Coping with World Class Manufacturing

This article reports on a study of shopfloor 'coping' behaviour in an engin eering company which had launched a major 'World Class Manufacturing' (WCM) initiative. The article unpacks the meaning of WCM and shows how its impac t varied markedly between different manufacturing cells. More centrally, it reveals a significant gap between managerial understanding and attitudes t o the new manufacturing and the response found among a significant proporti on of employees. In particular, through a close analysis of employee accoun ts and concerns, it is shown that shopfloor employees, far from viewing ini tiatives such as WCM as panaceas, regard them as disruptions to routines wh ich have somehow to be accommodated. Moreover, the analysis reveals how emp loyee coping behaviour simultaneously allows them to achieve that accommoda tion and enables the shortcomings in the planned initiatives to be at least partly rectified. Coping behaviour therefore both subverts the WCM program me and allows it to function.