Rationalization also Involves Workers — Teamwork in the Mercedes-Benz Lean Concept

At the beginning of the 1990s, at a time when Mercedes-Benz was faced with the problem of how to catch up with Japanese competitors in terms of costs and productivity, the company compared the Japanese working and production model with its own organizational processes and structures. This comparison showed, among other things, that there was a considerable need to reform the way in which work was organized. In a number of respects and contrary to the original intention, the division of labour in production at Mercedes-Benz over the last few decades turned out to be an obstacle to working efficiently and flexibly. Operational sequences were mainly characterized by duplication of effort (e.g. in quality assurance), downtimes which were too long (e.g. machine downtimes), too many delays due to hold-ups in the cycle (resulting from a division of labour which was divided into work cycles which were too rigid) and a lack of flexibility on the part of the workers in general. What is more, due to the division of labour, many workers did not make maximum use of their skills and training.