Assessing the influence of shop floor employees on increasing productivity at DOW Southern Africa, Durban, South Africa.

Abstract

The study analyses the influence of shop floor workers on increasing organisational productivity in a chemical manufacturing sector. This study was aimed at identifying the main contributing factors that drive employees at a shop floor level to come up with suggestions, ideas, identifying areas of productivity improvements and finding better ways of solving process issues. It looked at the extend which influence shop floor employees to generate ideas to better coordinate and synchronize resources towards making it easy to increase productivity while reducing process operation time and resources required to achieve planned production without any quality setbacks. The problem was that managers find it difficult to communicate the right message which tap into the highest note in terms of motivating employees to perform at their full potential, applying the required skilled attained over years of experience to increase productivity. For this reason, the study needed to investigate what are the factors that can get shop floor employee to fully participate and work together with management as a team to solve production issues as well as coming up with innovative ways of doing things better. The study adopted a cross-sectional assessment design by examining the extent to which the selected motivational variables influence shop floor employees into coming up with better ways of increasing productivity. Quantitative research design was used because its findings are solid and relatively easy to understand. The study was conducted at DOW Southern Africa (SA) manufacturing site, an organization based at New Germany Industrial area in the West of Durban. The population of the study was 35 upon which a sample of 17 was selected using systematic random sampling. The findings of the study indicated that most employees were willing to be part of influencing positively an increase in productivity at DOW Southern Africa. Statistics showed that the driving force in taking part in improving productivity was clear communication, clear career path and individual recognition by leadership for workable improvement that help the organisation improve productivity. The study was done amongst responded who most had some form of a tertiary qualification but work on the shop floor level, it is therefore not surprising that a career path within the organization was amongst the motivational factor that most corresponded view as the driving force while the union was not considered to be amongst the driving force to improve employee participation in increasing productivity. The study also provided evidence that employees have an intent to remain in an organization provided that their needs amongst them which is positive organizational culture and recognition of individual good work are recognized.