Suicide: The Cost of Poor Quality?
Perhaps Zhang Shuhong's taking of his own life will convince others in China's toy business to think twice before shipping contaminated products. According to MSNBC, Shuhong "committed suicide, a state-run newspaper said Monday ... Zhang Shuhong, who ran the Lee Der Industrial Co. Ltd., killed himself at a warehouse over the weekend, days after China announced it had temporarily banned exports by the company, the Southern Metropolis Daily said." In my view, even though suicide is never admirable -- or acceptable, as it has been in some Asian cultures historically -- perhaps this will serve as the wake-up call that other low-cost, low-margin margin suppliers need to hear about the seriousness with which the Chinese authorities are coming down on individuals associated with scandals. Clearly, the pressure Shuhong felt was not just coming from shareholders or his customers.
- Jason Busch
- Jason Busch
Thanks for being my conscience. I whipped that post together too quickly without thinking through it. I deleted the offending areas of the post and rewrote the ending of it. The version everyone sees now should reflect this.
Mark, thank you.
- Reduce their famously high quality standards?
- Change their supplier management approaches on the Mainland (from ROW)?
- Make a bet like this without significant analysis (e.g., why not India -- surely, a ton of thought was put into this decision over other low-cost regions)?
As a Honda owner -- a loaded Honda, with more bells and whistles to go wrong with it than any other vehicle I've owned -- I can say that the car has not had A SINGLE problem in the 12 months I've owned it. I've had BMWs and Mercedes going back to late 70s models before this, so I know quality -- and junk, based on some real lemons I've had -- when I see it. Would Honda bet the farm on their quality reputation without serious analysis? I doubt it.
Just my 2 cents ...
BTW: The cross-post reference here is:
http://www.spendmatters.com/index.cfm/2007/8/10/Gl...
I doubt as well, that Honda made that step without major analysis. But that is probably the big difference between an big player and a medium sized company. Honda can afford the analysis. They have people, who know the cultural differences. When they open up their calculation, there are not many unknown factors left.
In my opinion, not every company can follow here the leaders, as they do not have the ressources - and then it becomes very fast a big misinvestment ... Of course you do not read too often about that, as companies tend to report about their sucess stories, but not their flop stories ...