Re:2014 Gates Annual Letter: Myths that block progress for t...
by mikeash on Tuesday January 21, 2014 @03:24PM
(#7098066)
There's a classic (and probably apocryphal) story about this, from the time when Japan was just starting to turn things around. I can't locate it (even though I'm sure it's out there) so I'll paraphrase and retype:
Back in the dark ages, when computers filled rooms and devoured power, IBM decided to take a risk and try outsourcing some electronics manufacturing to Japan to see how it would go. They put out bids with full specs and also specified a 3% defect rate, which was considered aggressively low at the time.
They found a willing Japanese supplier and manufacturing began. Some months later, the parts arrived in big crates. The IBM people cracked open the first one to find their parts inside, but some of them were off to the side in a separate compartment. A note was attached. "Dear sirs: our cultural differences make it so that we have difficulty understanding some of your requests, but we have done our best to do what you have asked. Here are the 3% defective parts as you requested, packaged separately for your convenience."
Back in the dark ages, when computers filled rooms and devoured power, IBM decided to take a risk and try outsourcing some electronics manufacturing to Japan to see how it would go. They put out bids with full specs and also specified a 3% defect rate, which was considered aggressively low at the time.
They found a willing Japanese supplier and manufacturing began. Some months later, the parts arrived in big crates. The IBM people cracked open the first one to find their parts inside, but some of them were off to the side in a separate compartment. A note was attached. "Dear sirs: our cultural differences make it so that we have difficulty understanding some of your requests, but we have done our best to do what you have asked. Here are the 3% defective parts as you requested, packaged separately for your convenience."