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Since the late 1970’s, in the face of a severe loss of market share in dozens of industries, manufacturers in the United States

admin2010-02-20  51
问题    Since the late 1970’s, in the face of a severe loss of market share in dozens of industries, manufacturers in the United States have been trying to improve productivity and therefore enhance their international competitiveness through cost-cuttig programs. (Cost-cutting here is defining the amount of labor constant. ) However, from 1978 through 1982, productivity -- the value of goods manufactured divided by the amount of labor input -- did not improve; and while the results were better in the business upturn of the three years following, they ran 25 percent lower than productivity improvements during earlier, post-1945 upturns. At the smile, it became clear the harder manufactures worked to implement cost-curling, the more they lost their competitive edge.
   With this paradox in mind, I recently visited 25 companies; it became clear to me that the cost-cutting approach to increasing productivity is fundamentally flawed. Manufacturing regularly observes a "40, 40, 20" rule’ Roughly 40 percent of any manufacturing-based competitive advantage derives from long-term changes in manufacturing structure (decisions about the number, size, location, and capacity of facilities) and in approaches to materials. Another 40 percent comes from major changes in equipment and process technology. The final 20 percent rests on implementing conventional cost-cutting. This rule does not be tried. The well-known tools of this approach --- including simplifying jobs and retraining employees to work smarter, not harder -- do produce results. But the tools quickly reach the limits of what they can contribute.
   Another problem is that the cost-cutting approach hinders innovation and discourages creative people. As Abernathy’s study of automobile manufacturers has shown, an industry can easily become prisoner of its own investment in cast-cutting techniques, reducing its ability to develop new products. And managers under pressure to maximize cost-cutting will resist innovation because they know that more fundamental changes in processes or systems will wreak havoc with the results on which they are measured. Production managers have always seen their job as one of minimizing costs and maximizing out- put. This dimension of performance has until recently sufficed as a basis of evaluation, but it has created a penny-pinching, mechanistic culture in most factories that has kept away creative managers.
   Every company I know that has freed itself from the paradox has done so, in part, by developing and implementing a manufacturing strategy. Such a strategy facturing and implementing a manufacturing strategy. Such a strateg7 focuses on the manufacturing structure and on equipment and process technology. In one company a manufacturing strategy that allowed different areas of the factory to specialize in different markets replaced the conventional cost-cutting approach; -within three years the company regained its competitive advantage. Together with such strategies, successful companies are also encouraging managers to focus on a wider set of objectives besides cutting costs. There is hope for manufacturing, but it clearly rests on a different way of managing.
The author’s attitude toward the culture in most factories is best described as ______.
选项 A、cautious
B、critical
C、disinterested
D、respeciful
答案B
解析 该题问：对大多数工厂的文化气氛，作者持什么态度?A项意为“谨慎的”；B项意为“批评性的”；C项意为“无兴趣的”；D项意为“表示尊敬的”。在本文的第三段中可以找到本题线索：This dimension of performance has until recently sufficed as a basis of evaluation，but it has created a penny pinching，mechanistic culture in most factories that has kept away creative managers，意为“这一评判标准直到最近仍是适用的，不过它却造成了大多数工厂中的斤斤计较的、机械式的文化氛围，这将把有创造性的管理者拒之门外”。可以看出作者是持一种不赞成的负面态度。因此B项为正确选项。
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