Thriving on interdependence: The key to JIT implementation

Since Japanese firms have outperformed their American and European rivals in a range of industries, Japanese manufacturing techniques have justifiably been widely and intensively studied and analyzed. Rather than view the excellence in manufacturing demonstrated by some Japanese firms as comprising a catalog of techniques, the authors have tried to identify a unifying strand. They offer tighter interdependence within the firm between manufacturing operations as the cardinal concept underlying successful manufacturing. This article discusses the types of interdependence in manufacturing and provides a stepwise approach to implementation.