Employee participation in Industry 4.0 implementation in lean organisations
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2024-07-11
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en
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In recent years, Industry 4.0 has attained importance within the manufacturing sector. There is an increasing number of Industry 4.0 solutions used to reduce - in lean terms - waste. Central in lean manufacturing and automotive manufacturing is active employee participation. Contrastingly, Industry 4.0 development is anticipated by a change in tasks and requirements for factory workers, which might be in conflict with the interest of employees. The goal of this research is to investigate how employees participate in Industry 4.0 implementation in firms following lean principles. The following research question is used: How do employees participate in Industry 4.0 implementation in firms following lean principles?
Two automotive factories are studied. Using a thematic, qualitative, comparative research design, two forms of employee participation are defined. Twelve semi-structured interviews are conducted. The two forms of employee participation are direct and indirect participation, using both various methods of employee participation. This research shows how employees participate in Industry 4.0 implementation and reveals how employees participate in technological implementation in the eye of lean manufacturing.
This study aims to add knowledge to existing literature on employee participation. As employee participation, continuous improvement and Industry 4.0 have been researched extensively (Arredondo-Méndez et al., 2021; Rittberger & Schneider, 2018; Holtskog, 2013; Singh & Singh, 2015; Rauch et al., 2020; Soukupová, 2020; Vereycken et al., 2021), the focus on lean manufacturing in Industry 4.0 implementation is the main contribution to current literature of this study. Besides this theoretical contribution, results show that institutional context might influence the methods to be used for employee participation.
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Faculteit der Managementwetenschappen