Northwest Case Study Essay

Words: 1466
Pages: 6

Synopsis:
Northwest Canadian Forest Products Limited is a company that owns and operates five saw mills in British Columbia and Alberta, Canada. They produce lumber for construction in a few different countries. The President of the company is dealing with a tough situation with one of her mills in Jackson, British Columbia. The mill in Jackson is her least productive mill and she soon has to make a decision that could cost the company a substantial amount of money. She has the choice of either investing 50 million in the weak Jackson mill or to invest more that 50 million in a new mill high demand area. The president has been informed of the many complaints from the managers and supervisors, but nothing seems to be the right solution.
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Before the 50 million dollars can be invested the situation needs to be handled. The president needs to make sure that her employees know safety is important to her. Some labors never felt safe and they thought the only goal was to make money. When safety checks are conducted then employees can be properly trained to do their intended job. If time is spent now to reinforce their skills with production money will be saved because there will be less down time.
The company has been losing money for years now, so doing the correct procedures now will benefit them. The employees overall need to have a safe, friendly working environment or the saw mill will go back to how it originally operated. Each set of workers needs to be assigned a supervisor, then that supervisor reports to the manager. The general manger has the ultimate authority when it comes to decisions in the plant. The president puts full trust in the GM to run the day to day operations in this company.
The 50 million dollars invested should not just go straight towards equipment. Some of that needs to be budgeted for employee training, safety upgrades, management seminars, productivity seminars, and employee surveys. Each one of these upgrades will contribute to the relations problem stated by the president. These problems will not just vanish; many companies elect these options as a form of improvement. If each of these options can be taken into account the company will have a better