This document discusses ways to optimize human resources and methods to improve productivity. It focuses on motivating employees according to their individual needs, as described in Maslow's hierarchy of needs. Motivation techniques include addressing basic needs, providing job security, fostering social belonging, recognizing esteem needs, and allowing autonomy. The document also outlines additional productivity strategies like respecting employee status, providing certainty, fostering relatedness, ensuring fairness, and giving regular feedback. Methods to improve productivity include reducing defects, designing mistake-proof processes, following a plan-do-check-act cycle, removing process inefficiencies, enforcing correct procedures, and driving continuous improvement.

2. The process of production involves
Material
Machine
Men Methods
4M:

3. The productivity enhancement can be achieved only if there is
optimisation achieved in all the four processes.
In this discussion we will focus only on MEN and METHODS
and see how these two factors of production can be optimised to
achieve the highest productivity.
Here we use the term MEN to describe all human power –
male and female, managers, workers and so forth.
To achieve optimization in manpower utilization we need to
keep the team motivated. We can motivate a person only if we
address the “ need “ of a person. In other words, we should
identify and understand the need of the person and address
that particular need, only then that person gets motivated.

4. Dr. Abraham Maslow’s in his
theory of “need
hierarchy”, mentioned various
needs of the people and how
to motivate the people based
on their specific need(s).

5. Basic
Needs
Security
Needs
Social
Needs
Esteem
Needs
Self Actualisation
Need
According to Maslow :

6. Some people are motivated by “Basic needs” like food, clothes etc. In other
words, to motivate this segment of people to achieve the maximum
productivity, we need to provide them the basic things like food, clothing etc.
Some people are motivated by “Security needs” like shelter, old-age
pension, sickness benefits etc., for these people we need to give them security
feeling like “long term employment” in order to motivate and get maximum
productivity out of them.
Some people are motivated by “Social needs” like belonging to a group of
people, who speak same language, who come from same place or caste, religion
etc., for this segment of people, where they work and to whom they report to is
more important. If we change their group or their boss, their productivity may
suffer.Some people are motivated by “Esteem needs” like respect, respectable job
title, recognition and awards etc., for this segment of the people, how they are
treated at the work place both by the colleagues and the superiors are more
important. A good job title, separate cabin, recognition in a peer group meetings etc
will motivate them and increase their productivity.

7. Some people are motivated by “Self Actualisation need” like doing highly
creative, challenging jobs, solving very complex issues, negotiating a big
deal, establishing a new unit etc. In order to get the maximum productivity out of
this segment of people the manager has to give them lot of freedom and
independence, allow them to learn on the job, give them clear cut target in terms of
time, money and mission.
In short, to get maximum out of the team members, the manager should tailor his
approach to each and every member of the team. The manager should not go “ this
is my style” .He has to change his approach suiting to individual needs in order to
get the maximum productivity out of each of the team members.
The manager should focus on the strengthening the team. It is said that the strength
moves from bottom to top like in pyramid. For instance, the manger would be
strong as long as his team member is strong. In order to get maximum productivity
of the team, individuals in the teams should be made to be strong and highly
motivated.

8. “Work is logical but worker is a psychological”. Here “worker” refer to all human
capital. In order to get maximum productivity from the human capital we need to
approach them in a “psychological way” only.
Dr. David Rock has given some more “techniques” to enhance the
productivity of the people further, apart from motivation; he calls it
“SCARF (F)”.
“S” stands for “Status”. Team members do their best, when their “status” is
respected. If they feel their status is challenged they feel like victim and quit the
team. The status could have been gained from their achievements in the past, their
qualifications, their special skills etc.
“C” stands for “Certainty”. Team members want to be certain about their work;
about their position; responsibility; reporting relationships etc... If there is lot of
change and if it is too often, the team members lose their morale and motivation.

9. “R” stands for “Relatedness”. The team members should feel that they “have a
part” in teams performance; this will increase their motivation and productivity.
Thus, daily meetings, weekly meetings have very important role to play to increase
productivity.
“F” stands for “Fair”. The teams members should feel that all of them are treated
equally well without any bias or partiality. This will increase their sense of
belonging and improve their output.
“(F)” the additional “F” stands for “Feedback”. The teams members should feel
that they are on the right track and their progress contributes to the overall goal of
the company. Timely feedback to the members on their performance or lack of
it, will tune them more towards achieving productivity and excellence.
“A” stands for “Autonomy”. Team members perform well, if they are given
autonomy to decide their priorities and operations. If the boss has an attitude and
forces them to do things as per his wish and priorities, the team members may lose
their drive to achieve better. They always wait for the boss’s instructions to do even
a mundane routine function.

10. METHODS of optimization to enhance productivity :
In simple terms the productivity is higher, when higher output is achieved with
lesser input. The productivity is higher when the quantity and the quality are
higher. There are certain process approaches which are followed in many industries
all over the world to increase the quantity and quality of the output.
3D approach: The workers have to be goaded “not to produce Defects; not to
accept Defects; not to pass Defects”. This calls for empowerment of the line
operators so that they feel responsible to stop the defects at their work
station, instead of allowing to go through the entire production process and get
rejected finally. This will save lot of material and man power.
(1)
(2)
Autonomation: Toyota has brought this system, in which the process is
designed as “mistake-proof” . The operator “ can not” do the mistake at all.
Efforts to design the process in such a way that there is no scope for error, will
certainly increase the productivity.

11. PDCA it stands for Plan, Do, Check and Action (again). The productivity
improves when the process is first Planned very thoroughly and then carried
out (Do) as per the process plan. Check the outcome periodically and take
corrective Actions immediately. Resume the Action again, once the root cause
of the deviations identified and addressed.
(3)
Removing the Slack: The process which has slack, like lot of internal
transportation, storage of WIP, product correction etc. reduces the productivity.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rva3wRvpS_4
See the above video link, where by reducing the distance between two
operators, process cycle has been reduced from 35 seconds to less than 1
second.
(4)
Shitsuke - this is the 4th “S” of “5 S”. It means correct process. The team
should follow the correct process in order to increase the productivity. This
takes lot of discipline from the top to enforce the process at all levels.
(5)
Kaizen – the excellence is achieved only if there is continuous improvement in
all process involved . This calls for commitment from top to bottom of
the organisation .
(6)