A Tale of Two Factories

A Tale of Two Factories

1. Identify the differences in the processes of the 2 factories, addressing labour relations, safety, amount of automation, methods, costs, etc.

Tenneco, maker of auto parts firm which is located in Shanghai, China and Litchfield, Michigan. The Shanghai plant has 275 people working in 2 shifts with each worker working for 8 hours per day. The firm produces 400,000 exhaust systems in a year and they provide it to GM, Volkswagen, and Peugeot and to Chery, a local manufacturer. The plant depends on 57 suppliers out of which 33 suppliers are from local.

The Tenneco firm which is located in Litchfield, Michigan has 324 people who working in 3 shifts. This plant earns 3 times better than the plant which is located in Shanghai. In this plant, the production will starts with a 30min production meeting with engineers.

In the Shanghai plant, the relationship among the worker and supervisor is diplomatic in nature. The plant is very dirty, the workers wear jumpsuits in plant; the firm wants to provide the protective glasses, steel toed shoe, etc. and take care about the cleanliness of plant but it is very hard to implement practically.

In the Litchfield plant, the workers are smart, actively participate in the production plant and reduce the bottle neck to be more competitive in the market. The plant is clean comparatively Shanghai plant. If they found any defect in production, they immediately fix it before production starts.

The Shanghai plant has very less automation system and depends on labour but the Litchfield plant has semi-automated. The production cost labour is 1 percent in Shanghai but in Litchfield plant, it is 12 percent.

2. Discuss the differences in life circumstances of the workers.

In the Shanghai plant, Pu Chaunming married couple workers who live in a small single bedroom rental apartment and they travel to work by bicycle. They were not able to feed their own children due to more working hours. They both were getting about $1.56 per hour but still they think like their future is safe. Zhang Yiqi, a 26 year old bachelor