Abstract
Why does lean production appear at the beginning of 1990s and how does it resolve some problems associated with the crises of Taylorism and Fordism? What are its main principles? Moreover, what is meant by flux tendu, and in what ways does it vary from the Japanese concept of just-in-time? The chapter shows how work organisations and labour processes change during the last two decades and the new ways in which blue and white collar workers are mobilized. In this new organisation, middle management and supervisors are—like other employees—committed in other working modalities. They sometimes doubt their new functions: they live rather insecurely in their new circumstances.
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- 1.
Flux tendu (tight flow) removes buffers between job stations, workshops and so on. This method transforms profoundly the conditions of production and work (see below) so as to reduce costs in a number of ways. In this book we use flux tendu which could be narrowly interpreted as a synonym for tight flow since both terms could be seen as referring to the same process. However flux tendu is a much broader conception than the idea of ‘tight flow’. It both embraces, yet goes beyond the anglo-saxon meaning of the term lean production in so far as the latter refers almost excusively to production processes with organisational changes while flux tendu accounts for wider social changes including changes to production.
- 2.
To be profitable, flights must have an occupancy of more than 85% (98% for low-cost carriers). To reach these levels, companies use small planes to carry passengers from small and medium-sized towns to their hubs, where travellers are packed into much bigger long-haul planes. Most short or long-haul flights are therefore almost always full. Complex statistical and commercial techniques are used to fill planes by maximising the price that each customer pays. This is called yield management. All these requirements mean that companies organise plane transfers to make them as quick as possible, especially during evening and morning rush hours.
- 3.
By pressed flux tendu, Tiffon is seekitng to highlight the context in which customers in supermarket checkouts press those in front of them to move speedily to complete their various transactions. Broadly, what is occuring is that the customer becomes part of the management process of intensification of working in the supermarket ‘asssembly line’.
- 4.
An obvious pun here is just-in time which could mean just before breakdown, referring both to timing (there are no buffers hence a risk of production shutting down) and the capacities of a constantly decreasing number of employees, some of whom are close to burn out.
- 5.
“The cop is the flow” is an allusion to the very popular slogan of 1968 “the cops are on television” of the General de Gaulle.
- 6.
5S is a Japanese concept calling for an end to waste, the idea being that things should be arranged neatly. It also emphasizes the boons of order, cleanliness and rigour. The method prepares employees for the new rules that management will be applying in much more flexible forms than the orders they used to issue.
- 7.
The french word is ‘savoir-être’ to refer to ‘savoir-faire’ (know how), however ‘how to behave’ is a better term to describe management expectations regarding what it thinks constitutes the ‘correct’ workplace behaviour.
- 8.
Some companies like Amazon (Malet 2013) have gone even further and got employees (including temporary staff) to sign a commitment not to communicate information relating to corporate operations (including working conditions) with the press or any other external body.
- 9.
This might include how, through a similar process, a 360° evaluation—i.e. where individuals are assessed by upstream and downstream peers; by managers; and even by subordinates—has caused a constant reinvention of norms and behaviour to satisfy the imagined expectations of colleagues or senior management. The same could be said about self-appraisal, which at least is not quite as ferocious.
- 10.
“Le Management à distance: nouvelle forme of domination?”, AFS conference (Dujarier 2013).
- 11.
In English this is sometimes refered to as those, especially from a middle-class background who display a sense of entitlement.
- 12.
Technologia’s final report (2010) detailed situations of managerial and employee malaise, offering a subtle analysis of the different ways in which France Télécom employees suffered. This was a first-hand document that is still open to various interpretations. For a conceptual debate about suffering, malaise and psycho-social risk, all of which was covered in texts written around the year 2010, it is worth looking at Vincent de Gaulejac’s (2011) book (pp. 66–71).
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Durand, JP. (2019). Lean Management: The Invisible Revolution. In: Creating the New Worker . Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-93260-6_2
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