Conference 7.286::digital

    I have seen this in the ABO plant.  Which country is starting this
    program and how is one able to make a suggestion (I would like to
    use this myself)?  Back to the program in ABO, they have forms and
    suggestion boxes all around the plant.  Talk to them. 

    Your ENTIRE country?    ROM01 is Rome, no?   so, if you come up
    with a great suggestion, it benefits DEC and Ferrari, and Fimi,
    etc. ?
    
   	-DM-

    re:  "Has this been done before?":
    
    Yes.  Many companies (including DEC) have instituted employee
    suggestion programs in recent  years.   Some have gone _much_ further
    and actually solicit and value the input of employees from _all_
    levels in problem solving and decision making.
    
    My Master's Degree thesis (which is about half complete) is based 
    on research on employee involvement programs.  I will make sure to 
    publish the relevant findings in this conference in about six months.
    
   	Don Montgomery

    re: 836.2 
    

    >Your ENTIRE country?    ROM01 is Rome, no?   so, if you come up
    >with a great suggestion, it benefits DEC and Ferrari, and Fimi,

    yes, ROM01 is Rome, the program is country (italy) wide
    it has been pilot_started by Field Service.
    
    Bruno

My nephew picked up $18,000 on a sugestion award at IBM.

Bob

  GE (at least some plants) has had a suggestion program for 25+ years. Some
people have gotten large cash awards and the company has saved millions of
dollars. 
  When I joined DEC 12 years ago, I was surprised when I found out there was
no suggestion program. Seven years ago, while visiting the Mill, I saw a
suggestion box near the upper Thompson St. lobby. But I have never worked in a
DEC plant that had a formal suggestion program. Once I asked my supervisor
why there was no suggestion program and he said, "If you have a good idea,
please tell me. If your idea is not relevant to this group, find the right
person and tell him or her." There are three reasons why this is not enough:
1. It may take a lot of time and trouble to find the right person to give a
suggestion to, and most of us don't have the time.
2. If a suggestion goes to the wrong person, it will probably not be seriously
considered.
3. Unless the suggester personally implements the suggestion, he/she is less
likely to get recognition for it.
  Some DEC plants have a "rewards and recognition" program. This is not the same
as a suggestion program. For example, if I have a bright idea about how to save
tens of thousands a year in air conditioning costs, my boss isn't going to let
me spend 16 hours a week for a month putting this idea into practice. Therefore
I won't get an award from the Rewards & Recognition program for it.

    	In SW Florida the suggestions come out at unit meetings and
    go to the Unit Manager, and then the branch manager, and then they die.
    In all reality I don't know where they go but you never have any
    changes made.
    
    	Does DIGITAL have any program that anybody knows about ?
    
    	If so please post it. I do have some suggestion on contract
    administration, and other time wasting procedures DEC Field Service
    currently uses.

    McDonalds is a good example of Employee Suggestion success. Practically
    everything from the "Big Mac" to "Ronald McDonald" himself is the
    result of employee suggestions.
    
    Gerry

    
    Suggestion Programs in my belief or for thought thieves, I have
    had several ideas taken utilized and then the manager gets the 
    credit and the pat on the back... if you trust'em use'em but watch
    your back.
    
    paul

    Re: .9
    
             What a Kroc!
    

    In the spirit of cost cutting/saving,here is a suggestion that could
    save DEC some money:
    Once a week,facilities could wash company cars.
    This is no joke.
    If you think it would or wouldn't work,tell me so.
    If this has been suggested before,tell me *that* too.
    
    
    Ken

    Hey Ken, here's a revolutionary thought: once a week EMPLOYEES could
    wash their company cars.
    
    
    						- andy

    re .13:
    	From what I hear, they can now, and have been able to for at least
    a year (get the car washed once a week), and get reimbursed for it.
    
    	If your point is for Digital to come across with a better image,
    I agree (and Field service could clean up the back of those station
    wagons that look like junk piles :-)).
    
    bjm

    RE:.13
    >>> Hey Ken, here's a revolutionary thought: once a week EMPLOYEES
    could wash their company cars.
               ------------------
    
    If DEC gives me a car I'll wash it! ;^)
    
    Ben

    .14>    	If your point is for Digital to come across with a better image,
    
    Exactly!
    
    re:Andy and his suggestion about employees washing their own cars.
    
    Since someone else besides me owns the car and gets benefits from it
    (What do you think,DEC lets me drive their car out of some sense of
    kindness?) I would think that keeping it clean would be *their* concern.
    Of course,employees like me can go on having the car washed at a
    carwash.My suggestion was merely a money saving idea.
    
    Ken

    
    I was only semi-serious...
    

Digital will reimburse you for car washes once a week, or every other week,
(depending on whom you ask).  This could be $125 (or $250) per year, or 
more, at local New England prices.

I wash my car at home during the warm months because it's fun for the kids
and it saves a few bucks on expenses.


Hewlett-Packard has a a rather large field facility across South Bedford
Street from our facility (OFO) and they have a free standing car wash 
machine in their parking lot for their company cars.  So I guess they 
found it to be more cost-effective...
there's an urban legend in our building that one of our sales reps drove
his Taurus in there and the operator, realizing that he was a ringer, 
applied the soap and then told him to get lost!


The original suggestion is not a bad idea for a facility with enough cars to
justify it enough space to put it.  A master contract with a local car wash 
might also work.
\Gary

    re:suggestion programs
    
    	Most companies do have employee suggestion programs. They include
    everything from production to safety to energy. Most other companies
    have mutiple layer forms that require the suggestor to write or
    type the suggestion. The reason is to keep the system honest. Once
    an employee submits the idea, it has to travel the chain because
    the employee keeps a copy of the suggestion. Most often, ideas of
    less than $1000 a year savings are rewarded with a trinket and
    acknowledement. The programs have grades and levels that require
    different levels of management review. Big dollar items that save
    hundreds of thousands or millions of dollars are cash awards, trips,
    added vacation, and patents in some cases.
    
    	I also worked at GE and won 6-7 cash awards for ideas. The largest
    award I ever received was $1500 and the smallest was an infant's
    dinner tray. Two friend of mine split the largest award that was
    allowed under the program (at the time - 1976) $25,000. The company
    was flooded with nearly 5000 suggestions at our site (1200 employees)
    in the following 6 months. 
    
    	It works. It's beneficial to the company and employee. The problem
    with doing it at DEC is that a special department would have to
    be created and 2 years of meetings would have to be scheduled to
    approve a suggestion.......
    
    Ken 

    e: .20
    
    Don,
    
    About a year ago, when I was in PSS, I received a memo stating that we
    could expense 1 car wash a week on our plan B cars.  Now, I never used
    it, because it was my car and it never, ever will see the inside of a
    car wash.
    
    Now, I'm in a DCC and I get my plan A car washed every few weeks and
    expense it.
    
    Bob