Factory "Magyar Suzuki"
Magyar Suzuki Plant Magyar Suzuki Plant
Man is an unwanted figure
I met the largest gathering of workers at the plant, trying to bypass the checkpoint. A dense human stream was moving through the gate towards me.
- Relocation?
“No,” the guard winked slyly in reply, “our clerks are hurrying home.” Workers are all in the field.
The workshops are twilight, clean and spacious. On the floor flaunts bright markings resembling a road. Forklifts randomly drive around the “carriageway”, while we press in the “pedestrian zone”. At first it seemed that our group of journalists and accompanying people made up the entire population of this industrial city. Of course, excessive human intervention with its impulsiveness and unpredictability in the assembly process will not bring to good. But the desert of the workshops, despite the fact that the company employs 3, 500 people, was a little surprised.
For stamping presses, every few seconds spitting door frames out of their bowels, two work measuredly - they fold the doors onto a mobile rack. The third one selectively checks the quality of parts to one of the methods known to him - this is the foreman. In welding people can not be seen at all. The production area is carefully fenced off from walkways by a strong mesh. Behind her, swift manipulators with the speed of cobras attack the car bodies from all sides, biting their seams with fangs of electrodes and throwing out sheaves of yellow sparks. Yes, this is clearly not a place for walking, safety glasses no longer seemed something burdensome - eyes are more expensive.
And only on the main assembly line was it possible to detect a relative revival - the parts and assemblies flowing here from different ends of the enterprise are still mounted and fixed manually, although not without the help of equipment, for example, lifts. And no matter what people are busy with, their movements are economical, calm and measured - no fuss, ostentatious fanaticism or screams.
Factory "Magyar Suzuki"
Self Service Celebration
As the head of the Starkomkhoz comrade used to say Gavrilin, "to build a tram is not an ass to buy." Hungary has no right to give in to its Japanese counterpart, to fail with build quality. After all, otherwise some newly-minted Polesov is surely shouting at the car: "There is such rubbish!.. Versts will not last." And then forgive-goodbye sales, along with the brand's reputation.
That’s why the total investment in production and technology amounted to a considerable € 1.3 billion. Magyar Suzuki Corporation is a full-cycle plant, which Shigeru Shoji, Director General of Suzuki Motor Rus LLC, did not fail to proudly say. Body panels are stamped here, welded, painted and assembled into living cars. Components come from 71 Hungarian and 231 European companies. And only a few units, like diesel engines, have come a long way from Japan. The vast majority of production lines in the ancient capital of Esztergom, where the plant is located, were brought from Japan in due time. But first, factory specialists were trained on them in the Land of the Rising Sun, and only then the equipment was dismantled and transported to Hungary.
Factory "Magyar Suzuki"
In search of tribal relations
The secret of Japanese quality lies not only in the “right” equipment - in other countries, the technology is, at least, no worse. The thing is that the Japanese somehow can adjust the human mentality to the necessary tonality, to a certain attitude to work. Someone needs more intensive processing, someone less, but in any case it can not be avoided. In particular, the Japanese did not begin to hammer their principles into the heads of the Hungarians with a sledgehammer, but limited themselves to more humane methods. I, as the person who caused socialism, was especially pleased with the absence of slogans characteristic of Toyota, for example, calling for a struggle for quality, for fulfilling a plan, or for some other barricades. In the dining room, decorated quite utilitarianly, no one is imposing sushi on the workers. They may well eat the usual dishes of Hungarian cuisine - by the way, very tasty.
But Japanese know-how in the organization of production has long become for the leadership of something like a "sacred cow." Their first generic features are noticeable in the assembly shop - two traditional cords stretch along the entire conveyor. So the worker pulled the yellow cord - which means he needs help or advice from a more experienced specialist. They grab onto red only when a serious marriage is noticed and it is urgent to stop the conveyor. By the way, if you find a similar problem, then you will not be fined or fired, but rather, they will award you. Quality is above all, even above the plan. But forced downtimes in Esztergom happen infrequently - their total duration does not exceed 8-10 minutes per day. The conveyor runs almost at full power, giving out about 97% of maximum productivity, and every new car leaves it every 63 seconds.
Factory "Magyar Suzuki"
How to make friends with a Japanese
When I asked Mr. Shoji if quality workers' circles were functioning at the plant, he happily nodded his head: “Oh, yes, yes! But what about! Kaizen!”In general, if you want to make friends with a Japanese, talk to him about kaizen. He will in detail devote you to a system in which warehouses are practically not needed, and all spare parts arrive at the factory directly from suppliers in small batches and are sent directly to the conveyor, which requires phenomenal clarity and punctuality from all participants in the supply chain. The regularity of such deliveries is from 20 minutes to 3 times a week.
Still, I got the impression that to work in such conditions, you need to be at least a little bit, but Japanese. It seems that the mentality of the Hungarians is quite susceptible to the Far Eastern things. Well, you can understand them - 200 years under the Habsburgs, under the Austrian "ordnung". And their ancestors came to the present territories from somewhere from the region of the Khanty and Mansi. Under the influence of the Hungarian majority, our Slavic brothers also had to adapt: more than a third of those working at the plant are Slovaks. To the border between the countries from the entrance a little more than three kilometers. By the way, they have to speak exclusively Hungarian, like all other employees of the enterprise.
