Shingo Sugime Yomiuri Shimbun Staff Writer
At a trade school in the Corporate Manufacturing Innovation Division of Matsushita Electric Industrial Co. in Kadoma, Osaka Prefecture, engineers refine their techniques to participate in national and international skills competitions in dozens of categories.
As the young engineers process and assemble machine parts, instructor Masataka Tokunaga, 54, scolds some of them for their "bad posture" and tells them to "work more carefully."
Tokunaga is an experienced engineer acknowledged in 2006 by the Health, Labor and Welfare Ministry for his outstanding skills in machine assembly for special industry. He has worked as an instructor at the workshop, "Gino Dojo," for nine years.
The skills competitions in which these engineers will participate are open to people aged 23 and younger and cover dozens of vocational skills, including lathe work, sheet metal technology, hairdressing and cooking. The National Skills Competition is annually held every autumn, while the World Skills Competition is held overseas every two years.
Three employees are learning techniques and craftsmanship from Tokunaga with the goal of winning medals in machine assembly at the National Skills Competition.
In the machine assembly category, competitors process about 10 machine parts and assemble them within seven hours based on an assigned design. As it requires speed, efficiency and accuracy within one-hundredth of a millimeter, competitors cannot expect to win the top prizes if they are deficient in any of the three.
Tokunaga says the basic attitude of the participants--expressed in such ways as keeping an orderly worktable and personal appearance--is essential, adding that engineers should search not only for techniques, but also skills that reflect their goals.
After graduating from middle school in Matsuyama, Tokunaga entered an institute of the firm in 1969 amid the high-growth period of the Japanese economy, one year before the Japan World Exposition '70 in Osaka. At the time, newly graduated teenage workers were called "golden eggs" because of their potential.
Joining Matsushita after studying at the institute for three years, he participated in the sheet metal processing category in the National Skills Competition in his second year at the firm.
"I was confident of winning a gold medal," he said.
During the competition, he compromised on an aspect of his work and stopped before the time limit. Consequently, he received the silver prize in the category, just two points behind the first-prize winner. He deeply regretted the outcome and realized that a halfhearted attitude was not acceptable in manufacturing.
One day Tokunaga's supervisor, Rikuo Tabuse, 63, noticed that some of his work was sloppy and criticized him for being irresponsible.
Tabuse told him that a good engineer approached everything he manufactured, including prototypes, as if it were actually going to be used.
At age 32, Tokunaga was in charge of developing a quieter washing machine motor. Although he labored over it, he was unable to achieve satisfactory results. However, his supervisor, Hiroshi Harada, 59, pointed out that it was not just a matter of skill, but also a matter of personnel and work procedure, pointing him in the right direction.
Harada, a graduate of the firm's institute who has participated in the National Skills Competition, stressed the importance of planning based on work flow.
Tokunaga realized that he was so obsessed with manual skills that he could not see the big picture.
"Many artisans have learned by watching others," he said.
Manufacturing know-how has been passed from generation to generation since Konosuke Matsushita (1894-1989), the founder of the firm, developed a two-way socket.
In the mid-1990s, malfunctions in a series of Matsushita products prompted the firm to inspect and repair 430,000 units of defective refrigerators and television sets that were potential fire hazards. Meanwhile, the firm was unable to develop a new hit product.
The situation heightened internal criticism in the firm, where many felt manufacturing abilities had declined, a result of skills not being passed down.
In the 20 years after the nation's period of rapid economic growth, Matsushita introduced cutting-edge machines that reduced the need for manual labor, resulting in a decrease in young engineers. Specially reserved train services to transport groups of the "golden eggs," from the country to big cities for mass employment were terminated in 1975.
Matsushita began sending representatives to the National Skills Competition for its first meet in 1963, and has won more than 60 medals.
However, it sent no participant after Tokunaga in 1973 and closed the institute.
With the rapidly changing work environment, there is a strong desire to nurture skilled younger workers before the veteran engineers get too old. The mass retirement of baby boomers, which will start in 2007, is also expected to make it more difficult to pass on the skills to future generations.
In 1998, Matsushita opened the trade school in response to such concerns, and Tokunaga was appointed as an instructor.
In 1999 for the first time in 25 years, Matsushita sent two participants to the National Skills Competition in Shizuoka Prefecture, but neither won prizes. One of the participants, Kentaro Nakamura, 27, collapsed in tears at his hotel after the event, apologizing and explaining that his nervousness caused him to draw a blank during the competition.
Tokunaga also regretted not giving them sufficient training before sending them to compete.
To prevent a similar outcome, he began visiting his counterparts at firms that regularly participated in the competitions, such as Toyota Motor Corp., Nissan Motor Co., Denso Corp. and other firms.
Although Tokunaga did not learn their training methods, which are company secrets, he found they had the common goal of nurturing young people to lead the nation.
Introducing Zen sitting meditation and Self-Defense Forces training to the trade school's program, Tokunaga found ways to strengthen the mental agility and technical skills of his students.
His efforts paid off when Matsushita employees won a bronze medal and gold medal in 2000 and 2001, respectively. In 2003, they won gold medals in the machine assembly and milling machine divisions.
Matsushita Chairman Kunio Nakamura, 67, who helped the company recover by implementing sweeping reforms, told him the results were "good news," and thanked him for the effort.
The trade school became a symbol of Matsushita's revived manufacturing skill.
Yusuke Kageyama, 21, a Matsushita employee, won a bronze medal in 2005 and a silver medal the following year at the competition. This year, he is shooting for the gold.
He discovered the rewards of manufacturing when he designed a vending machine as a third-year student of an industrial high school in Shimane Prefecture.
After completing one year of basic training at Matsushita, he entered the trade school after being interviewed by Tokunaga and others, based on his dexterity and physical strength.
Kageyama still remembers the words he heard from Tokunaga when he first entered the school: "Winning medals is not our goal. The purpose of the training is to nurture employees who can show strong leadership in manufacturing. Acquiring skills is not enough."
Eleven employees have already graduated from the trade school to work in various divisions. They will play a leading role in teaching their skills to other workers.
Nakamura, one of the first employees to study at the trade school, is still working on a manufacturing line, but hopes to maintain the skills and work ethic he learned at the school and pass them down to others.
Believing improving technical capability is the only way to compete against foreign companies that manufacture products at low cost, Japanese firms are now reviewing their manufacturing and training environments.
"For the manufacturer, passing on the skills is a way to nurture human resources to develop products that will help society," Tokunaga said.
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