The phone rang. "Hallo, Professional Engineer here. May I help you?” The voice on the other end sounded a bit desperate. "I am JZ, the CEO of a company called RSA Ltd and I am here with my Financial Director PG and my Operations Director TM” We are enquiring whether you would be in a position to visit our works and give us some advice. Our main production unit called the Economy Machine is giving a lot of trouble”. "I’ll be right over” said Engineer.

In the debriefing meeting, Engineer enquired as to the purpose of the machine, the units of production and the throughout rate. "The machine is meant to produce a product called a GDP. We set it up to meet the needs of a market of about 50 million users, and to increase its annual output by 7%. No matter what we do it hardly meets even half of the user market, and is now only increasing by about 2% per year, and is absorbing most of our capital. You can see it needs some fixing, and up to now we have not used any Engineers, only our usual consultants. We think it may be time to consider the views of an Engineer.

Professional Engineer was then permitted to inspect the machine, test various components, take readings and then produce his report, having addressed this complex problem in accordance with the Exit Level Outcomes of the Engineer’s competency criteria. The essential elements of the findings were as follows.

1. The main problem is that the machine has three major functions that are all working against each other, thus stifling GDP at the material mixing stage. The three parts driving these functions are the Free Market Economy device, the SACP device and the COSATU device. Each is directing the raw material into different processes.
   
   
2. There are a large number of components fitted that are not up to the designers’ standards. We have listed many that were selected and fitted based on the coloured boxes that come from the favoured suppliers, and not from those meeting the working requirements in the specifications.
   
   
3. A lot of the raw material feedstock and many of the essential parts and correct spares for the machine have allegedly been removed from the factory, and are unaccounted for in the materials audit we did. It appears no action is ever taken to rectify this.The electrical power to the machine has frequent trips. Switchboard distribution components such as breakers are reset, a dangerous procedure, and no maintenance records are evident on any of the equipment. Much of it has been left in a dysfunctional state. Reviewing the costing records, the energy input price and labour costs have escalated alarmingly and well over the market inflation rate, and productivity of a GDP unit per worker has fallen by 40% over the last 10 years.
   
   
4. We reviewed the company’s annual report to attempt to glean some earlier financial and production records, and noted that the auditors have qualified their audit report every year since 2000.
   
   
5. We noticed that many of the factory workers were not busy, and in enquiring from HR, we were told that the cost of dismissing them is very high and that HR spend most of their time at the CCMA putting the company’s case against workers who have clearly failed to perform. In fact, while writing this report, the machine was stopped and the workers were out on strike apparently demanding a 60% wage increase, free housing, free medical aid and shorter working hours.
   
   
6. We reviewed the qualifications of all employees to evaluate suitability for the operation of a high technology production business and we noted that none of the Directors and Senior Managers has any technical qualifications or experience in GDP production.

Our report accordingly recommends a complete change of management, recruiting and training the appropriately qualified staff, removal of the functions of the SACP and COSATU devices, disposal of all the pirate parts used from the coloured boxes, re-order of the specified parts, the overhaul of the electrical systems, and the immediate introduction of a hire-and-fire labour policy. Without such measures, the machine and the factory will have to close down, with the accompanied non-production of GDP and the increase in unemployed workers. The shareholders need to act to replace the Directors at the next AGM.