ON THE PRODUCTION FLOOR IN BAJAJ AUTO, MARUTI SUZUKI AND MORE
Superwomen on the Shop Floor
Automakers
are increasingly seeing the advantages of having women manning their production
machines. The two biggest gains: increase in productivity and efficiency
At a recent
strike at Bajaj Auto’s factory in Chakan, Maharashtra, that lasted almost 50
days between July and August, most of the 900-odd permanent employees stayed
away from work, a few because they supported the unions’ call for a strike and
most because of the fear of violence. If the twowheeler maker was still able to
keep production humming — not at full capacity though — it was thanks to two
sets of workers: one, the 500-odd trainees who aren’t part of the unions; and
another 100-odd permanent shopfloor workers who weren’t fazed by the unions’
call to strike work.
Out of the 100 odd permanent workers, 53 were women.
“They didn’t miss a single day,” says a beaming Rajiv
Bajaj, managing director of Bajaj Auto. “As Aristotle said, ‘courage is the
first of human virtues because it makes all others possible’. I wish there were
more [workers] like them.” Some 2.2%, or a little over 200, of Bajaj Auto’s
workforce comprises women, of which 170 are on the shop floor (the others are
in the R&D, HR and marketing departments).
No Longer a Male Domain
Bajaj isn’t the only auto head honcho singing paeans of women working on
the factory machines to assemble and produce bikes, three-wheelers and
passenger vehicles. Women are increasingly breaking into what has traditionally
been a male stronghold. At India’s No. 1 carmaker Maruti Suzuki, for instance,
the number of women employees on the shop floor has increased five-fold to 75
in the last three years. It gets better at Renault Nissan’s factory in Chennai,
where 7% of the workers in the factory are women; the plan is to increase it to
15-20% in two years. Ford India has roughly 300 women on the shop floor across
different departments. And 10% of Yamaha India’s factory workforce has women in
it.
To be sure, hiring women to produce automobiles is no
token gesture to address gender bias; rather, there are some very real
advantages of having women on the shop floor. “The women are engaged in
hardcore areas of automation, designing of assembly lines, inspection of new
components and engineering support; they bring in versatility and out-of-the-box
thinking,” says S Y Siddiqui, chief operating officer (administration), Maruti
Suzuki. There is potential to groom women on the shop floor for leadership
roles in 2-3 years, he adds. Maruti has tied up with ITI-Gurgaon to build a
talent pipeline of women, and is currently grooming an additional 15 for the
shop floor.
Women are more dexterous and nimble and bring in that edge to the manufacturing
process, says Tom Chackalackal, executive director, manufacturing, Ford India.
They work with a greater precision in the trim and chassis, stampings and the
welding areas. And the best part, according to Chackalackal: they don’t waste
time and are more dedicated.
Ford India has 358 work groups of 10-15 members each. “Our aim is to have at
least one woman employee per work group,” says Chackalackal. The US auto major
has also started a project called KRUTYA to improve skills of women on the shop
floor, including training in the areas of team building, continuous learning,
soft skills and confidence enhancing skills.
Abha Garg, HR head at Bajaj Auto, points out that women bring a different set
of skills. “They approach a problem differently, offering better solutions, and
do not easily give in to pressure.”
Floored!
Yamaha has all-women lines on which productivity is 20-25% higher than the
norm. It has around 15-20 women group leaders who manage a team of women being
groomed to take charge as supervisors, says Ramesh Sharma, group head
manufacturing, Yamaha India.
Ramuni Nair, head of HR at Renault Nisxplains that initially there was ty of
resistance from the male kforce on employing women on hop floor, as it is
perceived to tough place. But after seeing he gains in productivity, that
resistance has met a quick death. As Bajaj puts it: “If women can manage my home
and my country, why not my company too!” ET Magazine profiles five such women
who are living their childhood dream of working in the midst of fuel pumps,
control valves and flywheels:
Women aren’t Welcome Here!
Automakers
like Toyota Kirloskar, Hyundai and Honda Motorcycle & Scooter India (HMSI)
do not encourage women on the shop floor citing reasons of distance from the
plant and the lack of ITI-trained women.
Toyota Kirloskar, for its part, encourages women to
work in sales and marketing, plant engineering, finance, human resources; but
it’s a no-no when it comes to the shop floor as shifts start very early and end
late, which the company feels is not conducive for female employees. The plant
is located around 40 km away from Bangalore city. “Given the distance and bad
roads, women employees don’t find it very suitable to commute to and fro,” says
Sandeep Singh, deputy MD and COO, marketing & commercial.
Clearly, such companies have traditionally been cool to
women shop floor workers and hence even today don’t go out of their way to
attract them. Hyundai Motor India, for instance, hires ITI graduates for its
shop floor production activities from across Tamil Nadu. These ITI graduates
are typically fitters, motor mechanics, welders and painters. “Women graduates
in ITIs in Tamil Nadu prefer to take up trades such as electrical, electronics,
computer hardware, basic office automation and the like, which do not fit in
with production requirements. This inherent and historic mismatch has led to a
situation wherein women are absent in our production activities,” says Sanjay K
Pillai, vice-president, HR & GS, Hyundai Motor India.
Perhaps it’s time for these automakers to re-look their
approach. Says Bajaj: “At companies that are circumspect about women managing
their shop floors, the problem is not the competence of women but the attitude
of their men.”
Pushkala Chandramouli Eswaran | 34,
Ford India
Driving it Home
She started as an associate 15 years ago; today
Pushkala Chandramouli Eswaran is a team leader managing 45 workers — 20 women
and 25 men — on the shop floor.
Educated till the 12th standard, Pushkala is now pursuing a diploma in
mechanical engineering. Her role model: Vijaya Lakshmi, who rose from the shop
floor to become general manager for product development.
Pushkala stresses that in the factories of Ford India both men and women are
given equal growth opportunities. As evidence she points to the trips she and
other women from the Chennai plant have made to Germany and the UK to learn how
quality cars are made there. “Working on the shop floor has been motivating for
me, and through my experiences I have been able to encourage more women to work
on the shop floor,” says Pushkala.
Perhaps what makes it easier for Pushkala is that her husband also works on the
shop floor at Ford India — he is a team leader in the quality department. The
mother of two (a 10-year-old and a six-year-old) is clear about one thing: it’s
not only a man’s job to make a car; even a woman can do it.
Nisha Narayan | 26, Renault-Nissan
Coasting Along
The Chennai plant is the only one across the world
in which Nissan has an all-women’s line, declares Nisha Narayan proudly. The
14-year-old Renault-Nissan global alliance has translated into a jointly-owned
manufacturing plant in India — which produces Renault models like the Pulse and
the Duster and Nissan’s Micra and Evalia. Nisha has been on the shop floor of
this factory for the past two and a half years, after a four-year stint at auto
components maker Gabriel India.
Nisha, who completed her diploma in electrical
engineering from the Andaman & Nicobar Islands, chose Renault Nissan over
other offers from rivals because she saw better opportunities at the Indian
operation of this French-Japanese partnership. In charge of a team of six
women, she oversees inner body production and stamping car bodyparts on the
pressline. The team has also contributed to making minor improvements at the
plant — like changing locations of some machines and bringing a few of them
together — that have helped improve productivity. Working on the shop floor is
an attractive growth option for women employees, says Nisha, simply because the
company sees merit in having women in the factories. “Not only has productivity
improved for us, women are very supportive of company activities and policies,”
adds Ramuni Nair, head of HR at the Renault Nissan factory.
For Women, by Women
As a group
leader, Rubina Khatul oversees nine women on the scooter line of Yamaha’s plant
in Surajpur, greater Noida. Her ambition: to be the group leader, in charge of
the two-wheeler maker’s eight other teams, thereby having a team of 72 women
under her.
Rubina who lives with her family in Shahdara, one of the oldest localities in
Delhi, works with her team on the line that assembles the Ray scooter, which is
“made by women for women.” “Ï had always dreamt of working in a motorcycle
plant,” says Rubina who joined Yamaha after graduating from Delhi University.
A unique feature of the Japanese motorcycle major’s India operation is that it
provides on-site education: It conducts a UP government-certified ITI course
that entitles women to practical and theory classes.
Rubina who started on the shop floor in mid-2012 earns a stipend of 8,000 per
month; after completing three years, she is eligible to write an exam to get
ITI certified. Her role model is Chandrashekhar Vashisht, the group leader
whose position she aspires for. “I want to be like him, have his ability to
take quick decisions and solve any problem in the smartest possible way.”
Manisha Rahagdale | 23, Bajaj Auto
Lady Pluck
If you can’t imagine piston rings and crankshafts figuring in girl talk, you
obviously haven’t met Manisha Rahagdale. The 23-year-old holder of a diploma in
mechanical engineering from MP University has been working on the assembly line
of KTM — Bajaj Auto’s Austrian partner — for the past one and a half years. “I
was always fascinated by how the cylinder and piston function, how the engine
is fired and tested, the compression timings, increasing or decreasing
excessive pressure in the engine, and all that. On the KTM assembly line I see
it happen,” says Manisha, who was campus-selected by Bajaj Auto.
The Pune-headquartered two- and three-wheeler maker gives
the women on the shop floor the option to work only on the morning shift (6.30
am to 3.30 pm) and not on the second and the third shift, thereby making it
safer for them.
Manisha goes out of her way to exhort women who fear
working on the shop floor to give it a shot; she makes it a point to stress
that a shop floor is not a place just for men, that it is a place of learning,
and that there few things in life as satisfying as being a part of the
vehicle-manufacturing process. For her part, she intends to work herself up to
a leadership role on the shop floor; and once
that ambition is released she would be keen to fulfill
her dream of
starting up her own mechanical workshop. “After working
on the shop floor, I have picked up the skills to start something on my own,”
she says.
Laboni Dasgupta | 21, Maruti Suzuki
On Autopilot
Laboni Dasgupta, 21, a diploma mechanical engineer from
Kolkata, is a supervisor at the automation-design area on the shop floor of
Maruti Suzuki’s Gurgaon plant. “As a kid I was interested in designing car
parts and wanted to work in a car plant,” says Laboni who has been on the
Maruti Suzuki shop floor for three years.
In this period Laboni and her team have gone about automating certain
operations, like lifting car seats and tightening nuts and bolts, which has led
to increased productivity and reduced fatigue for the operator. “We make
machines do more work, which has also led to improvement in quality and reduced
manpower requirements at the plant,” says Laboni.
Maruti Suzuki has a total of 15 supervisors in the Gurgaon plant, of which five
are women. “We are hoping that in the next 2-3 years, the automation area will
be totally operated by women,” says Laboni.
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Lijee Philip ET131020
