Historical Perspective and Overview

Competitiveness Defined Competitiveness - the ability to

consistently succeed and prosper in the marketplace whether it is local, regional, national, or global.

The most competitive companies are those that outperform their competitors in six key areas.

Competitiveness Defined Quality Productivity Response time Service Cost Corporate image

Competitiveness Defined Competitiveness does not lead to a

stable place, rather a constantly changing one.

The productivity record of today will be broken tomorrow.

What is considered world-class quality today will be considered mediocre tomorrow.

Competitiveness Defined What is excellent service today will be

unsatisfactory service tomorrow. The acceptable costs of today will be

considered too high tomorrow. Today's excellent corporate image can

fade quickly and be gone tomorrow.

Productivity & Competitiveness Productivity is the concept of comparing

output of goods or services to the input of resources needed to produce or deliver them.

Productivity is typically expressed as the ratio of output to input.

Output/Input = Productivity

Productivity & Competitiveness Value added is the difference between

what it costs to produce a product and what it costs to purchase it.

Value added is increased when productivity is increased.

Productivity: A Global View It is usually viewed that in the U.S.,

productivity peaked during WWII, and then it has steadily declined since that time.

Actually this isn’t true. Between 1950 and 1997, productivity in

the U.S. increased by 129 percent.

Productivity: A Global View The problem is that productivity in other

industrialized countries have increased more during this same period.

The pressure to increase productivity often results in actions that are detrimental to the safety and health of workers.

Productivity: A Global View In there rush to meet deadlines or

quotas, workers may disassemble safeguards, stop taking the time to use appropriate PPE, ignore safety rules, neglect equipment maintenance duties, improperly handle or store toxic substances, and take chances that they wouldn’t under normal circumstances.

Productivity: A Global View Such efforts occasionally result in short-

term productivity improvements, but they invariably do more harm than good in the the long run.

The inevitable result is that productivity ultimately suffers, and the company finds that it won a battle only to to lose the war.

Quality & Competitiveness Quality goes hand-in-hand with

productivity in the competitiveness equation.

Today’s production company must have both.

Quality without productivity results in costs that a too high to be competitive.

Quality & Competitiveness Productivity without quality results in a

shabby product that quickly tarnishes the corporate image.

Quality - the measure of the extent to which a product or service meets or exceed customer expectations.

Safety & Health/Competitiveness When the pressures of competing

become intense, it is not uncommon for safety and health to be given a lower priority.

Not only is this wrong from an ethical standpoint, it is wrong from the perspective of competitiveness and profitability.

Safety & Health/Competitiveness In the days when a worker’s most

important qualifications were physical strength and stamina, there were always plenty of applicants in the labor pool.

If a worker was injured, several equally qualified applicants were waiting to replace him or her.

Safety & Health/Competitiveness However, with the dawning of the age of

high technology and the advent of global competition, this situation changed.

Mental ability became more important than physical ability; suddenly, the number of qualified applicants got smaller.

Safety & Health/Competitiveness In fact, whereas the workplace is

becoming increasingly technical and complex, the literacy level of the labor pool is actually declining in the U.S.

To compete, companies must recruit, employ, and develop the best possible personnel.

Safety & Health/Competitiveness Having done so, they must keep them

safe and healthy to derive the benefits of their talents.

Talented people working in a safe and healthy environment will be more competitive than equally talented people who are constantly distracted by concerns for their safety and health.