The Organisation of a clothing factory

From designing a garment incorporating the latest trends to its complete production and the many stages involved in-between, Dr. Punam Rani explains the specific processes in detail as well as managing a clothing factory.

Introduction:

In every clothing factory, the first stage is fashion forecasting and sketching ideas in the design development process. The next stage is the development of the sample garment, which involves collection planning, pattern making, grading and production of sample garment and costing of garment based on the working sketches. The line or the products are then appraised for production the patterns adopted for the production requirement. For handling these tasks there are specific departments in a clothing factory.

Principle of management

Management, according to one of the most common definitions, is "the accomplishment of desired objectives establishing an environment favourable to performance by people operating in organised groups."

According to Henry Fayol there are 14 principles of management which are:

1. Division of Work: allows for job specialisation. Work should be divided among individuals and groups.

2. Authority and Responsibility: Right to give orders. Responsibility involves being answerable by whoever assumes authority assumes responsibility.

3. Discipline: Common efforts of workers.

4. Unity of Command: Employees should have only one boss.

5. Unity of Direction: A single plan of action to guide the organisation.

6. Subordination: Of individual interests to general interests of organisation.

7. Remuneration: An equitable, uniform payment system that motivates and contributes to success.

8. Centralisation: Degree to which authority rests at the top of the organisation.

9. Scalar Chain: Chain-like authority scale.

10. Order: Arrangement of employees where they will be of the most value to the organisation.

11. Equity: Justice and fair dealing

12. Stability: of tenure of personnel

13. Initiative

14. Esprit de corps: Harmony, general good feeling among employees

The management function is essential for all organised activity and at all levels of the organisation from the managing director down to a supervisor responsible for a small section within the factory. While the managing director has full executive control and authority for conducting the affairs of the company, the supervisor has the similar powers on a far smaller scale.

In order to achieve the specified objectives of the company, management has to perform five basic functions to coordinate group activity:

Inspection of garment

-          Packing: - before entering the finished goods warehouse, garments are boxed or bagged.

Packaging of the garments

•         Service function- while the service function mainly assists the production department, they also extend their services to other departments within the organisation. The main service departments are production engineering (project planning and development), recruitment of staff and training, machinery and equipment maintenance (maintenance of building, air conditioning, power supplies) and technical stores (holds the entire item required for repairs and maintenance).

•         Control function- These cover control services (such as quality control) which provide production management with regular and up-to-date information on the overall and detailed performance of the factory. It enables those responsible for production to anticipate and correct deviation from plans. The main control functions are production planning and control, budgetary control and quality control.

3.6 Operations Department

Operations department is one of the names given to the department that has the overall responsibility for planning, controlling and coordinating all activities concerned with the logistics of raw material supply and the production of garments.

The functions of operations department are as follows:-

•         Pre-production planning and control:-

Another function of the operations department is the pre-production planning and control, which plans and controls all the activities leading up to the actual production or garments. In effect, it is pre-production planning and control which organises and manages the route from the customer to the cutting room. The overall objective is to ensure that the logistics of supply and production are planned in such a manner that:

•         The sales programme is achieved on time

•         Labour, machinery and other sources are utilised to the best

•         The pre-production phase for an order is ended when the production order, graded patterns and all the raw material are issued to the factory.

•         Production planning and control (PP & C):-

-          Cutting room: - Here all the processes required to trim piece goods into cut garments are performed.

-          Sewing room: - Apart from actual sewing this include operations such as fusing, under-pressing, and in-process inspection. Sometimes the sewing room use outside contractors for operations which the factory is not equipped to carry out, such as pleating, embroidery and quilting.

-          Pressing room: - This department gives the garment its final finish by a process called top-pressing.

-          Final inspection:- Although this is not strictly a production function, it is tied in with production because the inspection department gives the 'go' or 'no-go' for every garment produced.

The most important function of the operations department is the production planning and control because without it, the department is like a bus driving along the road without a fixed route, destination or timetable. Production planning includes marker planning (manual or computerised technique) and cut planning and cutting room production planning.

As soon as the production plans are issued, the operations department begins the control procedure necessary to maintain up-to-date picture of the progress of each production order. Generally, the department requires information on the three stages of production- a) When the cutting of a production order has to be started; b) When a production order has to start being issued to the sewing room; c) the styles and qualities of the finished garments which have entered the warehouse. The department would receive information from the sections concerned on a daily or more frequent basis. Where system such as CIM (computerised integrated manufacturing) is employed, then the information is available in real time (relating to computer system that updates information at the same rate as they received data).

For the operations department, the principle of their global control system is two questions:

•         Have the garments been started and finished on time?

•         What goes in between is the responsibility of production management.

Conclusion:

The principles of management are the same for every clothing factory and the only difference is that of scale. While the basic purpose of factories may vary, all of them rely on the effectiveness of management in all the attainment of their objectives.

i. Forecasting and planning

Planning means looking ahead or to foresee, to assess the future and make provisions for it. Planning also means to decide in advance how to allocate available potential resources to fulfil set objectives. These resources can be classified in the following groups:-

What?

This concerns the materials required from the cloth, linings and trimmings to other ancillary material needed to produce garments such as chalk, marker paper, pins etc.

Where?

This the resource of space for storage of raw material or production areas of the warehousing of the finished goods.

Who?

Includes planning human resources, not just the production operator, but also manpower for managerial, supervisory roles and service within the factory.

How?

The question here is, how will the work be performed? The answer is in evaluating methods, capability of existing machinery or whether conditional machinery required. This planning element takes into account every section within the factory and not just the sewing room.

When?

This is the axis of all planning and time scale dictates which activity has to be performed and when it should be completed. It also includes the what, where, who and how elements to be coordinated, to ensure that they are available when required. This is the most important of all planning functions. The coordinated planning of these five elements bridges the gap from where we are to and where we need to go.

ii. Organisation

An organisation is not an end in itself but rather a means to achieve the required results. There has to be a structure which makes it possible to attain the planned objectives. Wherever the responsibility of management is vested in more than one person, there must be a pattern of relationship between the various management responsibilities. This involves delegation of work into or major responsibilities into specialist areas. This division creates the organisation structure. The main objective of an organisation chart is to define the management relationships within the company.

iii. Staffing

This function is basically concerned with people and training and its short and long term objectives or to provide the organisation with right types and quantities of managerial and non managerial staff as an when they are needed. It involves the following factors:-

a.      Recruitment: Sources could be school or job centres in universities.

b.      Selection: No magic formula to ensure the person taken is right but there are some physical psychometric psychological tests if interpreted by an expert could get the company right staff.

c.       Training: Systematic selection helps in obtaining the best labour but this effort is wasted if employees are not given the right training. This applies to all levels because even a new manager requires some degree of training by his supervisors.

iv. Direction: The function of direction is concerned with getting employees to accomplish their set tasks effectively. Just planning, organising and staffing will not work, like starting an engine of a car will not make it move. It is the function of direction which breathes life into planning and organisation. The behaviour of a group largely depends on the type of manager it has and good managers will always provide subordinates with the information necessary for intelligent action. Obviously, the more an individual knows about his or her own work and environment, the more intelligently they can work.

v. Controlling: The managerial function of control is the measurement and correction of performance in order to ensure that the company's objectives are accomplished as plan. The function involved three steps:-

•         Establishment of standards: Standards are criteria against which actual results can be measured. They can be physical and represent quantities of products or materials, or they can be stated in monetary terms, such as costs and income. All these standards are used as the basis for the second step.

•         Measurement of performance: This involves the comparison of actual results with those planned.

•         Correction of deviations: When organised planning and control procedures are operated, it is relatively easy to expose deviations and to apply corrective measures. Feedback is central to the correction of deviation; this informational input provides the basis for all operational decision regarding the non-achievement of the plans.

3. Various sections of garment industry

3.1 Design Department

The design department can be considered as the research and development department of a clothing factory, because it is in this department that the prototypes of garments are developed and prepared for selling and production. For most factories the process of product development involves seven stages:

i.        Forecasting: This stage commences with the evaluation and interpretation of the market's future needs in terms of fashion and price. Apart from intuition and common sense, these forecasts are based on the accumulated knowledge, expertise and experience of the company to make a fairly accurate prediction of the types of garments customers will buy and the prices they will be willing to pay.

ii.      Designing: In garment manufacturing, the first step is designing the sketch for the dresses that have to be prepared. For this purpose the designer first draws several rough sketches in the sketch book. The designer does not go for details at this moment but rather lets creativity flow on the paper. There may be many sketches. Later, these sketches are analysed by a panel of designers. They finally select a few of them. These sketches are rendered in detail separately or in the form of a single collection. The designer also draws working drawings along with the sketch. Working drawings are flat drawing of the sketch and it helps pattern maker understand the patterns involved in the construction.

iii.    Collection Planning: This process is actually the pre-production phase of sampling, and the objectives are to set out in detail the styles, fabrics and colours which will represent the company's proposals for the forthcoming season. The designer works in close cooperation with the marketing department and together they attempt to determine the best possible style, fabric and price combinations for company's customer.

After approval of the design, finalised plan becomes operative and the actual production of samples begins.

iv.    Pattern making: This function connects design to production by producing paper templates for all the components, such as cloth, lining and fusible, which have to be cut for a garment. Industrial pattern making has two basic stages, the block pattern and the garment pattern.

3.4 Purchasing Department:

The primary objective of the purchasing department is to obtain the right materials, in the right quantity, at the right time and price. Since purchased materials are the largest components in the cost of a garment, purchasing is an extremely important and specialist function within a clothing company.

The main functions of the purchasing department are:-

✔      Information: - The purchasing office is the company's 'window on the world' and provides information to all concerned regarding new products, materials and services.

✔      Suppliers: - Purchasing department ensures that the supplier is stable and reliable. This is particularly important where a new supplier does not have a known track record.

✔      Prices: - While the price, quality and quantity of materials are usually specified by the operations department, the purchase must be made at the most advantageous terms for the company. Other terms and conditions such as freight costs, insurance, discounts and credit terms are also negotiates before the order is placed.

✔      Progressing: - This is concerned with ensuring that the ordered materials arrive at the correct time, without any hold-up caused by the late or non-delivery of raw material. This system employed to progress orders can be manual or computerises, and is basically a diary detailing the orders placed and their confirmed delivery date.

✔      Verification: - In a well managed business, a standard procedure is to check that prices, quantities, colour, etc. Of delivered materials agree with the particulars specified in purchase order. The storekeeper checks quantities and the materials are then specified by quantity assurance personnel. If everything is found to be in order, the purchasing department approves the supplier's invoice for payment on the due date.

✔      Speculative buying: - When market conditions are particularly favourable, the purchasing department may recommend ordering materials such as fusible, linings and sewing threads which are not required for immediate use but there are chances that later on these materials would become difficult to obtain, or there will be a sharp increase in their price.

✔      Storekeeping: - The storekeeping staff is basically responsible for the receiving, storage and issuing of materials.

•         Receives goods inward and checks them according to procedure specified by the purchasing department.

•         Stores the goods so that no deterioration or damage occurs through, say, exposure to sunlight or crushing.