Word: saturn
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From that blueprint grew the most radical twist in Saturn's labor agreement, one that is even more democratic than the Japanese model: the provision for consensus decision making. The Saturn philosophy is that all teams must be committed to decisions affecting them before those changes are put into place, from choosing an ad agency to selecting an outside supplier. "That means a lot of yelling sometimes, and everything takes a lot longer," says U.A.W. official Jack O'Toole, who oversees Spring Hill personnel, "but once they come out of that meeting room, they're 100% committed...
...Saturn's workers were recruited from U.A.W. locals in 38 states and carefully screened. By accepting a job at Saturn, they gave up their rights ever to work for any other GM division. Instead of hourly pay, they work for a salary (shop-floor average: $34,000), 20% of which is at risk. Whether they get that 20% depends on a complex formula that measures car quality, worker productivity and company profits. In the company's first year, employee salaries will depend largely on car quality. If a team produces fewer defects than the targeted amount, its members will receive...
...result is that Saturn has attracted a younger, more entrepreneurial crew / than other GM divisions. The average age of a Saturn worker is 38, vs. 43 for the whole company. Saturn's work force is 20% female, slightly higher than the portion at GM as a whole. Many workers say they were drawn by the prospect that Saturn could compete on an equal footing. "The thing that most interested me was the idea that we could beat the Japanese. That's why I came here," says James Archibald, 34, a line worker in body fabrication, who pulled up stakes...
...people skills are not Saturn's only strong point. Since they were outfitting a plant from the ground up, Saturn's team members incorporated an array of new equipment and techniques. Their aim was to achieve what the M.I.T. study dubbed "lean production," the Japanese system that uses "half the human effort in the factory, half the manufacturing space, half the investment in tools, half the engineering hours to develop a new product." At Saturn, team members rejected the traditional U.S. form of assembly line, where workers do two things at once -- toil and shuffle -- as they struggle to keep...
...product contains several innovative features as well, including 54 patented inventions. Some are subtle: electronic controls for the automatic transmission that allow smoother shifting. Others are more fundamental: the body of a Saturn is built atop a very rigid space frame, which gives structural integrity and protection for passengers. The space frame is not unique to Saturn, but it supports a special feature: all the vertical body panels (doors, fenders, quarter panels) attached to it are made of plastic polymer, which doesn't rust and resists low-velocity denting. The horizontal panels are still made of steel...