Evaluating Employee Responses to the Lean Enterprise System at a Manufacturing Company in Cape Town, South Africa

Abstract

There is usually much reaction amongst employees when a new system is introduced in an organization. These changes are intended to improve performance but sometimes cause considerable controversy amongst the employees and management. This study examines the implementation of Lean Enterprise (LE) system and it attempts to analyze the reactions of employees at a manufacturing company (SMC.CO) in Cape Town, South Africa. Some of the questions that were asked in the research include the following: What benefits did employees perceive by the introduction of LE? How did employees respond to the implementation of the LE at SMC (in other words, did they welcome it or not)? A semi-structured questionnaire was utilized to determine the responses of employees with respect to the benefits of these innovative approaches of production with specific reference to LE. The finding of this study indicates that LE plays a significant role in a company.