The validity of the management strategy on expert skills in small and medium-sized manufacturing enterprises

Small and medium-sized manufacturing enterprises have played an important role in developing Japan's manufacturing industry. However, Japanese small and medium-sized manufacturing enterprises are currently faced with various difficulties in their business environment and are seeking ways to resolve the deadlock. In response, Mitsubishi Research Institute, Inc. has proposed a new methodology called "the management strategy on expert skills," which regards expert skills as important management resources that bring benefits to each company in terms of not only production but also sales. This paper aims to verify the validity of "the management strategy on expert skills" in small and medium-sized manufacturing enterprises through an analysis of the results of our questionnaire survey of these enterprises. The composition of the factors extracted using factor analysis is consistent with the theoretical procedure of"the managemeRt strategy on expert skills," which was proposed previously. Moreover, the comparative analysis between companies whose sales are increasing and those whose sales are decreasing shows the validity of "the management strategy on expert skills"and clarifies important management actions such as"the appeal of skills accumulated in the company,""recognition of training and effective use of the skills as a management issue"and"intensive investment in core skills.".