General Electric and Procter & Gamble, along with other companies at the beginning of the 1980s, are faced with the need to create a new breed of manufacturing manager, trained in a way that serves the needs of the industry in the current business climate. These two companies have long been considered outstanding developers of manufacturing management, and an examination of their systems should show what works and what does not. William Skinner has set forth what is needed from manufacturing managers today:
1) A comfort-level knowledge of mechanical, electronic, and management science technology as well as all business functions.
2) Skills including system design, contrasted with specialized technical skills.
3) Attitudes that are positive toward change.
4) The ability to conceptualize combined with the ability to work from specifics systematically and analytically rather than intuitively.
5) Assumptions that the objectives of a manufacturing system are multidimensional.
General Electric started in 1878 as Edison Electric Light and became one of the leading and most diversified manufacturing operations in the world. by 1985, the company operated plants and laboratories in over 200 locations in 34 states and Puerto Rico and had another 135 manufacturing plants in 25 other countries.
During that time, both manufacturing and the training used by GE have changed. Manufacturing was traditionally seen as a dirty job that did not require intelligence or managers as a
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