Читать книгу The Missing Links - Caroline Mondon - Страница 15
ОглавлениеPIERRE PLAYS TOTAL-QUALITY DETECTIVE
Color-Coding Clarifies Non-value-added Flows
BY THE TIME HÉLOÏSE calls Pierre, the retired policeman, he has already been brought up to date by Juliette. He would be only too happy to meet Héloïse. He remembers her perfectly from a wedding in Bretagne some twenty years before, when the whole extended family had come together. He had found her to be quite smart and had been enchanted by her big blue eyes as she sang so beautifully with the other children. His opinion of her was confirmed later in the afternoon when the ten children disappeared, causing panic among the parents. It was he who had questioned the wait staff, before finding the children hiding behind some straw bales in a neighbor’s barn. Héloïse had explained to him that she was looking for the bride’s treasure, and that she had sworn her companions to secrecy.
“If I hadn’t, the treasure would have disappeared,” the young Héloïse explained.
“And why is that?”
“Because you’ll only find it if you believe in it ... and the grown-ups don’t believe in hidden treasures.”
At that time, Pierre had just been promoted to the vice squad and was about to leave his native region of Touraine to live in Paris. This promotion had finally opened the door to the career he had dreamed of. It also meant waiting before he would be able to have children with his young wife. He knew that raising a child properly would be difficult to reconcile with working as a detective. He had promised his wife he would learn the most he could in Paris in two or three years and then apply for a transfer to a quiet police station in a provincial town so that they could raise their children together. He would regret this decision for the rest of his life.
Soon after their move, his wife was assaulted one night on her way home from work. She died two weeks later, but not before having described her attackers to Pierre. They were young hoodlums who had all the characteristics of the typical delinquents of the posh western suburbs of Paris.
Pierre had launched his own investigation, but never found them. What he found instead was how difficult it was to make inquiries in bourgeois circles where people felt themselves to be above the law. He began to specialize more and more in police work that involved so-called “decent” society and ultimately was transferred to the financial-crimes sector. His multiple skills in both vice and financial crime, along with his ability to blend into almost any surroundings, brought him no small measure of success. “There’s an awful lot of money in the dirty laundry that rich families clean in the machines of their enterprises,” he would often say when describing his work to others. Pierre had gained an enviable reputation after many spectacular successes and almost as many cases where the truth could not be revealed for political reasons.
But for some months now, as the time for retirement had come up, he felt sick with a lack of fulfillment. Day after day he paced the floor of the two-room Paris apartment he had lived in for the past twenty years. Juliette’s phone call, full of contradictions and strange details, was intriguing to this man so used to the world of business dealings. It lifted his spirits. What if he pursued his mission, as a private detective, using the techniques he learned in large companies to the benefit of a small business?
He betrayed no hint of his excitement to Héloïse when she called, however, for he had learned to hide his personal feelings behind a veil of professional disinterest.
It is exactly noon when Pierre parks his immaculate car in the oval courtyard of the restaurant—a so-called “troglodyte” one, half-situated in a cave—where Héloïse has asked him to meet her. He has, in fact, just recently purchased his dream: a metallic-blue luxury car—secondhand, of course. For him it was a way to thumb his nose at the rich delinquents he had seen driving similar cars in the past few years. He could have bought a brand new one a long time ago, simply by accepting a fraction of the bribes that were offered to him every year. But he had never been tempted to “go bad.”
Héloïse is alone in the restaurant at this early hour. She has kept an eye out for Pierre from her table and stands up to greet him nervously. She has no memory of this large and solidly built man who offers her his enormous hand. She looks, squinting, at his tired face hidden by metal-framed glasses that are slightly too large for him. She notices the piercing blue eyes behind. Héloïse begins talking before they sit down.
“I think my mother told you ... this is a rather unusual situation, isn’t it?”
No answer. Pierre looks at Héloïse who, fidgeting, has spilt some salt on the tablecloth. She goes on, her voice unsure.
“I can’t believe that anyone in the company would do something reprehensible, but Thierry Ambi’s disappearance is so strange. You’ll have to question the employees, but I don’t know under what pretext, or even whether they’ll talk to you. How to find out where he is? How to get in touch with him again? His family hasn’t contacted us, and we have no way of reaching them. And without their approval, I can’t go to the police. I want to know what’s happened to him in order to explain things to a potential buyer.”
“You want to sell the company,” Pierre says slowly, without the slightest hint of curiosity.
“To sell it or to find someone to run the place. The easiest thing, of course, would be to sell. My mother wants nothing at all to do with the business anymore. My grandmother is elderly, and I think she will soon need to cash in her shares to move into a decent seniors’ home, though she wouldn’t admit it. As for me, I know nothing at all about business. I’ve only agreed to run the place in the interim. I’ve already had to give up some of my musical activities, and I don’t want this to continue for too long. In any case, it is not my profession, and I don’t want to risk the employees losing their jobs because I don’t know how to read a drawing or design furniture.”
“And who says that this isn’t exactly what someone is trying to make you do?”
Héloïse looks startled. “What do you mean, ‘someone’?”
Pierre leans back slightly, and begins to explain in a soft voice. “When you’re trying to come to grips with a new situation—to begin to understand what’s going on—you need to start by considering the extremes.”
He sees Héloïse’s brow wrinkle. “To consider the extremes means to analyze opposites to determine the boundaries of the case. In your case, there are already two that we can look at. Either Thierry Ambi has deliberately put himself in this situation, or he has been forced into it. Within these two scenarios, all sorts of circumstances can be imagined: he’s gone into hiding because he’s committed some kind of fraud; he’s trying to escape from gangsters who are making his family keep quiet; he and his family all died in an accident, and they haven’t been found yet, etc. All the possibilities must be considered with equal rigor. Only evidence will allow us, little by little, to eventually favor one hypothesis over the others.”
Seeing Héloïse’s brow relaxing, Pierre carries on. “I’ve thought about how to investigate these two scenarios simultaneously. I suggest the following. I’ll register with an association of retired business executives, so that I can work openly at H. Rami as a consultant. These days, more and more young retirees want to transmit their experience to younger business people. There’s one such association in your area. As for you, you’ll ask your colleagues which aspects of the business they want to improve and tell them that you’ll be bringing me in as consultant to help you. You will tell me what the expertise is that I’m meant to have, and I’ll read up on it so I can ask questions using the proper vocabulary. I’m used to doing this. Try and find a particular topic that will allow me to stick my nose everywhere and to ask your employees all sorts of questions without arousing their suspicions.”
Héloïse nods, and he continues. “All I ask is that you pay my mileage. My brother lives just south of Tours, and I can stay with him when I need to be at H. Rami for several days in a row. Paul used to run a garage but ended up as a warehouse manager with a big company. He always has room for me.”
“I remember him. He serviced my Fiat 500, years ago.”
“Really? He also found me my new ‘collector’s’ car.” He points at it through the window. “It’s convenient to have a mechanic in the family, isn’t it? In the meantime I will make inquiries about Thierry Ambi’s family and piece together what he was doing over the summer. Using the information that you and your mother gave me, I’ve already learned that he is married to a Canadian and has a seventeen-year-old son. I still have friends on the police force who could point me in the right direction to find out more. Finally, I’ll make some inquiries about the company that he was working for before your father lured him away.”
Héloïse approves in silence.
“You will, of course, let me have access to all the documents at H. Rami that I require, and you will not tell anyone about my real activities under any circumstances. In a month or two, possibly three—but I make no guarantees—you will probably have sufficient information to know whether or not you will ever see Thierry Ambi again. He may, for that matter, simply turn up again on his own. In any case, this gives you the time to start looking for a buyer. But if that comes to pass, you mustn’t kid yourself. Getting a good price for any small business is very hard to do these days.”
Héloïse keeps quiet. She is reassured by the harmonious tone and rhythm of Pierre’s voice. Ever since she began studying music, she has developed one gift more precious than any other: the ability to recognize masters—those who know their subject inside and out—by the way they pitch their voice. She can hear when a voice is the link between heart and brain. Then she knows how to listen and do exactly as that person suggests. Even when she doesn’t understand everything, she knows how to trust and wait until she understands later. This was how she had been able to catch up with several years of music study. She became a professor of music theory at a young age and was respected by everyone in the conservatory— except the director, who felt threatened by any colleagues with outstanding talent.
The rest of their lunch meeting is relaxed. Héloïse is impressed by Pierre’s elegance and amused at the shape of his nose—like a slab of Brie, her grandmother would say fondly. He talks of Touraine wines and of the vineyards themselves, which would be harvested soon. He speaks of the stone—the tuffeau—and the constant temperature of the wine cellars along the Loire. Fascinated by his huge hands, Héloïse wonders which instrument he might have played.
Back at the factory, Héloïse convenes a meeting with the usual management staff and asks Léon, in charge of purchasing, to join them. She remembers that he wasn’t at the previous meeting, even though his role seemed just as important as other people’s.
“I’ve asked you all here today to tell you what I’ve decided to do. As the acting president, and with the support of my grandmother, who is the other shareholder in the company, I have decided to look for a buyer. In the meantime, a consultant will be coming in to help us improve our situation so we can sell in the best possible condition. This is to ensure the future of the business, as well as your jobs—”
“A consultant! Won’t that be too expensive?” Georgette is unable to contain herself. She bites her lip.
“The consultant is a retired businessman who now volunteers with an association that assists directors of small businesses. We only have to pay his travel expenses. Right now, I need your input concerning specific areas he should help us with. We’ll go around the table. Jean-Marc, why don’t you start?”
Jean-Marc thinks for a moment. He glances around the room surreptitiously and fidgets in his chair. “I’d like the consultant to tell us how to get the workers to go faster. Even if you tell them ten times a day, they just don’t get it. As soon as you turn your back, they slow down again. After every break, you have to round them up as though they were deserters. Yesterday, I had the doors taken off the toilet stalls. Some of them were hiding out in there—”
He breaks off at the sight of Héloïse’s stunned expression. From her seat next to him, Georgette speaks up, by way of distraction. “I think we need a financial adviser. We’re paying too many bank fees on the loans we’ve taken out to carry our inventory. There must be a way to reduce them. With the recent drop in sales, we won’t have enough money to pay the employees and our suppliers on time. Our business needs cash like we need oxygen!”
Héloïse has recovered. “Léon. It’s your turn.”
Trying not to stutter too much, Léon begins. “Well, ma’am, in my opinion, our suppliers could be giving us better terms. Only we don’t really know them. They’ve never been here, I’ve never gone to visit them. We could save money, for example, if we only took deliveries on set days. Or perhaps they would agree to send us kits of components instead of us buying them one by one.”
“Thank you, Léon. That’s interesting. Your turn, Hubert.”
“We mustn’t forget that our customers are our lifeblood. The first thing a potential buyer will want to see is whether our customers are faithful to us, and if we know how to satisfy their requirements. Today, our customers complain about our reliability regarding both the quality of our products and their timely delivery. Tomorrow, they may complain that our products are outdated. What we need is an analysis of our market and of our competition.”
“Thank you, Hubert. But it seems to me that you are the one who knows our customers best. What about you, Roger? What do you say?”
Roger had started to blush in anticipation of his turn as soon as Jean-Marc began to speak. Now his face, in contrast to his whiter-than-white T-shirt, is beet red. He gulps. “Umm ... I don’t know. In my opinion, everything said so far comes down to suppressing waste and loss of time, while improving the quality of our remaining activities. It’s all written down in the book that Thierry lent me when your father made me head of quality control. It was a matter of IPO certification. But I don’t remember what IPO stands for ... also your father said that it was just a worthless piece of paper. So we let the matter drop and I never had time to finish the book ...”
Roger is losing track of what he is talking about. Héloïse looks questioningly at Hubert.
“I think you mean ISO, not IPO,” Hubert says, turning to Roger. “ISO is the acronym for International Organization for Standardization. Its goal is to facilitate coordination and international unification of industrial standards. Independent organizations verify the ISO qualifications of companies when they want to standardize their processes according to a recognized industry benchmark. It’s a real opportunity to improve the whole company from top to bottom, including our relationships with both our customers and our suppliers. Roger is right. If we want this company to have a future, we need to learn how to improve our processes. We need to become engaged in waste reduction and continuous improvement—a ‘lean’ process, as everyone is calling it these days. Our competitors are already doing this.”
Héloïse leans back in her chair. “Thank you, everyone. I’ll introduce you to the consultant as soon as I have checked his qualifications.”
Héloïse watches as her management team leaves the office in silence. The sullen expressions on the faces of Jean-Marc and Georgette do not escape her. “They need a consultant in how to be harmonious,” she thinks wryly. She motions to Hubert to stay behind.
“We’re going to do what you suggested. We’ll get a total-quality consultant who is ‘lean,’ as you call it. At least this will give us all a common goal. I didn’t discuss the consultant idea with you before today. What do you think?”
“I didn’t want to contradict you in front of everybody else, but, as much as I think it’s a good idea to get ready for ISO certification, I don’t imagine a consultant would benefit us much. Those experts like to borrow your watch so they can tell you what time it is.”
“If you can’t tell time yourself, then it’s better than nothing,” Héloïse counters. “Only an outsider can assess every department of the company with complete objectivity.”
“Perhaps,” admits Hubert. “The consultant will advise you, since you’re the conductor—something I could never do. I represent just one department of the business, and my vision is distorted by that fact, as is the vision of all other departments. I can tell you’re shocked that we never seem to agree on anything. But that’s normal. Each one of us pursues different goals. Mine is to sell the maximum. Therefore I always want the warehouse to be full of all models all the time, as if this would ensure we’ll never miss a sale. Even if I notice this is becoming increasingly impossible, because the very product I need is almost always among the missing ones—it’s Murphy’s Law—I still request the stockroom to be full of all models all the time. The workshop supervisors, they just want to produce the exact same thing always, to be as efficient as possible. They want a stockroom full of components and a warehouse full of finished products, to make their lives easier. As for Georgette, who holds the purse strings, she doesn’t want any inventory—no finished products, no work in process, and no raw materials—because of the high cost of carrying that inventory. She also doesn’t want us to introduce any new models, because it’s risky. Everyone is right according to their role in their department, and yet everyone is wrong at a certain given moment. Only the customer is always right, but the problem is that they change their mind so often ...”
Héloïse interjects. “All the same, one can have a conflicting opinion and just say so nicely. There’s always such a terrible atmosphere at these meetings. It’s like listening to out-of-tune instruments being played by deaf people.”
“Things aren’t always this bad,” Hubert responds. “There was a full moon the other night, so I guess we were all especially aggressive. But I think what’s really needed here is training in management and in effective communication. I often said as much to your father. It used to drive him crazy. More and more, companies are starting to realize that continuous education is indispensable if a business is to be more profitable. One of our competitors—a very state-of-the-art German company—sets up two weeks of training per person per year, every year. And the boss leads by example, by taking part in those sessions himself. One can’t ever hope to know everything, and everything changes so quickly these days. But you’re the one to decide what we need. Send this consultant to me, and I’ll tell him all I know.”
Héloïse senses Hubert is more relaxed. She adds, “Look, if a person is sick, why deprive that person of a doctor? But I agree that afterward you need to learn how to keep yourself in good health.”
“You can count on me to work with the consultant. I promise you that,” Hubert says. “The challenge is to choose the right one. Once you’ve checked out the service record, it’s a matter of empathy and how you put him or her to work. We will probably end up with the consultant we deserve.”
“Do you think the others will cooperate?”
Hubert considers the question for a moment before replying. “For the most part, yes. But you’ll need to explain to them that a consultant is not just there for the sake of the business, but also to help them as individuals to improve their work. Or rather, I should say, to help them work in a more favorable environment. You should see the time they waste doing things they think are useful, but about which the customer couldn’t care less. I think you’ll need to explain this to the workers directly. Can you imagine how someone like Jean-Marc would pass on this information to them? It’s also important for you to meet with the shop steward. Finally, Héloïse, you can’t keep avoiding the workshops. You need to start going there. I’ll go with you if you want me to.”
“I know. You’re right. I’ll go tomorrow. I’m not dressed for it today.”
Hubert gives the hint of a smile. On this hot late-summer day, Héloïse is wearing a rather low-cut sleeveless top. Her tanned skin would no doubt attract attention. He understands her concern. As elegant as riding sidesaddle may be, Hubert also thinks it’s too risky for women to ride this way during the hunt. “With traditions,” he muses, “It’s best to choose when and when not to conform, although not everyone has the independence of mind to make that choice.”
The next day after lunch, dressed soberly in jacket and matching pants, Héloïse prepares herself to enter the workshops. She takes a deep breath and pulls the door open. This set of doors gives way to the passageway that connects the two workshops. Directly opposite the doors and perpendicular to the passageway is the wall that separates the workshops along their lengths. The din fills her ears.
The harsh cries of tortured sheet metal come from the right. From the left, she can hear the dull, regular thudding of wood planks falling rhythmically one on top of the next as the machine cuts them. From one side, the smell of machine oil makes her throat burn. From the other, sawdust prickles her nose. Héloïse stands in the passageway, motionless. Memories of the past race through her mind.
Suddenly Hubert walks briskly past her and bustles around motioning to the machine operators, who begin to shut down their equipment, one after the other. He gets behind them, and as he urges them forward, they slowly gather around Héloïse. Her spirits return. After what seems to her an eternity, they are all assembled and ready to listen. “For the first time,” she thinks.
Hubert motions to her to begin speaking. And so she does. She utters her words one after the other, as if she were deciphering a new passage of music. She doesn’t really know what she is saying, but she says it nonetheless. Later, she is able to vaguely recall having spoken about the company’s heritage, quality workmanship, faithful customers, families whose livelihoods depended on the work that was done at H. Rami, and her personal commitment not to leave the company until the future of each of them is assured. Swept away by her convictions, she nearly forgets to tell them about her decision to bring in a total-quality consultant to help her. Then she stops suddenly, her mind as empty as when she started to speak. She asks if there are any questions. There is a long pause. Her audience seems impassive, but faces have relaxed as her own body did while she formed her words. She feels relieved. Suddenly, a hand shoots up.
“Excuse me. We’ve been asking among ourselves. Should we call you ‘ma’am’ or ‘miss’?”
Héloïse gulps, dumbfounded. Why do men always need to check whether or not a woman is married? She is used to this most exasperating of questions, and usually counters in a barely disguised mocking tone, “Why do you want to know? Do you want to propose?” But this time, looking at the innocent moon-faced fellow who has asked the question, she feels almost tender.
“I’d be happy if you’d just call me Héloïse.”
There are no more questions. Gradually, as though in slow motion, the workers dressed in the blue grease-spotted overalls move to the right, while their counterparts, their yellow T-shirts and black pants smudged with sawdust, head to the left.
Héloïse smiles at Hubert. He looks at her admiringly. “The least we can say is that style runs in the family. But yours is quite different from your father’s. Come, I’ll introduce you to the shop steward. Every time the workers wanted to negotiate something with your father, Ivan was supposed to represent their views. He will pass your message on to them.”
They approach a stout, red-haired man with a ruddy complexion. He has a brush cut, and there are traces of sawdust on his yellow T-shirt and on his thick beard. He wears the black pants of the woodworkers. He is in no hurry as he turns his head toward Héloïse to study her with a serious look.
“My name is Igor Skisovitch, but here they call me Ivan. We’re all satisfied that you decided to come to talk to us, ma’am. I was the third person hired by the late Mr. Rami. I have been here for nearly thirty years. I was always frank with him whenever we didn’t agree, which was often. That is to say, nearly all the time. So I’ll be just as frank with you. If Jean-Marc Gridy carries on like this, he’s going to have problems.”
Héloïse opens her eyes wide, unable to comprehend what he is talking about. She turns to Hubert, who gestures toward the washrooms at the other end of the workshop. Héloïse looks at him questioningly.
“You know, the doors. The ones he thought it would be such a good idea to remove, so that—”
This time, she understands.
“Yes, yes, Igor—um, Ivan. I’ve heard all about it, and I think it’s completely unacceptable. I’ll see to it that the doors are put back on at once.”
Ivan takes his pencil out from where he put it behind his ear and turns back to his work. He has nothing more to add. Héloïse rejoins Hubert who has remained a few steps behind her.
“Hubert, let’s go speak to Jean-Marc right now. Where can I find him?”
Hubert gestures toward the back of the metal shop, and steps away discreetly. Héloïse sets off in that direction, and feels the familiar sensation of being watched rise in her stomach. She chases it away by focusing her attention on what she can see. This is not difficult: the scene is so surprising.
A myriad different things fills the workshop: dark greasy machines; small trolleys with rickety wheels, filled with bits of metal and dirty rags; wooden crates, some empty, but most filled with innumerable components of all sizes and shapes; grease-stained racks filled with nuts and bolts. Iron bars are spread out on the ground, or balance precariously on the machines. She has to be careful where she puts her feet. On the wall, there is an empty paper-towel dispenser that hangs forlornly over an ashtray that overflows with cigarette butts. While noticing that next to the ashtray is a large sign that says NO SMOKING, she nearly trips over an iron bar. She manages to catch herself by grabbing the door handle of a prefabricated glass shed, the windows of which haven’t been cleaned for a very long time. They are covered in sheets of paper that have been taped together, making sure that no one could see into what happens to be Jean-Marc’s lair. He comes out swiftly, allowing her barely a glimpse of a desk covered in papers and pieces of greasy metal.
“Hello Jean-Marc. I’ve come to talk to you about the toilet stalls. Could you please put the doors back on?”
“Well! Ivan sure doesn’t waste any time, does he? Don’t be taken in by him, and don’t worry about a thing. I’ll go and settle it with the guys in the wood shop just like I did with the guys in my metal shop. None of my people would dare bug you with little details like that. They better understand that they’re here to work hard, and that if they’ve got a problem with the boss, they can go do something else for a living.”
“As it happens, I’m the boss now. Please be so kind as to put back the stall doors that you thought it was such a good idea to remove—and please do it quickly. In the future, if you’ve got any similar initiatives planned, you’ll speak to me about them first.”
Jean-Marc stares at her, aghast. Finally he stammers, “But ma’am! I thought it was the right thing! Ever since we came back from holidays, the guys have been slacking off. Especially in the wood shop, they go to the toilet several times a day! Productivity is way down. I’ve done all the calculations based on Georgette’s numbers. I thought it was the right thing. For the company!”
“But we’re human beings, after all,” says Héloïse, trying to soften her voice. “Surely it wasn’t my father who taught you to behave this way.”
“But I did it to show you that you only have to ask me to take over both workshops, and you’ll see how well I can turn things around.”
“We’ll talk about your ambitions later. In the meantime, just do as you are told.”
Héloïse turns and leaves the area quickly, zigzagging around the iron bars lying on the floor as she goes.
“How can they work in such a mess, day after day?” she wonders to herself. “What would my cello sound like if I didn’t maintain it regularly? Awful!”
The next day, Héloïse receives a visit from a small, bleary-eyed man who is a mass of nervous tics. He introduces himself as the representative of the association that could send H. Rami a retired quality expert to help with ISO certification. He is wearing a jacket threadbare at the elbows and with sagging pockets, which renders his precious way of speaking somewhat suspect. The man describes several experts, but for this particular job he suggests he do the work himself. He hasn’t officially retired yet, but his rates are very reasonable. The first day would, in fact, be free.
Héloïse is indignant, but she thinks of Pierre and maintains an inscrutable countenance.
“My dear sir, Pierre Chevalier, who has only just joined your association, is a family friend. I would like therefore to work with him. But I’m sure you and I will have another occasion to work together. Your areas of expertise are clearly very wide-ranging, and you obviously know a great many people. Please put me in contact with a serious buyer for my business and tell me your fees for that.”
The man appears cunning but still can’t tell whether Héloïse is being ironic or sincere. Therefore he takes his leave, saying that he will formalize Pierre’s membership as quickly as possible, so that he can start work right away, and he promises to track down an ideal buyer.
One week later, Pierre spends his first afternoon with the company, starting with a meeting with Héloïse in her father’s office. He wears a gray suit and a white shirt. Since the weather remains cloudy, he also wears a long trench coat. “But it’s perfectly pressed,” thinks Héloïse. “No one will ever suspect he’s a detective.”
Pierre is carrying a briefcase filled with books. “Since our meeting, I’ve been cramming in as much study as I can of the concepts, methods, and tools one uses in quality and lean management, logistics, and supply chain management, so I can better understand Thierry’s profession. To find this material, I went to the associations that promote current internationally recognized standards. These associations gather recent case studies to build these bodies of knowledge. Then they publish the best practices, which we can use as a benchmark.”
“A benchmark? How can we use that to run a business?”
“In any situation where you want to know what to do to improve, you need to get a sense of where you stand compared to where you want to be. In business, this means ‘benchmarking’—comparing your company to an excellent organization that uses best practices. This is obviously only valuable if these best practices are continuously updated with scientific progress successfully tested by the practitioners, of course.”
Héloïse thinks for a moment and then speaks.
“Yes. The supervisor of the wood shop, Roger, who is also responsible for quality control, brought this up the other day. He probably already has these documents, but I don’t think he’s read them. By the way, who wrote them? A bunch of technocrats who use a lot of jargon?”
“No. Apparently, they’re written by current practitioners and recognized experts who come together as volunteers to share their experience and expertise and to share them in simple language. I bought these books since, as a quality consultant, I’m supposed to be using them.”
Pierre takes three books out of his bag. “This first one is about total-quality management.” He smiles as he exaggerates the word “total.” “It describes a business through all of its processes. It’s very structured. This second one is about lean management and is very pragmatic. It talks about how a ‘lean’ company is achieved through a state of mind—not just by using the right tools and methods. Both of these books reflect the foundation of companies that perform well, in manufacturing and also in the service sector. There’s a third book here of cartoons about quality management. I like it. It offers common-sense examples of how people’s attitude can make processes robust or fragile. It may seem too simple, but as my brother used to say, ‘It’s easy to make things hard, but it’s hard to make things easy.’”
Héloïse looks somewhat disillusioned. “I’ve spent half my time in this place for almost three weeks. Frankly, I haven’t noticed that anyone here is particularly obsessed with simplicity, or ‘lean,’ as you call it. I’ve been watching them. Everyone in their own little corner, working away fastidiously. And why? Just because they’ve always done it that way or because they want to prove that their job is more important than anyone else’s. If there’s a problem, they spend more time looking for a scapegoat than helping customers. It’s like musicians in an orchestra who each play their part independently, without considering what the audience is hearing. In fact, if they didn’t have any customers at all that would probably suit them just fine.”
Pierre laughs. “That makes me think of what I’ve read about the virtues of a systemic approach, and the way the logistics manager should apply it. Even though you might think that logistics management is the oldest profession in the world, if I can put it that way, it’s currently changing very quickly. Even people who do this job don’t seem clear about what to call themselves. Information technology has developed lightning-fast in the current context of globalization. This makes the management of tensions where the links of the supply chain interface in their logistics activities1 possible in real time. So we still need ‘logistics managers,’ obviously, but more and more companies seem to need ‘supply chain managers’ to manage the supply chain of customer demand, especially if the chain is complex and international. But I’m not really sure when to use which term. It seems to depend on the amount of connections.”
Héloïse looks at him questioningly, and Pierre continues: “We understand, of course, what logistics means in a military context. It’s the art of combining all the means of transporting, supplying, and housing troops to support them for victory. Like Napoleon said, ‘An army marches on its stomach.’” He chuckles. “The same concept applied to business is, obviously, not so different. The goal is to respond to a demand—in your case, an order that has to be delivered. To deliver the product, you need to transport it. Before you can transport it, you need to have manufactured it—either when you receive the order or in advance by having it in stock, if the customer doesn’t want to wait. To manufacture it, you need to have the workforce, the facilities, and the machinery. You also need to have acquired your raw materials or components on time or have them in stock already. As for labor, you need to have hired workers far enough in advance that they can be properly trained. These steps constitute ‘links’ that form a ‘chain,’ and that chain needs to be managed to supply the customer demand through what we, in fact, call ‘supply chain management.’ Maybe it should have been called ‘supply/demand chain management.’”
Pierre notices that Héloïse has started to doodle on a piece of paper. He speaks louder. “Obviously, all of these contingencies require skills in strategic planning and operational scheduling and on how to connect the two. To synchronize the internal and external means of production, collaboration skills—or ‘soft skills,’ as they are called—are also critical. It’s no longer enough to employ a logistics manager to simply execute orders by managing the means of storage, transport, and production in a fragmented way. Nowadays, the physical flow, the information flow, and even the financial flow must be synchronized, and this is the main role of the supply chain manager: to continuously adapt to external and internal changes. And if these flows aren’t ‘lean’—that is to say, aren’t synchronized with the customers’ needs and free of waste—and if the processes of the company are not under control, the poor supply chain manager is reduced to trying to organize chaos.”
Héloïse looks pensive. She pushes her paper across the table to Pierre and asks, “So that’s why it’s called a chain. Everyone knows the strength of a chain isn’t equal to the sum of the strengths of all its links; it’s only as strong as its weakest link.”
After a glance at Héloïse’s drawing, Pierre exclaims, “Yes ... but again, with globalization and information technologies, supply chains shouldn’t be thought of as chains but rather as complex networks, like a web, that must adapt continuously, like living bodies do.”
Héloïse straightens up and pushes the paper brusquely aside. “So, how are you going to proceed?”
Pierre’s eyes light up. “Did you use the word ‘proceed’ just now because I’ve been talking about management of processes?”
Héloïse sighs, mildly exasperated: “OK, what exactly is a process, anyway?”
Pierre gloats. “My dictionary—my number-one reference book—tells me that a process is a series of ordered operations that are carried out within a given time frame and that lead to a defined end result. This is not to be confused with a procedure, which is a method—a machine, for example, or a recipe—that is used to make that result. The business reference books say much the same thing, even though they say so in a more ... jargon-y way.”
Héloïse is about to ask another question when the phone rings. She gets up to answer it, and after listening for a minute, says, “Yes, Roger, of course I agree. You must not ship it if you know there are defective components in it. Why doesn’t he want to wait? Look, just ask Hubert what he thinks. Or you can come and join us in the meeting room. I’m talking to Pierre Chevalier, our new total-quality consultant. I’ll introduce you.”
Héloïse can’t help grumbling as she hangs up the phone. “We’re still having quality problems with one of the orders, and the two shop supervisors can’t come to any sort of agreement. It’s an epidemic. There really needs to be some kind of process in place to deal with this particular situation!”
Roger knocks at the door and enters timidly. Héloïse makes the introductions, and then Roger announces, “I’ve told the shipper that you’ve decided to stop shipment on this order until you have Hubert’s opinion.”
“Good,” says Héloïse, reassured. “Keep me posted. We’ve just been talking about well-defined processes, and what the company can hope to gain from them. What do you think?”
Roger sits down, and answers promptly, “The most important thing is to keep our customers happy.”
Hearing the word “customer,” Héloïse gives him a look of admiration.
Pierre speaks up. “Have you already formalized the main processes of your company?”
Roger suddenly seems ill at ease. He fidgets with a notebook in his lap. “Well, I actually answered as quickly as I did because Thierry always said that when you don’t know what to say, you should always say ‘customers.’ But I actually couldn’t tell you offhand all the names of all our processes. I only remember that Thierry Ambi outlined five main ones that cover all our different departments. He used them when he wrote the IT procedures. If you’d like, I can look in my notes. I wrote everything down.”
“Yes, please go ahead,” answers Héloïse, calmly.
Roger thumbs frantically through his notebook. Pierre gets ready to take some notes of his own.
“OK. There are: the Sales and Marketing Process, the Supply Chain Process, the Human Resources Process, the Financial Process, and finally the Total-Quality Process. These five processes cover all the activities of the business.”
Pierre stops writing and asks, “Do you have any details for the individual steps for the supply chain process?”
“Yes. I’ve written them down—there were five of these also, but a sixth step was added: plan, source, make, deliver, return, and enable. This follows the SCOR model,2 which stands for”—here, Roger makes a huge effort to remember—“Supply Chain Operations Reference model. When talking about this model, Thierry always used to say that there’s no point in reinventing the wheel: we needed to use the SCOR model as a starting point—even if it meant simplifying it for small businesses like ours in order to take into account our level of maturity, as he said.”
With a big smile Pierre murmurs, “Well, well ... clearly this is how you move from traditional logistics to supply chain management.”
Roger is about to respond to this but, seeing Héloïse’s impatient look, continues with what he was saying. “As I said to you in the meeting the other day, I wanted to work on the total-quality processes, but I never had time to read the booklet. Maybe Mr. Chevalier—”
Héloïse interrupts. “Yes. It would be really useful not only to have a process to avoid quality problems, but also a process for reacting to problems when they arise. This would save you time and energy, particularly when Hubert and I aren’t here. Can we look at it together?”
Héloïse turns to Pierre and notices his stiff expression. She understands and continues, “But before we do that, Pierre will obviously need to visit the company and meet each person. Roger, could you inform your colleagues of his visit?”
Pierre seems soothed and adds with another big smile, “I’ll meet you on the shop floor soon.”
Roger agrees, and takes his leave. Héloïse looks at her watch. “Well, how are you going to proceed?”
“I’m going to take Roger’s advice, and start with the customers,” answers Pierre promptly. “I’m going to see which operations represent added value in their eyes.”
“But how do we add this value?”
Pierre leafs through one of his books and scans his notes. “In industry, we add value that the customer expects by transforming raw materials, assembling the various components, and packaging the products. Administrative tasks can also add value—for example, if we send out specific information that the customer needs, or if we implement systems that systematically respect the specifications of the products or services that the customer requires. In the lean-management book, they’ve colored in green the operations that add value. Those that don’t add value are colored in red. Their case studies show a great deal more red than green. They must be exaggerating ...”
“Actually, I get the impression that we’re doing a lot of red operations here,” Héloïse comments. “I don’t know if there’s more red than green, but there’s certainly a lot of red.” She looks at Pierre mischievously. “I know how you could proceed! You only have to follow the whole chain of operations, from the arrival of the raw materials to the shipping out of the finished products, all on the pretext of eliminating the red. That will give you the chance to interrogate everyone!”
“That’s just what I intend to do,” says Pierre, smiling. “But I’m going to start with the finished products, to understand how they need to be put together to conform to the customers’ deadlines and quality expectations. It will be the best way to identify the green operations too—by seeing how they contribute to the finished product. Now, if I’m going to start the interviews, you’ll need to tell me who does what, and who is the boss of whom. I will need the organization chart.”
Seeing Héloïse’s perplexed expression, Pierre explains. “The organization chart is the visual representation of the various positions in the company and their hierarchical relationships to one another. Then, I’ll visit some customers and suppliers and ask them relevant questions.”
Héloïse raises her eyes to the ceiling. “Well, the subject of hierarchical relationships got me off to a bad start. I asked Georgette about that. She told me she’d tried to get my father to clarify them, but, since his own responses were never clear, she eventually gave up. I tried to work out who was the boss of whom by looking at job titles from pay stubs. Same problem. They weren’t up-to-date and no longer corresponded to existing jobs in the company. No wonder no one knows whom to ask for instructions, and no wonder certain people act as if they’re boss even when the real boss is there.”
Pierre raises an eyebrow, dismayed. “Just imagine being in the police force or the army and not knowing who was in charge of whom! Or imagine that there were several people in charge and that team missions weren’t clearly defined, even for the people who were meant to be carrying them out—” he breaks off as he hears a knock at the door. Hubert pops his head in, clearly very annoyed.
“I’m really sorry to bother you, Héloïse, but I need to speak with you at once.”
“Come in, Hubert. I’m with Pierre Chevalier, our total-quality consultant. I have to leave before four o’clock to be on time at the conservatory, so let’s talk right now. Mr. Chevalier has signed a confidentiality agreement.”
Hubert comes in and moves toward Pierre. The two tall men size each other up briefly and then shake hands.
Hubert says, “Good afternoon, and welcome. In fact, it’s good you’re here because the problem is in your area of expertise. You’ll be able to help us.”
Pierre fidgets slightly with discomfort, but Hubert doesn’t seem to notice as he turns toward Héloïse with a grave expression. “We’re continuing, slowly but surely, to lose orders from Saint-Nazaire, one after the other. This information is spreading around the shipyards like wildfire. Everybody now knows about the loss of your father, and this has already become a concern for our customers. I could have calmed the waters if we didn’t have this recurrent quality problem with the armchairs. Not just any armchairs, either, but the ones that were intended for the officers’ bar—and just when a new purchaser came on the scene, too! It is well known: a satisfied customer doesn’t say anything to anyone, but a dissatisfied customer will complain to at least ten prospects.”
Hubert pauses for breath. “When you’re hunting and the hounds come across a wounded animal, they will not let it go. Customers do just the opposite, but it ends up the same way—when their supplier goes through a bad patch, that’s exactly when they let the supplier go. At this rate, the revenue in our most profitable product line is going to collapse. The business is going to lose value at the very time we’re trying to sell it.”
He is deathly pale. Héloïse, pale also, offers him a chair. Pierre looks at both of them impassively. A heavy silence descends.
Finally, Pierre clears his throat and speaks up. “You say ‘everybody now knows.’ Whom do you mean by ‘everybody’?”
“The whole network in contact with the subcontractors in western France.” answers Hubert.
“And where do they build these boats that you equip?”
“Mainly in Saint-Nazaire and in the west.”
“The west?” Pierre presses on.
“Yes. You know, the western area of France, which includes Bretagne.”
“And what exactly is keeping you from outfitting boats that are made elsewhere?”
“Hmm ... well, ah, we’ve never really sought out other shipyards. Saint-Nazaire has always been enough for us,” says Hubert candidly.
The conversation trails off again. Pierre gets up, breaking the silence by saying that he would start his work right away by drawing up the organization chart. “It will take me the whole afternoon. I’ll bring it to you tomorrow.”
Hubert watches him go without saying anything. Héloïse doesn’t leave Hubert time to reflect. “Have you talked to Roger about the quality problem we’re having with the order that was to be sent today?”
“No.” Hubert sighs loudly. “What’s the problem this time?”
After leaving the somber office, Pierre starts for the shop floor with gusto. He is keen to see the products that are made by H. Rami and also to identify the “green”—the value-added factors that justify the company’s existence. In the wood shop, he finds Roger contorting himself inside a piece of furniture, probably in the process of fitting one of the parts. Pierre gestures to him to carry on; he will conduct the visit by himself.
From first glance the layout of the factory intrigues Pierre. The furniture being assembled is mostly made out of wood. The metal pieces are secondary parts.
“Why, then,” he wonders, “are the two parts of the overall shop floor, the wood shop and the metal shop, separated by a wall for nearly their entire length? And why is the shipping dock beside the wood shop located so close to the passageway that links the two workshops together? It requires the finished products to retrace their paths through the factory before exiting.”
Pierre strides toward the shipping dock. There, on a clipboard, he begins to draw up a diagram that shows the flow of products backward from the shipping dock through the factory. He uses different colors to indicate first the finished products—the furniture; then the wood; then the metal components—the machined parts that are fitted to the pieces of wood; and, finally, the raw material of which the components are made—the metal itself.
He moves quietly from one workstation to the next, greeting each of the workers with a nod and a smile, and they respond in kind. He watches them with great interest as they work. They can sense this, and some of them make more of an effort than usual, especially those who are working directly with the wood. They plane the surfaces and attach the small metal accessories with an economy of movement that amazes Pierre.
“It looks like the ‘red’ is between the various operations and not within the operations themselves,” he observes. Each time he moves from one workstation to the next, his diagram grows more complete. He makes a note of the small, strange prefabricated shed with its papered windows, at a corner of the storeroom. He notices the storeroom supervisor gives it a wide berth. When Pierre asks him if he might enter it, the storeroom supervisor says that it is up to his boss if a visit to “the coop” is permissible. But when Pierre asks him who the boss actually is, the answer he receives is so vague that Pierre makes a mental note to ask the question again later.
Once the diagram is finally finished, Pierre continues to look around, absorbing the atmosphere in order to notice any possible clues that might lead him to Thierry Ambi. He winds his way between workstations cluttered with wooden planks, partially assembled drawers, and rows of half-built armchairs. He navigates his way around a mountain of small school desks that are stacked one on top of another. He zigzags his way past piles of wooden planks and blocks his ears as he passes the screeching circular saw. He discreetly lifts the sheet of plastic that serves as a door to the painting booth, careful to avoid the half-opened cans of paint sitting on the ground. Pierre’s brow furrows as he watches workers struggle with the stacks of wood and batches of metal.
Like Héloïse, he too nearly loses his footing over the iron bars on the floor of the metal shop. He makes a mental note of the number of people who are moving about the shop or shifting the various materials from place to place. He realizes that, at any given moment, there are more of them than there are machine operators working with the raw materials or assembling the components. It is as though the lenses on his glasses turn alternately red and green, according to what he sees. He glances at his watch. He has been here for less than two hours, but he can already deduce the low percentage of value-added activities. Just like the case studies in the book, there are at least double the number of red activities here as green.
Absorbed in his observations, Pierre very nearly forgets his mission that afternoon: the organization chart. Who is the boss of whom? No point in asking, he saw that with his own eyes. He saw Roger Chaillou rushing around twice as much as any of his co-workers, to the point where he didn’t even have time to catch up with Pierre. He also saw the supervisor answer, on the spot, each of their questions as they came up. “A real go-to guy,” as his brother used to say about one of his apprentice mechanics. And Pierre saw Jean-Marc Gridy, with the attitude of an aggressive pit bull, treating his co-workers like ill-behaved children who were likely to do something wrong at any moment.
He noticed the sideways glances that the “children” in question gave as they slowed down the moment the “pit bull’s” back was turned. He also saw a red-bearded man whose posture froze and who stared coldly as he passed by. Pierre didn’t know who the guy was, but noticed that, as soon as he had passed, the man went to speak with his black-and-yellow-attired co-workers, and that they listened attentively to him. Pierre saw how the man tried to speak to the guys on the other side of the workshop wall, the ones dressed in blue, and how the “pit bull” spotted him at once and, with lower jaw sticking out, headed straight for him. Pierre admired the way the red-bearded man went back to his machine and resumed his work with a calm air at the very moment the pit bull would have pounced on him.
It is late in the afternoon when Pierre leaves the shop floor to return to the offices. He still needs to question Georgette about the hierarchical relationships within the company. Pierre has never had a problem ingratiating himself with anyone. He only has to smile. He does so on meeting Georgette, something that assures her complete cooperation.
“It seems that this woman’s brain is a gold mine of information,” he thinks to himself. Aloud he inquires, “Who is the boss of the fellow in the gray smock? You know, the one who exchanges components for the slips of paper that the machine-operators themselves get from their supervisors?”
Georgette knits her eyebrows together and scratches at her right hand for a moment, considering how to answer precisely. “In the old days, Eric, the storeroom supervisor who is also in charge of shipping, worked under Roger since the storeroom was on the woodworking side of the shop. But because Roger was always overwhelmed with work, Mr. Rami put Eric under the supervision of Jean-Marc in the metal shop. But that didn’t work out either, because Jean-Marc had Eric distribute the raw materials too far in advance. As a result, we could never find what we needed when the orders were ready to be finished. We were always out of stock on items. We often found them months later, after we’d already produced new ones!
“In the end, when Mr. Ambi came, he started to install the IT system that includes the storeroom. Just after that he put Eric with Léon together in the supply chain department he created. This appeared bizarre at first, but I must admit it seems logical that a storeroom supervisor who organizes transport and shipments should collaborate with the buyer-planner. This way, at least they are able to pull the orders that we actually need to build, rather than trying to push out the components to produce whatever suits us.”
Georgette stops speaking for a moment, her eyes looking upward, as though the logic of this system were dawning on her for the first time. Then she looks back at Pierre. “Mr. Ambi once asked me to draw up an organization chart. But when I asked Mr. Rami if I could do so, he told me that it wasn’t necessary, so I never did it.”
Georgette hesitates again. Then she adds, “But, if I may say so, I think it would be very useful, especially for Léon. It would make it easier for him to go to the shop floor. Right now, he doesn’t dare, because of the workshop supervisors, who are always changing the sequence of the orders that come in, according to what suits them. This causes a lot of arguments, and, since Léon is a bit embarrassed about the way he stutters when he gets nervous, he’d rather busy himself at the reception desk ... if you know what I mean.”
Pierre smiles knowingly, and begins to sketch the organization chart as Georgette discusses its structure with delight. Before the afternoon is over, Georgette has explained the roles of all the management staff in the company to Pierre, but she has conspicuously avoided any questions about the disappearance of Thierry Ambi. There is nothing left for Pierre to do but meet with the employees individually, to try and get to know them better. He would start next week with the storeroom supervisor, Eric, who works by “the coop” with the covered windows.
1 From Hervé Mathe, a French professor of logistics.
2 SCOR: A model for representing the supply chain flows within a company. This model is maintained by the APICS Supply Chain Council (see www.apics.org).
