I found an interview article (Nikkei Cross Tech 5/19) with Mr Yukio Sakamoto, the former president of Elpida Memory.
Before moving to Elpida, Mr Sakamoto got the first full-scale foundry business in Japan as the president of Japan Foundry.
Q: In the first place, it has been said that Japanese people are better at productivity and quality control of the manufacturing process than the imagination of coming up with products. I think it was initially suitable for foundries, but how was it?
A: Ethnicity doesn't matter. Instead, I think it is a matter of management power.
Even if the Japanese work, the yield will not increase if the factory is left alone. The management must grasp the situation and decide what measures to take.
By the time Mr Sakamoto entered the Japan Foundry, he seemed to have fixedly stuck people to many places on the production line and left them as they were.
"Abandoned state" is a familiar scenery often seen in various factories in Japan.
Isn't "leave it to the worker" or "unmanaged state" synonymous?
Improving yields and reducing person-hours are important management points that we should manage every day on the production line, but how many sites are in trouble every day without going that far.
In addition, since daily trouble handling is becoming a norm, it is my job to solve it.
Various things break out every day at the factory.
Try hitting it like a mole; when the mole retracts, it will spurt out from another hole.
I want to do this only for the moment of the initial flow, but in reality, there are many workplaces where it becomes a fixed daily work and a full-time person in charge is assigned.
I'm tired of thinking that troubleshooting is a daily task.
Even in the mole-hitting game, the number of mole holes does not increase.
Various things seem to break out every day, but if you crush the problem from the root, the mole will never come out, and the holes in the mole will not increase.
It seems that there was no one in the Japan Foundry at that time who could manage the manufacturing site daily.
It seems that even the yield, the most crucial index that influences the productivity of semiconductor factories, was not in a steady-state.
Mr Sakamoto immediately said, "Let's review the yield every day," He started doing it every day with his participation.
It is not something the president should do, but no one from the staff at the site was willing to manage the yield, despite the thick management layer of chiefs, section chiefs, department managers, and vice presidents.
We talk daily about why the yield is so low, where the problem is, and why it went up and down compared to yesterday. It's essential to do it every day.
It is recommended to use why and why daily.
Initially, nothing is challenging to do daily management steadily.
If you continue every day, the staff who could not answer anything at first will gradually be able to raise the problems they noticed through measurement and observation trial and error.
A thought circuit of why and why is created in the brain.
Everyone gradually becomes aware of where and what factors influence yields, what happens to them and how they affect yields.
It is training rather than education.
Mr Sakamoto also understands the importance of education and training.
It is only an illusion that "Japanese people are better at productivity and quality control of the manufacturing process than the imagination of coming up with products".
Instead, it's a big mistake to put someone in an important post who doesn't want to do new things, just thinking about their self-protection.
As the president of Japan Foundry, Mr Sakamoto first succeeded in improving productivity.
He then proposed a scale-up of some of Japan's major electronics manufacturers to compete with Korean and Taiwanese companies in terms of cost.
The proposal "Why don't you make a big foundry in Japan with a joint venture system in which Taiwan UMC (Taiwan UMC) invests half, and some major Japanese electrical equipment manufacturers invest the other half?" is.
At the planning staff level, we got approval.
However, I was asked to ask Mr Sakamoto to propose to the president.
The planning staff is not doing their job either. I got a hint of an important proposal, so why didn't I take it to the top as my proposal?
Specifically, in addition to Sharp, he talked with NEC and Sony.
Even for the Japanese foundry, if they can make Sony chips, it will be a great source of profit. So it was an obvious idea.
The president agreed that it was a good idea.
The next day, the president called me directly and said I would like to move forward.
I was instructed to talk to him because I will be in charge of the vice president in charge of technology.
However, the vice president says that although it is an excellent idea, let's proceed slowly.
Contrary to the feeling of talking with the president, the atmosphere is not very optimistic.
I had an unpleasant feeling that this would not move forward, but as expected, they didn't realize the investment from that company.
Next, let's move on to the story of the Elpida era.
When people above the department come to the office in the morning, the first thing to do is slowly start reading the newspaper while drinking the tea they had made.
Then I start working. And after 5 p.m., I quickly leave work and go out for a drink or go home.
Even though it is a semiconductor industry that catches the eye of living horses, it was easy to see only them, and it was like a paradise.
There were more than ten hierarchies, including business division managers, deputy division managers, department managers, deputy managers, and section managers.
Of course, decision-making and communication will be slower. For example, you can't start a product development plan without passing through a thick document like a phone book.
At one point, there was something like this.
I called the sales manager and asked, "What's happening with the customer companies here and there?"
I call the deputy general manager because the general manager does not understand.
When the deputy general manager arrives, he calls the general manager, saying he still doesn't understand.
The manager calls the section chief, and even if the chief comes, he does not know.
It wasn't until the section chief called the top class that he had the information I wanted.
I thought this would not help, so from November when I joined the company to January of the following year, I carried out organizational reforms and reorganization of executives.
Many of the executives who did nothing were returned to their parent company.
I often hear in Asian countries that if you don't give a bribe, you won't be able to work, but this story was about Japan.
I just heard that the semiconductor industry was forced out of business due to the trade friction between Japan and the United States.
However, I can only think that they crushed to crush.
On-site staff who do not know how to increase productivity.
Managers, section chiefs, general managers, and vice presidents cannot explain what their subordinates are doing.
Does anyone in your organization do nothing like this?
No, they are people who do nothing but destroy the company just by being there.
There was a word that could perfectly describe such a person with four letters.
"Wuwei food"
Last but not least, it is only an illusion that "Japanese people are better at productivity and quality control of the manufacturing process than the imagination of coming up with products".
Anyone can do it if they have the motivation.
The answer to Mr Sakamoto's interview is precisely this.
Ethnicity doesn't matter. Instead, I think it is a matter of management power.
Even if the Japanese work, the yield will not increase if the factory is left alone. The management must grasp the situation and decide what measures to take.
Corporate coaching works on this management power = top management rather than on-site kaizen management.
Understand what top management should do and share it internally in an easy-to-understand manner.
The full policy sets a high level of abstraction that includes what employees want to do.
It will increase collective efficacy, and everyone will start moving.
The importance of eradicating moles,
We also realize the importance of daily yield management (daily management).
You can also see the vice president who understands the president's policy as his task and starts moving quickly.
(But it's a pitiful vice president to return.)
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