this elsewhere. The way I see it, they need to replicate every aspect of their operation for customers to get the same experience. And being so dependent on having the right people, working together in the operation will be their greatest challenge.

McDonalds are one of the best examples of how to reap the rewards of franchising, and the key to their success is not just replication, but also repetition. What McDonalds did from the very beginning was to set up standard operating procedures in their kitchens and service counters that ensure that we pretty much have the same experience wherever we are in the World. The next time you’re in a McDonalds, take a look around; they have the same layouts, equipment, packaging and products. It means they can deliver high volume, low cost, quality products at high speed without having to employ highly skilled staff. The jobs people do in McDonalds are simple and discrete. Similar things happen at the small business above, but I bet its not well documented because their skilled staff know theirs jobs like the backs of their hands. What they’ve got to do is document every little thing that makes their operation tick. Then they can break down the tasks and know what to replicate and what needs to be repeated time after time, for any franchise to look exactly like what they do today. Acquiring and training the right people will also be fundamental. This I think is simple in principle but not necessarily so easy to put into practice. We’ll see if it can be done.

Our demand for a wider choice of products in higher volumes on the high street has driven manufacturers to outsource and ‘offshore’ their production plants to low cost economies. Labour will always be the highest cost in any business, so if firms can keep it to a minimum, they can achieve significant cost savings to increase profit margins or (more likely) to offer products at lower and more competitive prices. This has led to the current trend in global manufacturing and supply chain management, with markets in the west and factories in the east. China has long been viewed as a low cost economy, with factories clustered in various regions to mass produce products ranging from socks to electronics. Yet now with a better educated workforce, new knowledge and fast learning, Chinese manufacturing is moving up the value chain. With such a vast population of people seeking employment, manufacturers are able to drive down wages whilst increasing productivity, and now innovation. China is not alone. India and other eastern economies are also prime locations for today’s manufacturers.

We must face the facts; globalisation and demand for new and innovative products are driving intense competition between retailers and manufacturers. Low cost manufacturing is apparently here to stay and consumerism is the root cause. I see this as a significant issue. The Foxconn suicides may well prove to be the start of things to come, with more workers being driven to extremes to escape the intense working conditions they find themselves in that are in place to keep the price of our iPads down. It is only a matter of time before there is an escalation of such incidents or revolts and protests by factory workers; unless we seek to tackle the issue.

I see two potential solutions: 1) The focal firms in their supply chains (such as Apple and Dell) take responsibility and aim to work with their suppliers to improve working practices and focus less on cost and more on other competitive factors. 2) We consumers change our buying habits. Rather than continue to increase our demands, we seek to reduce them. Neither of these approaches are easy, and they certainly won’t happen overnight. However, what is for sure is that we need to take responsibility for the current state of manufacturing.

An article by Fiona Tam in the South China Morning Press on May 29th talked about the “regimented lifestyle” at such factories being out of step with this new generation of workers. There was a time when young Chinese workers would leave their rural communities to seek a better income to ultimately return home one day. They were willing to work hard in their early years for a better life later. Today’s workers are however now better educated and looking for something different. Their worldview is much wider, and they have already been exposed to much more of the world beyond their hometowns, and want it for themselves. So living and working in such intensive environments when they reach the big city far from meets their expectations of a better life.

Fiona goes on to discuss how factories in Guangdong operated by Hong Kong- and Taiwan-based firms were not too dissimilar not so long ago, but their working practices have improved to adopt the latest thinking in operations management. Yet why is it that just up the road in Shenzhen, and in so many other corners of China, manufacturers are not doing the same from the start? Is it that workers have (until now) accepted such working conditions, so why not just implement the most cost effective solutions? Is it that there is such intense competition amongst manufacturers that they have to drive down cost to stay in business? Is it that their customers place those cost pressures on them? (How do you think your iPad was able to be so affordable?) Or is it that we consumers want so many of the latest and greatest products that such intensive production plants are necessary for supply to meet demand? These are questions I’ll aim to address in my next blogpost. Whatever the answer is though, such working environments are not sustainable.

Well there’s a good chance it was made in the Shenzhen factory of the world’s largest electronics manufacturer Foxconn. You may not have heard of Foxconn until the past couple of weeks, but now they are making headlines.

Foxconn employs 300,000 people at it’s Shenzhen plant in southern China. On May 29th, the South China Morning Post reported that there had been 13 suicide attempts at the huge complex since January. The question everyone is asking is why.

In a short series of blogposts I’m planning to examine the sustainability of such production plants and their working practices to maintain our insatiable desire for the latest and the greatest products. In my next blogpost, I’ll look at living and working in the Foxconn compound in Shenzhen, and what drove those workers to such drastic acts. I’ll then turn my attention to the wage rises announced by Foxconn this week, seemingly in response to recent events. And finally, I’ll ask who’s responsible for all of this, and why it couldn’t have been prevented.

I left school at 16 to take a four-year engineering apprenticeship. I had no desire to go to university, nor was it expected of me. During my apprenticeship I could have taken one of two paths: mechanical engineering (design & testing) or manufacturing engineering (making). Being a practical kinda guy (i.e. I’m not good at Maths) I followed the latter. Working in machine shops, assembly lines and flight sheds, my interest in how things are made was fueled (it was first ignited playing with Lego as a kid).

I later went to University to study manufacturing engineering further (that’s part of the story anyway). I spent 4 years learning about business process reengineering and Japanese manufacturing techniques. What really captured my imagination was how work was organised and jobs designed. I also became interested in information systems like ERP. I was now sure that I wanted to work in the automotive sector on process improvement (although there was good money to be made as an ERP consultant back then). Fortunately I didn’t get into the car industry (the UK automotive sector is not as healthy as it once was). Instead I was invited to stay on at uni to take on a doctorate.

As before, I’d not considered continuing my studies, but faced with not having found a ‘proper’ job, I grabbed the opportunity. This was where I first began to think about the foundations of my thinking around manufacturing, work and technologies. I was in an engineering school where the main school of thought was based on improving operational performance following Taylor’s principles of scientific management. This is what much of modern operations management thinking is built upon. Indeed the highly commended Toyota production system can trace it’s roots back to the Taylorist way of thinking. I’d been trained to think in the same way, always seeking improvement. It was only when my experiments with IT at the shopfloor began to throw up unexpected results that I began to question Taylorism (I also questioned my methodology and its epistemology, but I’ll save that debate for another day). I then discovered socio-technical systems theory, which I’ve discussed before. I found it could help me to explain all those intangibles you get when you’re implementing IT in the real world (which was basically what I’d been doing).

After I completed my doctorate, I took up my first academic post at Hull University and two shifts in my thinking occurred: firstly I moved away from manufacturing and into logistics and supply chain management (long story short); and secondly I was working alongside systems thinkers. Although I never quite got into their inner circle, they helped me realise that I too was a systems thinker, I just hadn’t realised it. So I continued to research the impact of technologies on work and jobs “through a socio-technical lens”, but now in the logistics and supply chain context, and with my eyes open to other schools of thought.

Researching supply chains, I began to realise that that particular area of research is mostly tackled from a particular perspective, where to explain complex systems such as global supply networks, we use simplified models. Yet, as a few other researchers have also pointed out, supply chains are highly contextual. The problem with research in this area is the desire by most supply chain researchers to draw out the commonalities and define one best way of designing and managing them. I wasn’t comfortable with this; there are too many intangibles that are currently neglected. So I discovered structuration theory (note: I’ve never studied sociology), which would appear to explain the differences inherent in different contexts.  I’m therefore now exploring its potential for application to supply chains, to see if we can get away from the conventional reductionist thinking and embrace the complexity.

The point of this post was to reflect on and share my journey. I probably always thought this way, but didn’t realise it at first, and was diverted a little along the way. But that was a good thing. It’s crucial to see things from both sides. Not every academic takes a ‘journey’, but instead some stay firmly within their comfort zone. My issue has been that the job I did at the shopfloor when I was 16 cannot be easily explained through the theories I was first exposed to when I first went to uni. I’ve therefore had to begin my journey in seeking to turn some of those intangibles into tangibles. My journey certainly isn’t over yet, and I don’t yet know where it’ll take me. I do, however, look at the world differently.

I use this diagram to sum up what it is I research.

Short-term adversarial transactions (e.g. bulk buying) are certainly not sustainable, and many retail supply chains now realise this. Yet sustaining long-term collaborative relationships is not easy, with shifting market demands and the availability and competitiveness of alternative sources. So I’m planning to explore the nature of contemporary buyer-seller relationships, how their work is organised, how their jobs are designed, and what technologies are used. I have an idea about the sort of inclusive and autonomous organisations necessary, but we’ll see what the research reveals in the coming year. In the meantime, if you are involved in procurement or are a supplier, I’m really keen to hear from you about your experiences.

Ou plan just to remind you all is to have the Zimbabwe story finished by now, which Lana has  done! Then for tomorrow the story by Cairen and Tammy on other things to do in G town etc…

We are still working on the X story for a much later stage, and Lana is working on the Outrhodes story too for a new angle.

Thanks

so i’ve made a new blog, basically the same as this one

that one will be our public blog

just so we dont have all our internal meetings and ideas and stuff on the actual blog

it seems easier to just have 2 different blogs than to try and seperate them

so we keep talking on here

but the other one is our actual blog with pictures and articles etc

the adress is http://www.1one1andall.wordpress.com

hope everyone is okay with that

will add you all as admins as well

For those of you who couldn’t make the meeting, all is sorted. We discussed our civic map and have designated sections to people, so will be done by Thursday. We have decided that Illana, Cairen, tammy and Mzo will be reporters and researchers. Whilst Kelly and I will be editors, photographers(where needed), marketers and help the rest of you know what story is due when k?

thanks guys

cheers

Tam

and then everyone can just reply with what they basically want

just to see how this works…