NISSAN, TENNESSEE

...Quality and productivity have reportedly matched or surpassed Japanese levels...

...Management has broken the work force down into small groups, which keeps workers isolated from other groups...

...People are our most valued resource," the Nissan creed read...

...Four years later, the mystique that once surrounded Nissan has dissolved...

...They don't try to tell you that you can't go to the bathroom," says Boyd...

...But most of the difficulties stem from the plant itself...

...They're pushed to the limit," he says...

...It's a total nightmare," says Dixon...

...And Nissan management has added a car line, the Sen-tra, and a second shift, boosting its investment to $850 million and employment to 3,300...

...He told us basically that he liked to see people with smiling faces, and if you can't come in here and smile, get out," recalls MacArthur...

...By all external measures, Nissan's Smyrna plant is a success...

...The superiority of this Japanese approach to management was accepted as gospel by most Americans...

...He filed charges before the National Labor Relations Board that he was fired for union activities, but his case was dismissed...

...Finally, Bowman was allowed to see a doctor, who ordered him off work for five weeks and restricted him to light labor when he returned...

...As many as 250,000 Americans now work in these plants, and that number is likely to surpass one million in the next decade...

...In a talk with the engineering department after the attitude survey was released, Jerry Benefield, Nissan's vice president of manufacturing, upbraided the employees...

...The pressure intensified after Nissan began a program of awarding merit points to work groups for accident-free production...

...Distrust and fear pervade the plant...

...Bowman pressed himself, dreading the thought of another layoff...

...Selected from a pool of 130,000 applicants after an endless battery of interviews and tests, many had vaulted from minimum wage or unemployment to one of the best-paying jobs in Tennessee...

...Several weeks after he got back to work, he was transferred to the Sentra trim line, where he installed radios and performed three or four other tasks on a ninety-second cycle...

...It is because they are tightly controlled, subjected to strict and unquestioned hierarchy, and pressed by their peers in small, highly competitive work groups...

...This policy has been abandoned, and work loads have steadily increased, especially over the last two years...

...Most of all, there is an expectation-common in Japan—of loyalty, gratitude, and enthusiasm from the employees, deWorkers are urged to restrict their intake of liquids so they won't have to go to the bathroom while on shift...

...Research for this article was supported, in part, by grants from The Dick Goldensohn Fund and Essential Information, Inc...

...He had collected only $29 a week in workers' compensation payments, and his wife had just had a baby...

...After observing the underbody line where engines are installed in the Sentra sedan, a Japanese quality supervisor took Harding aside and told him, in his broken English, "You're crazy...

...But it's too easy to blame former Ford managers...

...Employees who speak up "are identified as having an attitude problem," Harding says...

...In Japan, we have twenty-two...

...He would say things like, 'Jackie's bones are getting old,' or, 'Jackie's got a little ache, so he's going to the doctor again.' " Dixon was reassigned to a job supplying the assembly line with parts...

...Employees would call Harding on the phone and begin weeping...

...Me and my granddaddy don't get on too well," Bowman says, so he left the farm and headed for Smyrna...

...Once the plant started operating, Dixon assumed he would check and repair engines...

...We hired exceptionally good people, people we thought we could keep for the rest of their working lives," he recalls...

...they are a natural consequence of the Nissan system...

...There was a relief man right there, but they had said at the morning meeting that people were abusing their breaks...

...Employees are called "technicians" and are organized in small, closely supervised work groups...

...Peter Harding (not his real name) came to Nissan five years ago with decades of experience in the auto industry...

...John Junkerman, a free-lance writer in So-merville, Massachusetts, reported on labor-management relations at Nissan for PBS's "Frontline" in 1984...

...Nobody can whup us.' " Later that day, Dixon was fired for threatening his supervisor and insubordination...

...Many employees have chosen to leave...

...I was following the open-door policy, but from then on, the judgment fell on me...

...It was like he was saying, 'I'm Nissan...

...The human-resource people would try to get on the employees' good side, get them to open up to them," says Larry Mac-Arthur (not his real name), a manager in the engineering department...

...It seems so far out, but it's the damn truth...

...In parts of the plant, employees have to run from one task to the next to keep up with the line...

...Intended as employee advocates, "now they are nothing more than a Gestapo for management," says Harding...

...Former supervisor Peter Harding recalls at least fifteen times when employees with complaints were transferred to the most difficult jobs in the plant, without rotation, for months at a time...

...He's lost thirty pounds, he's had a shoulder operation, and now he's taking medication for his hand...

...There's a pretense of 'family' at Nissan, and workers are forced to put on a good face...

...As soon as people are injured, they have no use for them," says Harding...

...I didn't want to be laid off again...

...You had to be real fast...

...Many of the people got their jobs at Nissan through relatives or friends," Turner points out...

...Younger, less qualified workers landed the job he thought he deserved...

...But word that he was a troublemaker followed him...

...Not only is it a "right-to-work" state...

...They'll say, 'Get him the hell outta here.' It's hard for me to believe it, and I have seen it...

...Now "it's got such a bad reputation, it's pathetic...

...One explanation is that many of the senior company officials, including President Marvin T. Runyon, are former Ford Motor autocrats who brought with them the worst tendencies of traditional American management...

...I wish I had never heard of Nissan...

...And the next thing you know, your boss is calling you into the office...

...it also has weak or nonexistent statutory protection for workers who are injured or sexually harassed on the job...

...Even co-workers are suspicious of each other...

...When the Smyrna plant opened as the largest single Japanese investment in the United States, it was hailed as a model of nessee worker-management cooperation...

...Instead of reporting injuries to first aid, employees will work with injured wrists, hands, and elbows...

...It was the hardest line," Bowman recalls...

...Why has Nissan strayed so far from its benign image of cooperative management...

...It was achieved the old-fashioned way-through the speed-up...

...What they preached at the beginning, it would have been a beautiful company, but it is absolutely the worst company I have ever worked for...

...A year or so after joining Nissan, Bowman started attending union meetings and talking with other employees about the United Auto Workers...

...Today, they are more likely to whisper sympathetically, "I hear they're killing you out there...

...Instead, he was placed on the assembly line...

...Now Jerry Bowman spends his days trapping fox in the woods around War-trace and runs a video store at night...

...If you don't think exactly like they do, you're out of the ballpark...

...The media, from 60 Minutes on down, came to Smyrna to witness the introduction of the new industrial revolution, complete with uniforms and morning calisthenics, common cafeterias and parking lots, team organization and open communications...

...Their bosses are called "area managers" and "operations managers," and they pick up the tab for regular beer and pizza parties...

...Even Nissan advisers from Japan, where the intensity of work is legendary, are startled at the Smyrna work loads...

...A month later, Dixon was called into the supervisor's office and told that he was not doing his job...

...Dixon is suing Nissan for libel and slander...

...When the Smyrna plant opened, Nissan had a policy prohibiting workers from doing heavy physical labor for more than two hours before rotating to lighter tasks, Harding says...

...The union also must contend with the natural impulse of workers to deny they made a mistake...

...Support for the union and attendance at its monthly meetings have been increasing, but the organizers are taking a cautious "go-slow" approach...

...Repairman Dennis Boyd (not his real name) cites a recent management effort to have workers "restrict their intake of liquids" before the shift so they won't have to take breaks...

...I ran into one of them at the pharmacy the other day...

...Only seventeen doing the job...

...It is a system in which workers strangle themselves," says Shoji Kokichi, a sociologist from Tokyo University...

...They will tell me privately that they can't stand it, and then go back to work the next day and tell their supervisor, 'I love the challenge of this job.' You look at them with your mouth wide open...

...The operation even turned a small profit in 1986...

...And the barber near the railroad crossing at the center of town tells people he can spot Nissan workers even when they're not wearing their telltale blue uniforms: They're the ones who fall asleep in the chair when they're getting their hair cut...

...And some employees have even been known to report the injuries of workers in other groups...

...Favored employees are selected for inclusion in the studio audience, and that still has the capacity to thrill some employees...

...Tellingly, the morning calisthenics were dispensed with about fourteen months after production began...

...But there is still evidence of the Japanese influence...

...Nissan's Smyrna factory is the flagship of some 500 Japanese assembly and manufacturing plants in the United States today...

...They told him other workers had mastered it in just a week...

...You want to put your confidence in them, but then they'll turn you in...

...They'll wear us out and then hire new blood.' I think he may be right...

...A recent study by the Southern Labor Institute rated Tennessee the sixth worst in the United States on worker protection and fifth worst on overall "labor-climate...

...He owned an engine-repair shop in Union City, Tennessee, until 1983, when he moved 150 miles across the state to take a job at Nissan Motor Company's truck assembly plant in Smyrna...

...Harding is not hopeful for Smyrna: "Nissan will ruin more people and lives than the good it will do in Tennessee, and that's a hell of a thing to say...

...You don't have time to unwrap a piece of chewing gum and stick it in your mouth until the line stops," says one assembly worker...

...Bowman's job was to install heavy steering gears on the Nissan pickup...

...They make them feel guilty, y'know, like you're betraying your father if you take a sick day...

...Nissan took away the car he had leased from the company at a discount and escorted him out to the highway...

...Nissan wanted him back on the job the very next day...

...They are basically honest and loyal, and the company takes advantage of that...

...spite the intense production pressures...

...There were no grounds for it...

...But people are coming around to realize this is not the Utopia they promised it would be...

...He wrapped up a recent address by saying, "I'm sure everyone is enjoying their job...

...A recent company-wide attitude survey reflected a drop in satisfaction levels, compared to the previous survey, in virtually every area tested...

...The people in charge of the plants just reverted back to type, back to the only system they ever knew...

...What's more, Nissan President Marvin Runyon has a Reagan-like ability to stay above the fray and retain the trust of the work force...

...I had to jump in the car and lie flat on my back...

...The first 2,000 employees also seemed to equate their initiation into the Nissan "family" with entering a state of grace...

...The entire trim-and-chassis line reportedly burst into laughter...

...Nissan's "open-door" policy, which ostensibly allows any employee to bring a complaint to management without fear of retaliation, is a fraud, employees say...

...Last fall he quit...

...I kept asking, and I kept getting deeper and deeper in the hole," he recalls...

...He would drag their names through the mud during meetings with other managers, until I got him to stop...

...He looked like he was dead...

...Runyon has a charisma and netism that is unreal," Wood says...

...One day, he wrenched his back while lifting a gear and doubled over in pain...

...When Dixon pinched a nerve in his shoulder and was taken off the assembly line on doctor's orders, his supervisor ridiculed him in front of his co-workers...

...The open-door policy just lets them know if you're going to be a 'troublemaker,' " charges Juanita Brown, the pseudonym of a quality-assurance inspector at Nissan since 1984...

...The internal structure of the Nissan plant makes unionizing difficult...

...They think he is like God over there...

...But Runyon's charm has its limits...

...In a recent one-year period, 235 quit or were fired, including a significant number of top managers...

...That job alone has accounted for fifteen injuries in the past year, Harding says...

...Human-resource managers act as the 'Nissan will ruin more people and lives than the good it will do in Tennessee, and that's a hell of a thing to say,' a former Nissan supervisor warns...

...You just can't believe it...

...Managers would come by and ask him how long it was going to take for him to learn his job...

...If an employee falls behind in production or takes a sick day, the burden must be shouldered by others in the group...

...They say they have to quit or they'll be dead in a year...

...He was rushed by ambulance to a hospital in nearby Murfreesboro...

...It's h to keep my balance in my head when I am around him...

...I wish I had never seen the place...

...MacArthur recalls one human-resource manager who "went on a witch hunt to find out if two of my people were sympathetic to the union, strictly because they were in the habit of voicing their opinions...

...Eight-hour aerobics" is how one employee describes work on the production line...

...The state of Tennessee, hostile to worker rights and unions, presents problems to the UAW...

...Some of those who have not left have been subjected to harassment and transferred to the most demanding jobs in the plant...

...In this area, it was a prestigious thing to have a job at Nissan," says one former supervisor...

...What we've got there is management by intimidation...

...The only difference is that here the people on the line don't have a union...

...It was hurting worse and worse, but I kept trying...

...In addition, the smaller the group, the greater the peer pressure...

...Two of the workers have had shoulder operations...

...I actually saw a man wet his pants on the line,' one employee recalls...

...At grocery stores and on bank lines, clerks once responded with envy when a Nissan employee entered...

...Through some fishing buddies in management at Nissan, he was hired on at the plant in early 1985...

...Those who fail to show the proper esprit de corps are routinely told, "If you don't like it, here's the door...

...It broke down six months after we started production...

...I put my whole heart, soul, and body into that plant," Harding says...

...Because of his experience, Dixon was assigned to train other employees before production began...

...I was ashamed to tell people I was a manager at Nissan...

...You can't trust the person working next to you," says Steve Cobbs, the pseudonym of an assembly worker...

...enforcers of the system...

...I was busting butt, but I just couldn't do it," he says...

...he was put to work opening boxes, but he could only stand five minutes before the pain forced him to sit down...

...I'm God...

...People don't want to admit they were hogwashed," says Sara Wood, the pseudonym of an assembly worker...

...If Japanese management is more productive, it is not because workers are more loyal or committed...

...Eventually, Bowman was called up to the front office and fired for inadequate job performance...

...You'll be out of here before you know it," Bowman was warned by a foreman he used to fish with...

...His supervisor didn't flinch...

...Jerry Bowman grew up on a farm in Wartrace, about thirty-five miles south of Smyrna...

...Nissan stressed a system based on teamwork, cooperation, and trust...

...He said to me, 'I think they've got us on a four- or five-year cycle...

...They run all over people, and there's nothing to stop them...

...What are people going to do twenty years from now...

...The definition of the 'Nissan man' is one who is never late, never takes a day off, and never complains...

...Given the spreading disillusionment in the Smyrna work force, it is not surprising that the United Auto Workers union has begun to make inroads...

...Hired as a supervisor, Harding spent his first seven months at Nissan interviewing prospective employees for his department...

...People with problems are immediately cut out of their so-called family...

...Adds another, "You feel like you've done three days' work at the end of the shift...

...Consider this remark, from a Nissan worker I interviewed in Japan in 1982...

...I actually saw a man wet his pants on the line...

...When you first start, they tell you, 'If you ever have any problems, just come to us and we'll do everything in our power to clear them up, since all of you are now members of the Nissan family.' But when you do have a problem, it's like you're betraying them...

...The Nissan plant here is remarkably similar to its counterparts in Japan...

...Jim Turner, the UAW's Nashville-based regional organizer, has been developing contacts among Nissan workers since the plant began operating, and the union has recently added two full-time organizers...

...The abuses at Smyrna are not an aberration, nor are they a betrayal of the promise of the Japanese model...

...There are 80,000 people out there who want your job...

...The white-haired, folksy Runyon addresses the work force every three months on a closed-circuit television system that extends throughout the plant...

...Smyrna mayor Sam Ridley told reporters that looking down from the overpass at the shining white factory made him understand how Moses must have felt when he gazed down from the mountains on the Promised Land...

...Dixon requested a transfer, availing himself of Nissan's widely praised open-door policy of worker-management relations...

...The employees work with their hands over their head 80 per cent of the time, and the constant repetitive motion wears out their joints...

...They're all big wheels up there," he says of Nissan management...

...When the address was rebroadcast for the night shift, that line had been edited out...

...Dixon protested that there had been no complaints about his performance, and then, in anger, told the supervisor he would file suit for harassment...

...He said, 'Go for it,' Dixon recalls...

...You take the best employee, a hard worker with a good attitude, and say an elbow goes out from overwork...

...Innovative Japanese management had little to do with this success, however...

...They try to put you on a super guilt trip...

...The so-called 'new concept' doesn't exist," says MacArthur...