Passage 27 (27/63)
Since the late 1970’s, in the face of a severe loss of market share (market share: 市场份额, 市场占有率) in dozens of industries, manufacturers in the United States have been trying to improve productivity—and therefore enhance their international competitiveness—through cost-cutting programs. (Cost-cutting here is defined as raising labor output while holding 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 same time, it became clear that the harder manufactures worked to implement cost-cutting, 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 imply that cost-cutting should 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 investments in cost-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 (BRING ABOUT, CAUSE “wreak havoc”) havoc with the results on which they are measured. Production managers have always seen their job as one of minimizing costs and maximizing output. This dimension of performance has until recently sufficed as a basis of evaluation, but it has created a penny-pinching (FRUGALITY, PARSIMONY), 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 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.
5. The author’s attitude toward the culture in most factories is best described as
(A) cautious
(B) critical
(C) disinterested
(D) respectful
(E) adulatory
同问，在哪儿看出来the culture in most factories 是critical的？
关键是most factories在哪儿定位出来的
是不是in the face of a severe loss of market share in dozens of industries,这段话推出most factories的？作者: kittenalways 时间: 2012-2-11 09:51
整篇文章是在讲从70年代到现在的一个现状（从recently viisit）,cost-cutting is flawed和它没有增强竞争力的原因（两个方面），最后总结了一些其他成功公司采取的不同措施.....全篇的主基调是贬不是褒->D,E错误,disinterested是无关选项，比较cautious和critic很显然是critic,本题类似主旨题，对全篇需要有把握作者: Benite 时间: 2012-2-12 19:58
说说自己的想法~~
首先，在第二段作者说“ ... the cost-cutting approach to increasing productivity is fundamentally flawed.” 也就是说（公司使用的）削减成本的方法在根本上是有错误的。然后下面又说了cost-cutting的 "RULE" 本身没有错误（是有效的）。给出这两个条件，就能推出必然是公司对Rule的理解是有偏误的，导致对Rule没有正确运用。所以作者对cost-cutting rule是respectful的，对公司的表现是critical的。
下面在第三段后半部分出现了"most factories"这个词： but... penny-pinching, mechanistic culture in most factories ... kept away creative managers. 这句话说公司采取cost-cutting就会显得小气，吸引不了creative managers，也表明了不赞赏的态度。
