Garment Assembly Case Study Business Plans Examples

Introduction

Garment assembly involves several detailed processes through which an item of clothing goes through for it to be a finished product. Industries involved in this type of business must follow the set standards to capitalize on the quality of their clothing. Sewing personnel have to be professionals who are well trained on the job with knowledge of the various processes, techniques and stages of garment assembly to reduce on the production costs. Specialized machines may be used in garment assembly as well as human labor. Laborers and professionals should have adequate knowledge of the machine parts and the various ways of operating them to create different sewing designs. Processes like putting of buttons and folding the clothing can be done manually by laborers (Jacobs, 2006).
Productivity in the work situation is a major contributing factor towards the business achieving its main goal. Efficiency in productivity will directly affect the profitability of a business thus increasing its competitiveness in the industry. As productivity increases the volume of wastage is also deemed to reduce so since processes are efficiently carried out. Managers and supervisors through the help of employees can implement certain changes to increase productivity which will in turn reduce wastage. Controlling the number of working hours in the work place, this will greatly increase production since the workers will have a time controlling schedule which they will follow to perform their tasks. This helps workers to concentrate on a specified task fully at a given time allowing workers to contribute efficiently in production. This will reduce amount of wastage considerably. Advocating for time off work in between working hours helps workers take a rest and resume work with fresh minds. A set timetable should also incorporate these time offs for increased production (Stevenson, 2005).
Workers should be taken through trainings through which they are taught on the basics of assigning themselves tasks depending with on their urgency, time consumption and hardness. These tasks should be performed when their minds are fresh and mostly assigned in the morning hours. This will increase efficiency in their work thus reducing on amount of rejects. It would be advisable to also train workers on how they can assess themselves on their daily performance for specific tasks. For those tasks they tend to perform poorly should be advised on how to better them e.g. by making sure they undertake them when their minds are fresh. Executive management should also help them by giving incentives where need be (Jacobs, 2006).
Workers should be advised on the pros and cons of concentration at their places of work. Any interruptions that will deter this should be communicated. Phone calls that aren’t necessarily emergency and not work related should be discouraged to ensure time management and proper concentration during work, where they are advised to keep them pending until there time offs. Strict controls should be put in place for media access at the work place. Internet should be controlled and accessible only for work related sites. It is also important to inform workers on the discipline that is to be maintained at the work place so as to increase production and reduce wastage.
As a fact absenteeism reduces production and slows businesses development goals. To account for this certain measures have to be in place to increase morale of employees and cube absenteeism. A policy can be put in place on how employee evaluation and ranking is done so as to measure employee performance and offer rewards to those who have performed well. This process should be open and not biased so as to increase healthy competition among employees thus increasing their morale. Workers can fail to attend work due to various factors, maintaining a close and good relationship with them will help them to open up on issues they may be facing. Understanding your workers can help a great deal in reducing absenteeism. Giving them days off work to enable them catch up with their social life will reduce their absenteeism and increase their morale on the days they are working. Encouraging employees to share their work related goals and help each other on attaining them where they become personally liable in fulfilling them. Workers will want to have a good picture in front of their peers and this increases their morale. Big tasks are often seen as a no go zone by workers, to encourage employees to take up these tasks rewards should be offered to those who take up these tasks. Management can take up the responsibility of changing the wage payment patterns. To motivate workers they can be paid on hourly basis depending on the volume and efficiency of work done (Stevenson, 2005).
In the situation under study the workers were following some set processes which professionals had set up which entailed hourly payments to the workers. The workers were trained and assigned on the processes that they were to follow. Hourly payment terms brought about issues of garment wastage and creating the attention of the managers. Managers decided to change this system by informing workers to assemble garments independently from start to the finished product. Workers readily accepted this change on the basis that they comfortably fit in the situation. Workers were in control of the whole process and they fit in quickly into the system. Sometimes change is as good as a rest, the effects of this change positively productivity by increasing it and drastically reducing the amount of wastage. Workers became more productive after adopting the new changes implemented by managers. Since each worker was assigned an entire piece of garment he or she became more involved in the processes and individually entitled themselves with the end products. This increased their morale at work and reduced on wastage (Jacobs, 2006).

Conclusion

Various factors affect the productivity of workers in an organization and its upon managers to keep on reviewing business processes to identify and make changes that they may deem effective. High productivity allows a business to perform highly increasing their profitability and competitive levels. Determinants like workers morale, absenteeism and wastage should be considered to optimize on productivity. For a garment assembly industry to realize its goal as a business these aspects must be taken into consideration addressed in every process in order to increase productivity.

References

Chase, R. B., & Jacobs, F. R. (2006). Operations management for competitive advantage.
Boston:McGraw-Hill/Irwin.
Stevenson, W. J. (2005). Operations management. Boston: McGraw-Hill.