ANALYSIS OF THE PRODUCTION-TRAINING DEPARTMENT OF BLIND

PEOPLES ASSOCIATION, AHMEDABAD

Report submitted to
Prof. N. Ravichandran
And
Hemangini Soni
(Academic Associate)
In partial fulfilment of the requirements of the course
Operations Management-I
On
11h December 2014
By
Group-4, Section-D
Deori Adarsh Kumar
G. Sameera Sree Deepti
Som Sekhar Thatoi
Rahil Sheikh
Divekar Ganesh Bandu

INDIAN INSTITUTE OF MANAGEMENT AHMEDABAD

TABLE OF CONTENTS

1. OVERVIEW
Blind Peoples Association (BPA) is a professional organization, which serves to all
categories of people with disabilities. It serves its people by providing them with
education, employment opportunities, equal rights and a quality of life. The
organisational philosophy is that only by providing employment can these people be
given a meaningful status in the society. Acceptance of disabled persons at work can be
viewed as society's acceptance of these Persons without discrimination [1].
In line with its mission, BPA has an employment and placement service department
which not only provides a window to job opportunities but the organisation also
consistently works towards providing self employment opportunites to its people. In the
past five years, it has provided employment to around 1500 people in the public as well
as in the private sectors. Some of the organizations include banks, railways, hospitals and
restaurants and work profiles include telephone operators, computer programmers,
mobile repairers, liftman, etc.
To support self-employment BPA also provides Micro-Credit to its individuals. Around
900 individuals are currently earning a regular livelihood from its self-employment
programs. They have their own telephone booths, food stalls, beauty parlors, mobile
repairing shops, etc. BPA also runs a project called the "Swayamsiddha Pariyojana"
project where mainly blind women are empowered by giving them Micro Credit so that
they can be independent individuals.
2. ORGANIZATION
BPA was founded in 1954, when a group of people got together to start a recreation club
for the blind. Now the organization is a large multi-faceted agency providing many
services. BPA today is one of the largest organizations in Asia working with and for all
categories of disabilities. BPA has a functional organizational structure. [Exhibit 1] The
main functions of the organizations are Fundraising and Publications, Training,
Education and Braille Press. A director heads each function with several managers under
him. The organization performs several activities and has around 8 departments running
under it. [Exhibit 2].
3. PROJECT PROPOSAL
This study curtails to an in-depth analysis of two sub-departments under the production
and training department. The departments are the tailoring unit and the handicrafts
division. The tailoring unit currently employs the deaf-dumb whereas the handicrafts
division employs partially and fully blind employees.

TAILORING UNIT
Tailoring unit BPA consists of sixteen workers, one supervisor and one helper.
Some of them (around 12-13) are deaf and dumb. Most of the workers have
one year of work experience, while a few workers are working in this unit since
it started three years ago. There are 20 sewing machines in this unit out of
which 14-15 machines are utilized in a day. Floor plan of Tailoring unit is shown
in Exhibit 1A.
The main output of the unit is custom ordered clothes, which consists of
uniforms, salwar kameez, shirts etc. Apart from this the unit also produces 4
other types of products: Files, Jhola Bags, Ladies Hand Bags and Cloth bound
Notepads. It is difficult to forecast demand for these products as it is seasonal
and varies. Though the unit has some organisational buyers who place order on
a more or less regular basis. Hence this unit follows JIT(Just in time) method for
delivery. Usually only one product is produced at a time. But there are
occasions when two or more orders are received with high priority in which
workforce is divided to produce more than one product. Certain experienced
tailors are more skilled and thus take up more complex work e.g tailoring of
shirts etc whereas the others can be cross utilised. The workers are divided into
workstations accroding to the demand and thus each kind of product requires
reorganization of the workers. For example, for making a hand bag 4 workers
produce the accessories like the handles and 4 others work on the body and
later at the end, these are stiched together. The process flow diagram for two
different products in shown in Exhibit 4 and 5.
Different products require different skills. Only 3-4 special workers can make
files and notepad. Jhola bags and normal bags are the main products and
everyone is trained to produce them. Production of clothes is also specialised
where the main work is done by a few experienced tailors and the finishing and
cutting can be done by the rest of them.
Employees start working at 10:00 am and leaves at 4:00 pm. Official timing for
lunch is 2:00 pm to 2:30 pm but it generally extends up to 3:00 pm. Employees
take frequent leaves, hence average number of workers per day is 14. Also,
demand for products is very low and people work leisurely at their own speed.
Though BPA is not profit driven, for many employees this is the only source of
income. Employees are paid based on experience. Junior employees get salary
of Rs 1,000 per month while senior employees get salary of around 1,200 per
month. Employees who are not physically disabled are penalized for taking
unofficial leaves.
Numerical Analysis:
Exhibit 2 shows capacity of products and current production for them. It can be
seen that for most of the products capacity is underutilized. This unused
capacity can be utilized to make school uniforms for children in BPA. Currently

BPA School of blind people (Around 200 students) purchases uniform from
outside vendors using donation money.
Key Issues:
1. The demand is variable as well as less.
2. The unit is not profitable enough to buy its own material. Most material
inputs comes from BPA donations.
3. The variation in demand leads to frequent reorganisation of the process
flow, which in turn affects its efficiency.
Demand Improvement: The demand can be increased by undertaking the
production of school uniforms for children studying at BPA. Currently
uniforms are bought from outside.
Tie ups with online stores can be forged to expose more people to the
goods. At such low costs, their demand can be expected to be significant.
Also, this can give them the chance to earn a premium on the goods.
Other ways to improve the demand isnt in the scope of this project.
Efficiency Improvement:

Exhibit 1A Floor plan

Supervisor

Helper

Machine 2

Assembly line

Machine 1

Machine 8

Machine 9

Machine 15
Machine 16

Machine 3

Machine 10

Machine 4

Machine 11

Machine 5

Machine 12

Machine 6

Machine 13

Machine 7

Machine 14

Exhibit 2 Tailoring unit products

Product

Actual
capacity

Ideal
capacity

Clothes

Price Order
batch
size
200
20-30

0.5

Workforc
e
available
9

Files

100

50 - 100

Jhola
bag

10

100

10

20

16

Ladies
Hand
Bags

100

100

20

16

Notepad

25

100- 300

15

100

* Varies with variety and order size

Exhibit 3 Profit calculations

Product

Price

Demand
month

per Revenue

Clothes

200

30

6,000

Files

100

50

5,000

Jhola
bag

10

500

5,000

Normal
bag

50

50

2,500

Notepad

25

300

7,500

Total

Income Statement per month

Revenue
Wages
Electricity
Material

26,000

26,000
20,4001
3,000
2,0002

Depreciation

8003

Net Income

-200

14 junior workers at Rs 1000, 2 senior workers at 1,200, supervisor and

helper at 2,000
2

Most of the material is donated, hence material cost is low.

There are 16 machines with average cost Rs 3,000. Assuming 5 years useful
life, depreciation per month will be 16 * 3000 / 60 = 800

Extra contribution by selling uniforms (per month) = Students * Uniform

Contribution / 12
= 200 * 300 / 12
= 5,000
Efficiency calculations using actual capacity
Assuming 5 hour per day per worker and 20 days in month
Total hours available = 16 * 5 * 20 = 1,600
Current
demand
month
30

Actual
Per capacity
day

50
500
50
300

Hours required per Total hours

per unit
1

10.00

300.00

2.50

125.00

10

0.50

250.00

1.25

62.50

15

0.33

100.00

Total
Actual efficiency = 837.5 / 1600 = 52.34%

837.50

Efficiency calculations using ideal capacity

Current
demand
30

Ideal
capacity
1

Ideal
hours Total hours
required per unit
5.00
150.00

50

1.00

50.00

500

20

0.25

125.00

50

20

0.25

12.50

300

100

0.05

15.00

Total

352.50

Actual efficiency = 352.5 / 1600 = 22.03%

Handicrafts Unit
The handicrafts unit of BPA employs blind/partially blind women who produce
varied kinds of handicrafts. The unit has a workforce of 19 women, out of which
17 are regular workers, a secretary and a president. The organizational struture
can be seen in Exhibit 5. The work floor is organized into 5 workstations where
similar kind of work is performed by all the workers. The floor plan can be seen
in Exhibit 5A.
The products made here vary from time to time and are mostly dependent on
the festivals in that particular season or demands they receive. The products
made include chocolates, rakhis, friendship bands, Diwali diyas or dandiya
sticks. Their duties also include preparing breakfast for the entire community
working in the association.
Production is mostly pull-driven, and the choice of products to be manufactured
rests solely on the supervisor. The supervisor is assisted by a normal person.
<Pls sugest an alternative for this line>Apart from the supervisor, the
workforce consists of 17 other people. There are 4 worktables in the room, and
each table is assigned to 4-5 people. Most of them are completely blind, while
there are 3 workers who are partially visual- impaired. Some of the activities,
like pouring hot wax in Diwali diyas may prove to be hazardous, hence they are
taken care solely by the partially blind people.
The demand for the products is low, and hence importance is not given to cycle
time or capacity in particular. Capital for raw materials is usually obtained from
the revenues they earn or the donations received by the visitors who visit
occasionally. Due to the law demand, another department involved in
manufacturing blankets had to be shut down as they were not able to get
enough money to buy the special kind of raw material required for making
blankets. The future of other departments also looks bleak, keeping in mind the
dwindling demand and reduced capital inflows.
In a shift of 4 hours, a blind worker is able to produce 100 wicks, a considerably
low quantity. There is scope for improvement of capacity, especially for single
workstation processes like making wicks and friendship bands. In production
lines involving more workstations, the lower number of partially blind people
can prove to be a bottleneck <Can we have a few numbers?> as a few
activities are completely reliant on them.
Workers are employed not with the motive of earning profits but to keep them
involved and receive whatever remuneration they are able to earn. The people
working in this section are fairly educated, with most of them matriculates, and
a few having senior secondary and graduate education also. With such a
workforce, it is also possible to get demands for a few activities, which involve
a higher amount of mental application, which will be valued higher than the

current skill. The range of products manufactured can also be extended, and
more orders can be sought once the capacity constraints are taken care of.

Exhibit 5A:

Supervisor

Helper

Machine 2

Assembly line

Machine 1

Machine 8

Machine 9

Machine 15
Machine 16

Machine 3

Machine 10

Machine 4

Machine 11

Machine 5

Machine 12

Machine 6

Machine 13

Machine 7

Machine 14

Exhibit 1: BPA: Production Training Unit

Exhibit 2. BPA ORGANIZATIONAL STRUCTURE

General
(350)
Policy,
Annual
Policy, Budget,
Budget, Annual
Report
Report

Executicve
Committee
(35) body ,,
Administrative
Administrative body
Execution
policies,
Execution of
of policies,

Board of
directors
Day to day

Day to day
monitoring
monitoring ,,
purchase
,
Investment
purchase , Investment

Executive
Directors
C.E.O
Investment //
C.E.O // Investment
Purchse // Appointment
Purchse
Appointment

Project
Director
All Projects,
Projects, fund
fund
All
raising
raising

10 Managers
Includes Staff
Includes
Staff and
and
health workers
workers
health

Director
Training
Workshop,
Workshop, Production
Production
Store
Store

7 Officers
Includes
Includes store
store
assistant ,, supervisors
assistant
supervisors

Director
Education
Vacant
4 Principal
Includes
and
Includes Techers
Techers and
staff
staff

Manager
Braille Press
Braille,
Braille, Press,
Press, Blind
Blind
women
women

Teachers and
Staff

Exhibit 3. BPA Departments

BPA Activities and

Departm ents

Education
Training

Rehabilitation
& Intervention
Production
Training
Employment
and placement
service
Health
Support
Services
Professional
Training

Tailoring
Handicraft
Offset Printing
Assistive
Devices

Exhibit 4: Tailoring unit organizational Sturcture

Supervis
or
Helper
Head
Tailor

Tailors(13)

Exhibit 4. Tailoring unit: Process Flow Diagram

for Handbags
Handles and
Work
station
1

Work
station

Inventory

Materia
ls

Superviso
r
(Order
Processin

Order
Placed

Work
station
3

Work
statio
n4

Main Body

Stitching
together

Finished
Product

Exhibit 5. Tailoring unit: Process Flow Diagram

for bulk order clothes

Materia
ls

Superviso
r
(Order
Processin

Work
station
1

Inv
ent

Work
station
3

Inv
ent

Work
station
3

Inv
ent

Work
station
(Stitchi

Work
statio
n4
Work
statio
n4

Inv
ent

Inv
ent

Inv
ent

Work
station
(Embroide

Finished
Product

Work
station
1

Finished
Product

Work
station
1

Finished
Product

Order
Placed

Exhibit 6 Handicraft Organizational structure

Presiden
t
Secretar
y
Helper
(1)
Exhibit 5: Tailoring Unit

Workers(17
)

1. REFERENCES
[1]: http://www.bpaindia.org/aboutus.php Blind Peoples Association Website