Archive for the ‘JM’ Category

JM’m Panki Site wins the JM Human Sustainability Award

Saturday, September 12th, 2009

Our client in India, JM’s Panki plant in Kanpur, has won the group’s Human Sustainability Award. This is indeed a major achievement for Panki site. JM Chief Executive Neil Carson said the following about the rewards: ‘With nearly 90 entries from around the group, all of an exceptionally high standard, judging the Sustainability Awards has been no easy task.’

JM Employees at Panki

JM Employees at Panki

  Tarun Ghoshal, General Manager of the site, wrote the following after having won the award:

 

Empowering a Sustainable Workforce

 

A programme of change in work style and behaviour has transformed the Johnson Matthey site at Panki, India. A workplace that was once characterised by a strong sense of ‘them’ and ‘us’ – the worker / management divide – has now become home to a strong team ethic and commitment to excellence. Productivity at work has increased, hand in hand with a greater emphasis on employee and community wellbeing. This remarkable paradigm shift has earned Panki the 2008/09 Sustainability Award for People. The ethos among employees was previously one of only ‘doing what I was asked to’ – and no more. Working structures were inflexible and the site was noted for its militancy. So when the programme of change was introduced there was initial resistance: people were worried about their jobs and felt that any change must be bad.

A Human Resources module called ‘Care & Growth’ was set up to underpin behavioural change. Everyone was covered, from the managers down to the operators on the shopfloor. Individual accountabilities were determined and everyone accepted their roles and responsibilities. This has been backed up by periodic reviews, counselling where needed and a system of performance based pay increases at all levels. In the past, people were more concerned with what they could get, not what they could give, and the site has moved on from a ‘get’ culture to a sense of ‘give to get’.

Formal training needs are identified through an annual assessment and include skills, behaviour and knowledge training which is delivered either internally or externally. To raise awareness of community issues, the Panki site collaborated with the Central Board of Workers Education in a scheme to get involved with the local community and help tackle their domestic health and safety problems. A special training module on CSR was devised for Panki employees.

A morning meeting is held at the start of every working day, with everyone attending. A calm tone is set by a few moments of yoga and then the operators themselves lead the meeting. The performance of the previous day is discussed, together with the plan for the coming day. The nitty gritty questions of production are covered and tricky issues of incidents, near misses and absenteeism can be raised in a blame-free atmosphere.

Self confidence has soared as operators have begun to take responsibility for their machines and their jobs. So too, has productivity up 37% and 50% at the two plants; while the production of catalyst pellets per man hour has increased by 141%. 

This is altogether a happier workforce where people think in terms of ‘my factory’ and where there has been no disciplinary action for over two years. The health and safety record is robust. With a greater understanding of life, work and the economy, people at Panki are on the road to a sustainable culture of work excellence and selfless giving.

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Care and Growth at JM by Chris Walker

Tuesday, September 8th, 2009
JM Clitheroe

JM Clitheroe

As an overall organisation we didn’t embrace the model from day one (the reality is that we have been at it for ten years now). The site manager at Clitheroe heard about it and then a couple of us who were also based at the site got interested and decided we would do it ourselves. Interestingly, the values and beliefs of the management team at site at the time probably made it easier to introduce the model. However, as with all change the leadership resisted until they grasped and understood the principles (just like any other change process).
 
What didn’t happen at Clitheroe, that in my own experience happened many times with other ICI initiatives, was that the leadership team who saw the benefits of the idea, didn’t cave in to pressure. They continued the journey albeit at times a difficult one (the battle was still uphill) - they were resolute!
 
Often the old ICI culture was institutionalised and this made it easy for managers to just opt out of anything they didn’t initially like. There was no pain if they didn’t move forwards. When there was pain it didn’t last for long (”there would be another initiative along soon”). There was little pleasure for those who did adopt change and not much building on successes by the senior team - the ICI culture lacked accountability in the truest sense!
 
Clitheroe provided a unique opportunity for implementation in that it was largely isolated from the rest of what was then ICI (I guess we took it out of the worst parts of the institution). To a large extent it was the pilot for the rest of the business without any real intent for it to be that way. It was done because it was the appropriate thing to do.
 
The Clitheroe site needed to change and care and growth was one of the vehicles that helped. The site was small enough that the senior team new every individual by name, there were personal relationships that enabled the infiltration of the care and growth programme across the site to be done more effectively. It’s taking a long time and Im pretty sure that’s a good thing (heaven forbid we ever stop working at it).
 
The organisation as a whole came along more slowly and steadily and care and growth wasn’t introduced to the wider organisation with a fanfare. In reality true movement began about four years later. Some of the senior managers at Billingham embraced it because it appealed to their values but for others it has been a similar experience to that of Clitheroe - hard and long.
 
The organisation has moved significantly in implementation of the priciples and in utilising them but we have a way to go before it “really” is the way we do things here. What is heartening is that the senior team are resolute in their support even when they find it difficult.
 
The model in itself in fascinating in that it gives a simple language that everyone from an operator to an MD can understand and engage with. I cant think of any other leadership model that I have engaged with that speaks to all manner of men “its not consultant speak”, it gets to the heart of what being a human is all about (most of the models I remember confused the trainers, let alone the people who were supposed to live and breath the stuff afterward)
 
What is interesting is that universally people cannot and do not argue with the principles that sit behind this model “a leaders job is to give means, ability and hold people appropriately accountable;” - this is unique in my 30 years experience. They don’t necessarily find it easy to live it and breath it every day but they are working at it and that’s as much as can be expected (our role now is to enable them)
 
Final thoughts for now would be to reflect on my personal experience of Schuitema, care and growth et al and to say that although simple in its appearance, the use and embracing of what it is really all about is infinitely complex and yet at the same time infinitely simple! “Do what you can for others and but more importantly do what you can for yourself”

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