Counter-Productive Organization in Acme, Essay Example

Having applied effort to the Business Process Improvement (BPI) game, a wide variety of problems are identified with virtually every facet of the ACME operation, in regard to its arrangement with the United Box Company (UBC).  It seems that the systems in place, while created to expedite accuracy in ordering, payment, and shipping, actually impede efficiency.  Poor organization is evident throughout the unnecessarily complex system, which in turn goes to further issues in actual job performance.  To begin with, the process in place is marked by a grossly inefficient use of personnel, and at all levels.  Managers, for example, have far more to do than the workers they supervise, and the unequal workload distribution blocks the operation. This inequality of workload has negative effects on both levels; the workers, lacking the responsibility to address problems, are left with even less to do because the overloaded managers cannot find the time to solve the problems. Conversely, the managers’ duties to supervise and problem-solve are not performed because they lack the time.  Skills are wasted, in short, because there is a reversal of responsibility. Linked to this is that the managers’ time is further wasted by duplicate processes.  Sections 3 and 11, for example, are essentially the same as Sections 2 and 10, so the former Sections are either ignored or performed unnecessarily.  Poor organization is also evident in the redundancy of Sections 1 and 6, which in turn goes to an excessive workload in Sections 7 and 11.  ACME appears to have focused on checkpoints, but neglected the reality of how these actually waste time in repeating steps already taken, and which may be approved by managers initially.

Within this scenario of inefficiency, other issues present themselves. Likely owing to the poor organization, there is no cohesion within the workforce; each person acts independently and does not take any real sense of responsibility for their performance.  This lack of motivation may be due to poor or non-existent training, as the workers seem to have little idea of both what they are expected to do and how to execute the work properly.  No matter the cause, however, no work ethic is apparent, and this connects to severe issues in communication.  Workers, managers, and customers are frustrated by communication in which no party has any clear sense of how problems arise or how to solve them, and responsibility is then perpetually passed on to others. As few managers or workers are able to identify where the errors occur, productivity is literally stalled and customer satisfaction remote at best. What occurs is a cycle of mistakes requiring address, which completely stalls the business process itself.  Put another way, the poor organizational structure, and absence of employee training and supervision, create problems exponentially; motivation is non-existent because the process does not work, which in turn leads to unsatisfactory communication.

It must be noted as well that the process suffers from antiquated tools and a lack of efficient technology.  Actual paperwork is used, rather than computer systems, so there is both greater opportunity for human error and an enormous waste of time.  The slowness of these processes then negatively impacts on the already unsuccessful functioning. Not surprisingly, it is also then seen that mismatching of kazoos and the appropriate boxing occurs frequently, which then creates further confusion and resources wasted in seeking to correct the errors.  As noted, then, and in every aspect of the ACME business process, each form of inefficiency promotes issues which generate other problems.  Redundant systems, poor training, and irrational worker distribution combine to create a process virtually assured of failing, managers too burdened with menial tasks to properly address the issues, and little to no employee motivation.

Business Process Improvement (BPI) Game.  ACME Manufacturing. 2015, PDF file.