EXAMINING THE RELATIONSHIPS BETWEEN MANUFACTURING AGILITY AND COOPERATION, COMPETITION, AND CONFLICT

Agility theory contends that internal and external cooperation arc essential factors for achieving agility. This study explores the internal aspect of this assertion by examining relationships between manufacturing agility and inter-group cooperation, competition and conflict at the manufacturing plant level. The results are based on a survey administered in 2005 to manufacturing facilities located primarily in the United States. Inter-group relationships are assessed for pairs of functional groups. It also compares results for pairs of groups both located within the manufacturing plant and pairs in which some or all of one group is located at the company headquarters. A simple linear regression model indicates that conflict is significantly related to manufacturing agility, although it accounts for little of the total variation. Analysis of specific functional pairs shows that Management/Production and Purchasing/Production have high levels of cooperation. Surprisingly, inter-group relations were found to be similar when both groups were located in- plant and when some or all of one group was located at headquarters, with two important exceptions: cooperation is significantly impaired for the Production/Production Planning and Control (PPC) pair and the Production/Human Resources (HR) pair when some or all of PPC or HR are located at headquarters. The exploratory findings, from a survey of 54 manufacturing plants, suggest that internal cooperation is not essential to achieving agility, that conflict or the recognition of conflict might be positively associated with agility, and that most dispersed functional groups can have similar inter- group relations as those co-located in the same production facility.