I. Management Features

1. Plastic processing solution business

They process plastics and make a wide variety of parts. When you think of plastic processing, molding comes to mind, but they cut, bend, and bond. Unlike molding that mass-produces using molds, it is a high-mix low-volume production, and one-item production accounts for half of the production, and the monthly production reaches 1,000 types. 500 companies are registered as customers, and 100 companies place orders each month.

Products are mainly equipment parts. Half of the equipment parts are related to semiconductors, and there are also plating, automobile parts, aviation, medical, light electrical, printing, robots, and hydrogen energy related. They wanted to keep semiconductor-related sales at 30%, but the proportion increased due to the Covid-19 crisis.

The company receives orders such as "customers cannot process them, or even if they do, the cost is high, or they cannot afford the time for technological development." So, it is a solution business related to plastic processing.

The first is precision processing technology. Since plastic expands and contracts with temperature, it is difficult to meet strict dimensional tolerances. Therefore, they built a 25℃ constant temperature factory. Air conditioning is required, but the air is forced out of the floor through the groundwater, complementing the electric cooling and saving the electricity bill.

The second is technological development capabilities. According to President Isomura, the company is able to cut from extremely hard plastics such as CFRP to fluffy materials similar to rubber, as they are "Perfectionists about cutting process." They are also developing a processing method that does not generate burrs, called “burr-less processing”. Precision is required due to the integration and miniaturization of parts, and it is no longer possible to remove burrs by hand. It is achieved by devising how to make the blade and the direction in which the blade is moved. Technological development is carried out by collecting knowledge on site.

In a bright factory that exceeds the JIS standard of 500 lux, it is possible to visually check the burrs. The technology of the company has been advanced by showing customer's needs in a tangible form. A pamphlet of the company describes burr-less processing as "Our technology is only what we have gained by having our customers train us. Please continue to ask us any unreasonable questions.” As their job is to solve "impossible problems", the processing unit price is roughly as desired. However, this is not always the case, as orders from major companies are based on matching estimates.

The sales were 651 million yen in 2018, 554 million yen in 2019, 522 million yen in 2020, and 731 million yen in 2021. Prior to the recovery from the Great Recession of the Japanese economy due to the Covid-19 crisis, last year's sales exceeded the pre-Covid-19 disaster sales.

2. History from Founding the company

In 1978, the father of the current president, Mr. Isomura Yoshitaka, became independent from a plastic processing company and started his own business. He made store equipment from acrylic sheets. Hearing from customers that industrial products would increase in the future, the factory was expanded in 1984. He hired "craftsmen" and started cutting with lathes and milling machines. In 1985, he established Sun Jushi Processing Co., Ltd. (changed to Sunjushi Co., Ltd. in 2017). In the same year, when he installed a machining center, he was able to achieve sales for a week in one day, so he introduced another one (1988). However, when the bubble economy burst, the number of employees, which had increased to 20, was reduced to six. He had the potential young people quit, leaving six people of his father's age.

The current president, Mr. Isomura, graduated from university in 1995, but perhaps because he had been in university for seven years, he had nowhere to go, and his father asked him to help him with his work. Until then, he thought the company was a 3K (hard, dirty, dangerous) workplace, and it was not a place for university graduates to go. His mother also said, "Don't be like your father." However, when he helped with the work as a part-timer, he found, "It was really fun." He remembered that when he was a child, he was good at drawing. His wife, who was a classmate in high school and is now managing director, also said he was good at it.

At his father's company, the customers who receive the products processed by the craftsmen say thank you to them and leave, and the craftsmen are arrogant. The material costs 500 yen, and the craftsman processed it in 1 hour and sells it for 10,000 yen. If it can be processed faster, it will be more profitable. Intrigued, he joined the company with his wife in 1996 at age 27.

When he joined the company, he didn't have a title and was called "Taro-san" by the employees. A customer said to the president, "Why don't you give him a job title?", so he "got" the title of "Managing Director". Around the year 2000, his father was diagnosed with cancer, so he assumed the role of acting president.

The first thing that surprised him after joining the company was the aging of the workforce. Believing that there would be no future for the company unless he hired young people, he made it his mission to develop new orders and engage in recruitment activities. The factory was also terrible. He was asked by an old craftsman what he thought of toilets. It was a rental factory, so it was a temporary toilet for 15 years. The first goal for him was to create a factory with clean toilets.

He had to make money for that. He decided to do a job that other people couldn't do, and started sales activities with the motto "Don't say you can't do it." 10 years after joining the company, in 2006, a new factory and office were built separately from the rental factory. Thanks to that, the number of applications to join the company increased, and he selected and hired three young people who seemed to have guts. However, they soon lost their motivation and left the company one after another in less than a year (2007).

II. Features of Labor Management

I. They quit because they had no common purpose

He asked the last person to quit what he didn't like, who replied, “The pay was better than the previous company, and overtime work was paid without fail. The job was interesting. (President Isomura says that this is because the work “integrates concept and execution.” See below) The work place was air conditioned, clean toilets, and a good working environment. But he didn’t like the company.” The President couldn't understand what he was saying.

As long as get paid and the work is fun, it shouldn't matter. This idea made him think about what a company is for the first time, but he couldn't figure it out. So, he asked the old employees why they thought they were quitting.

Two of them said it was because young people today don't have guts. One of them said that he has guts so he can endure the MD (managing director)'s insults. If MD brings in young people, he has to teach them, and his productivity drops. He told MD not to hire young people and he would work 1.5 times as much.

The third person said, "MD talks only about money, so the young people quit, and I don't like it." He was referring to the MD's words that if a defect were to appear, the material would be wasted, resulting in a loss of so and so yen. He didn't mean to be obsessed with money. All he wanted to do was put in good machines and make the factory a good place to meet the needs of customers, and he wanted to pay a high salary. His feelings were not communicated to them at all. He even thought that it would be better to do a job that he liked by himself, but he had just built a factory for 100 million yen. He couldn't do it alone. He joined the SME Doyukai (2006) because of these concerns.

The remarks from a fourth employee gave him a turning point. “I like my job and my MD, and I intend to work hard, but I don’t know what will come after working hard." t that time, he was working hard to increase sales. However, he realized that it was not so important for the employees to grow the company, and that they were expected to work together to accomplish a single task or to do a job with a sense of accomplishment. In this company, workers work autonomously. If a drawing is assigned, the worker envisions how the work will be done, and carries out integrated processing up to the final process (however, in recent years, the division of labor has been adopted as the workers have become younger).

Labor in which conception and execution are separated is a hard labor called forced labor for workers, but in labor in which both are unified, the worker is the main character, and through work, they can satisfy the innate human desires of autonomy and competence. For workers, this is a non-economic reward called "job satisfaction." Autonomous labor of the company is based on high-mix low-volume production at SMEs. It can be said that this is a privilege unique to SMEs that is not possible for large companies.

But the enterprise is a working community. Autonomous labor systems are treasures, but people also find joy in pursuing goals together while helping each other. The company did not have a sufficient system for that purpose, and there was an aspect of a disjointed group of craftsmen. The fourth employee pointed out this problem.

2. Creation of Management Policy and Vision

From this employee's words, he realized the importance of the management guidelines recommended by the Doyukai, and studied and created the guidelines. It was an A4 sheet, not perfect, not elaborated. When he read the labor-management opinion for the first time at a training session of the Doyukai, he felt that he hadn't really thought about it as a business owner. Under such circumstances, the Lehman shock occurred and sales decreased by 80% in a single month. In order to rebuild the company, he ran around to sales, and in May 2009, he became President, and at this time he created a management philosophy that continues today.

~We will become the sun that shines by ourselves~

We will make the world's dreams come true with the power of manufacturing.

We will create a company where the lives of irreplaceable individuals shine.

We nurture the culture of manufacturing and revitalize the region.

The philosophy was created by the president, but the specific vision for the future was created by a project team with the participation of the president after listening to the opinions of all employees.

Work began in 2008, and in 2009, the company announced its vision for 2015, including the construction of a new factory to replace the old rental factory.

When they were discussing the vision together, he often wondered, "Is this what employees are thinking?"

Until then, there was no idea of ​​incorporating the opinions of employees.

He didn't think the employees were thinking about anything either.

He thought it was up to him to decide what to do with the company.

A management philosophy and vision were created, and the goals that everyone pursued became clear, and the atmosphere changed.

3. Falling into the sales-first trap again

In 2009, he also participated in the joint recruitment of the Doyukai, aiming to acquire new graduates. Due to the recession, there were 1,700 student visitors and 40 participating companies, with long lines for their booths. However, because they were busy and did not prepare, there were no students who visited the company. They were able to talk to only six students who were brought by a member of the Doyukai who felt sorry for them, but the result was zero. The employee who accompanied him told that our salary was not bad, but the result was such a miserable result. In the car on the way home, he continued to get angry at the President who didn't prepare.

From the next year some began to join the company and became the current core employee. They came in after seeing the Management Philosophy and Vision. He thought that what he had learned at the Doyukai had started to work for him, but it was naive. Six employees quit in 2015, including four new graduates.

Sales were declining, so he was forcibly asking employees to increase sales. The direct cause was that senior employees neglected to give guidance to newcomers as they continued to be busy and did not have time to spare. The employee who was hired in 2006 quit because of the sales-first management behavior, but he fell into the same trap again.

4. Organization, Information sharing

But there were also organizational problems behind it. The problem of fragmented craftsmen was still unresolved.

The organizational management of the company had good communication between the president and employees, with the president having dinner with everyone twice a year and grasping the problem from each person's talk. This is an advantage of SMEs, but they were "skipped in the middle" and did not develop leaders. In addition, the work was a rewarding system in which each person was entrusted with how to do it, but the information that each person had was not shared.

Processing methods that worked well were not shared, and there were times when failures occurred in the same places, and new employees were taught different processing methods by senior employees. The increasing number of employees of different ages, combined with the fact that communication between employees is not going well, and the lack of relationships among employees were the underlying causes of the six resignations. A management philosophy and future vision were created, but the system for pursuing them as a labor community was incomplete.

First of all, he decided to stop "skipping in the middle". The organization of the company can be simplified as <president-group-team> (for example, there are "machining team", "plate processing team" and "lathe team" under the manufacturing group), but the president decided to hold a weekly executive meeting with the group leaders and discussed any minor issues there. Instead, they do not directly ask about requests from below. He decided to receive all requests from the team leader and below through the group leader. After continuing for about two years, the coordination of ideas between the group leader and the president became smoother, and the "executives meeting" came to be formalized within the company.

However, since the team leader is not yet functioning and there is no coordination of ideas with the President, there are problems such as the on-site information not being well received and top management's policies not being communicated to the work site, and developing team leaders is a challenge for the company.

They are also promoting the standardization of processing methods that have been entrusted to individuals, which are the basics of 1,000 types of work per month. In the past, there were work manuals for specific products, but they were not applicable to the processing of other products. This also means formalizing an information sharing loop between workers. Previously, the information sharing loop between workers was done through informal verbal communication, but as the number of workers increased, it became difficult to communicate. Although there was some resistance to the standardization of work, they explained the significance of this change, and after a year of convincing them, they moved to implement it. With this, newcomers can now perform the same work regardless of who teaches them.

At present, in the manufacturing group, each team has a target for the skills of the members for each process. This is a verbalization of the worker's "single-fledged model," which shares the growth goals of each worker and aims to improve skills as a labor community. There is a history of incorporating the division of labor into the work that was originally processed by individuals, and there is also a meaning to repair the harmful effects of the division of labor by work sharing.

The company also promoted the sharing of management information. The annual management policy is created by the officers and four group leaders, but the annual management plan for each group is created with the participation of the group leader, team leader, and all team members.

Management results are shared with all members at monthly reporting meetings. Information such as financial performance, production output, defect information, progress status of each team, employees' paid leave, overtime hours, etc. are all shared.

5. Autonomy and Community

No one comes to the company saying they want to be a craftsman. The reason for joining the company is that it is a “homely company”. Applicants' impressions when they visited the company," I thought manufacturing should be done without talking, however, I got the impression that this is a company where anybody can talk to anyone.”, "When I joined the company, all the seniors actually taught me kindly."

This seems to indicate that the relationship between employees has become closer. A traditional feature of the company has been an autonomous labor system in which conception and execution are integrated. It can be said that the company is headed towards a labor community where both autonomy and community are compatible by covering it with close relationships between employees through organization and information sharing.

Conclusion: Technology is what makes it interesting

People who joined the company who were fascinated by the "at home" atmosphere also enjoyed the work of deciphering the drawings, developing them into parts, and making them. Some have their first product in their pocket. President Isomura says that it is important for employees to feel this fun, and that it is important to accumulate fun. However, it used to take 3 years for a newcomer to become a full-fledged person, and now it takes 5 years. According to Managing Director Isomura, the technology has become more sophisticated, but it seems that the desire to grow is waning. She worries that there is something in today's society that deprives people of their natural motivation.

President Isomura says that even if the company's employees were to move to other companies, he would like them to grow up to be human beings who can be accepted in society, so that people would say that SunJushi has something unique to them.