That was a story goes like this…
There was a quality meeting in one big corporate. Due to the parts supplied by one of the suppliers, XYZ Company was not meeting requirements, the quality project manager, Mr. Q called a meeting to discuss this issue. Due to the quality issues had been happening since long ago, the boss of XYZ Company was summoned to attend the meeting. During the meeting, the boss, Mr. B. Boss did not present himself to the meeting, but instead there was another person.
Mr.Q asked the person: "Who are you?".
The guy answered: "I am Alec, from XYZ."
Mr.Q asked: "So, you are the manager of XYZ?"
Alec: "No. I am the office clerk."
Mr. Q stunned for a while, asked: "Where is Mr. B. Boss? Does he aware this is a meeting regarding the quality issue of your products?"
Alec: "My boss told me this is small issue, he will talk to your boss during dinner tonight and settle it."
Mr. Q left the meeting room, and left his resignation letter to his boss' table.
Anyway, that was just a story. Now, back to the news I recently read.
In January 2006, The new MD of Proton told the media that the quality issue is the company first to focus on now. After 20 years in the industry, now only they talk about quality. To be positive, it is never too late to improve the quality of Proton, they just have to work double hard.
How can Proton end up in this way? It was the pride of the nation. Malaysian put so much hopes and faith into Proton, and yet it is so disappointing. We can build up Sepang F1 circuit, but we don't see Proton team in F1 race.
I guess this is what we called "Corporate Complacent", they have been enjoying good life within a protected environment, no competitions at all. They just sit inside air-conditioned rooms because sales came to them easily. They believed all Malaysians only wanted Iswara and Wira. We all have bad experiences with Proton -- arrogant sales people, overpriced and low quality products.
When an old man never goes jogging but today this old man has to compete in marathon. What do you think?
With the newly appointed MD, we still sincerely hope that he can bring Proton back to ground. The road ahead for Proton will not be a joyride and it is definitely more than bumpy. From top to the bottom in Proton has to change the paradigm in their daily work. They must put quality as the first thing in mind.
People won't change until they are facing the critical moment -- do or die, that is the question.
Friday, January 27, 2006
Monday, November 21, 2005
Write up on MAS and Proton Jan 2006
"There are always two sides of story".
This is practically true to the recent corporate scene in Malaysia. Where MAS and Proton are the hot topics in town. People are talking the huge losses in their financial books.
One side of story, MAS is claiming that the hike of oil price causing the shrink of its revenue. The other side of story, Air Asia is giving millions of free tickets to the lucky one. While Proton is having the controvesy of the 1-Euro sales of Agusta, the waiting period for Perodua Myvi is 1 year due to the huge demand from the public.
In many people eyes, MAS and Proton are the spoilt kids. Whenever they loss money, they cry to their parent and ask for even more money, and they spend the money in expensive toys. In order to bring the 2 companies out from trouble and continue to survive in the competitive environment, the managements have to control the costs and try to think out of the box.
Stop the financial assistance from the government will help the 2 GLC companies to grow stronger. It is a tendency that if there is a subsidy given to a company, the company will not take any effective measure to control its costs. Management guru Michael Porter says that one way to stay in the competitive business world is to keep up the cost leadership and try to be differentiated.
No doubt that MAS and Air Asia are having different types of business model. But this does not mean that MAS should operate at high cost. By hiring an experienced person from oil industry, to go into fuel hedging is one of the means to control the cost. MAS must do more than that. The cost can be controlled by reducing the spending on the unnecessary, the fringe benefits for managers. Perhaps, by slimming down the management size would be a feasible option too. Increasing the fare prices is a temporarily solution, this will not ensure MAS's financial figures go back to black if MAS still continue runs on high operation cost. There is not wrong to hire expatriate from other airlines company, but the most important thing is to give substantial authority and free hand should be given to them in order to implement radical changes. Bear in mind that MAS is still facing strong competitors from Cathay Pacific and SIA in this region.
Proton has been in the automobile industry for 20 years. Some of its car model are almost 20 years old and you still can see them in showrooms. The introduction of new car model is slow as compare to its competitors. This is possibly that Proton cannot keep the production cost low. If the sales of the car can cover its cost, Proton should move on to produce another models. Unfortunately, they have been in the industry for 20 years, they can only produce sedan cars. When there are high demand in SUV and MPV, there is nothing from Proton can offer to the market.
There are many people placing their orders for Myvi and the waiting period is now more than 8 months to one year. With my unpleasant experience with Perodua over my order of Myvi, later I find out that there are many unhappy people have cancelled their orders for Myvi. However, I don't see any aggressive action taken by Proton to tap into this group of car buyers. Proton has launched Savvy and another model of Gen-2, but sadly to hear that their sales cannot compete to Myvi. It may be the people perception on Proton's quality, however, this is up to Proton to change the market perception. Besides advertising the high quality of its new car, quick delivery is another good selling point too.
It's time for Proton to think out of the box in order to get back the customers. A massive re-branding exercise for Proton is highly and urgently required. The problem in Proton is that the company always takes the local car buyers for granted. I believe many of us still can recall the arrogance of the salesmen back in the years before 1997. We had to wait for 1 year to get car from Proton. The salesmen spoke the same tone: "if you cannot wait, go and buy other cars!".
The golden day for MAS and Proton is gone, the customers are financially sounded and they have more choices now. Putting all political issues aside. Get down to the serious business.
This is practically true to the recent corporate scene in Malaysia. Where MAS and Proton are the hot topics in town. People are talking the huge losses in their financial books.
One side of story, MAS is claiming that the hike of oil price causing the shrink of its revenue. The other side of story, Air Asia is giving millions of free tickets to the lucky one. While Proton is having the controvesy of the 1-Euro sales of Agusta, the waiting period for Perodua Myvi is 1 year due to the huge demand from the public.
In many people eyes, MAS and Proton are the spoilt kids. Whenever they loss money, they cry to their parent and ask for even more money, and they spend the money in expensive toys. In order to bring the 2 companies out from trouble and continue to survive in the competitive environment, the managements have to control the costs and try to think out of the box.
Stop the financial assistance from the government will help the 2 GLC companies to grow stronger. It is a tendency that if there is a subsidy given to a company, the company will not take any effective measure to control its costs. Management guru Michael Porter says that one way to stay in the competitive business world is to keep up the cost leadership and try to be differentiated.
No doubt that MAS and Air Asia are having different types of business model. But this does not mean that MAS should operate at high cost. By hiring an experienced person from oil industry, to go into fuel hedging is one of the means to control the cost. MAS must do more than that. The cost can be controlled by reducing the spending on the unnecessary, the fringe benefits for managers. Perhaps, by slimming down the management size would be a feasible option too. Increasing the fare prices is a temporarily solution, this will not ensure MAS's financial figures go back to black if MAS still continue runs on high operation cost. There is not wrong to hire expatriate from other airlines company, but the most important thing is to give substantial authority and free hand should be given to them in order to implement radical changes. Bear in mind that MAS is still facing strong competitors from Cathay Pacific and SIA in this region.
Proton has been in the automobile industry for 20 years. Some of its car model are almost 20 years old and you still can see them in showrooms. The introduction of new car model is slow as compare to its competitors. This is possibly that Proton cannot keep the production cost low. If the sales of the car can cover its cost, Proton should move on to produce another models. Unfortunately, they have been in the industry for 20 years, they can only produce sedan cars. When there are high demand in SUV and MPV, there is nothing from Proton can offer to the market.
There are many people placing their orders for Myvi and the waiting period is now more than 8 months to one year. With my unpleasant experience with Perodua over my order of Myvi, later I find out that there are many unhappy people have cancelled their orders for Myvi. However, I don't see any aggressive action taken by Proton to tap into this group of car buyers. Proton has launched Savvy and another model of Gen-2, but sadly to hear that their sales cannot compete to Myvi. It may be the people perception on Proton's quality, however, this is up to Proton to change the market perception. Besides advertising the high quality of its new car, quick delivery is another good selling point too.
It's time for Proton to think out of the box in order to get back the customers. A massive re-branding exercise for Proton is highly and urgently required. The problem in Proton is that the company always takes the local car buyers for granted. I believe many of us still can recall the arrogance of the salesmen back in the years before 1997. We had to wait for 1 year to get car from Proton. The salesmen spoke the same tone: "if you cannot wait, go and buy other cars!".
The golden day for MAS and Proton is gone, the customers are financially sounded and they have more choices now. Putting all political issues aside. Get down to the serious business.
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