INSTRUCTIONS

Read the case and write your opinion. Write your student number at the end of your message. Be respectful of others's opinions.

Issue for 2nd Semester 2007- 2008

Suppose you are working for a multinational company that has a couple of manufacturing plants in Puerto Rico. The company has been restructuring their operations worldwide and reducing operational costs by cutting 4,000 employees from different sites. Your plant was forced to layoff 45 employees out of 380 because of the company cost reduction plan. Although, the plant manager is assuring the employees that there will not be more layoff and the plant is meeting its production targets, there are many rumors going on throughout the plant, including shutting down the plant and moving the operations to Asia or Ireland.

You, as the plant industrial engineer, are working on several cost reduction projects. While revising the time standards of one assembly line, you realize that by installing some new machines in the market and doing some simple changes in the standard procedures, the company could have a net benefit of up to $250,000 annually. However, implementing the changes will result in the reduction of 20 positions from the production lines. What would you do? Do you keep the project to yourself (and work only on the projects that have being assigned to you) or do you communicate your ideas to your boss? Why?