The changes were accomplished by a harsh set of expectations and demands. Changes were sweeping. Many managers held the perception that they must succeed or they would be out. Managers worked 10-to-12 hour days, and during the worst periods of crisis some worked around the clock to the point of exhaustion. However, this is not considered to be a permanent problem or a major issue which needs resolution. Many of these demands were associated with the planning and implementation of the change process, and the need to respond to crisis and fix all the things that went wrong when the changes were first made. With most of the changes in place and progress being made in the pro-duction process, it is assumed that the demands on managers will ease up and the issue will become less important in the future.
?FL? Numerous facts in the case illustrate factors which gave rise to the morale problem. First, there was a total change in manage-ment philosophy, from a more traditional administrative approach toward banking operations to "factory" management. Increased work flow had typically been handled by hiring more people, but in the new environment an aggressive manufacturing production management philosophy took hold. New measurements and controls took effect and managers were determined to reorganize and handle the tasks with fewer people and without increased expenditures.
The change in management was accomplished by bringing in a number of young, technically oriented, production managers from Ford Motor Company. This had to be unsettling, because personnel were accustomed to managers who had a different management style and who had years of experience in banking. The fact that people jumped to react to management requests, without questioning, showed that they were somewhat intimidated.
When the first sweeping changes of reorganizing the paper pipeline into six separate pipelines were implemented, it showed that the plan...